Not So Clever Trevor

Cripes, lummee and yer what?

Sir Trevor Brooking, an otherwise splendid fellow and accomplished footballer, who is now the Director of Development at the Football Association (amongst other things,) said yesterday that the FA may re-appoint Steve McLaren to the job of England manager after Fabio Capello retires. Ahem. Sir Trevor should have kept this thought to himself, I fear. All followers of the England team will be spending sleepless nights over the next two years in trepidation that this may come about.

Whilst it is understandable that the FA should want to find an English manager, besides Sir Trevor there's probably only Mr McLaren's mum thinks it should be him. I suspect Our Trev is just being an old softy because he was involved in giving Mr McLaren the job first time round after the debacle following Sven's dismissal. You will recall that the FA couldn't get any top-flight managers to take it on and McLaren was about fifth choice. Meanwhile Sven's contract meant that the FA had to continue paying him for two years afterwards, whilst Mr McLaren fumbled England's qualification for Euro 2008 - another reason why Sir Trevor should keep a low profile in the matter of choice of manager!

I need not go into the reasons why Mr McLaren should not have the job. One may as well ask why we don't re-appoint Norman Lamont as Chancellor; or Coco the Clown.