Blogwatch.
I've managed to catch up one or two of the blogs that I regularly read today and in doing so I came across an interesting piece about Kevin Keegan.
It was on former footballer Andy Hunt's blog, and is part of a series that he is doing entitled 'How to become a professional footballer' covering all the way from his first pro-contract to his unfortunate and premature retirement.
What I found particularly interesting about this latest instalment was that it covered his time at Newcastle United and his (non)relationship with Keegan. He had signed for them prior to Keegan's arrival, and had performed fairly well the during that time. However, for whatever reason it became clear that Keegan simply didn't 'fancy' him as a player and effectively jettisoned Hunt from the team and shunned him in the process until Hunt's former 'Toon manager Ossie Ardiles rescued him and took him to West Brom.
Whilst Hunt admits his admiration for what Keegan achieved at Newcastle, the piece is an interesting insight into how Keegan operates and confirms the theory that with Keegan that it is 'my way or the highway'. Of course this was true during his days with City as well in that players he didn't fancy when he took over were frozen out or sold off (Whitley and Wiekens) and those that challenged him were also discarded (Jensen and Berkovic).
It's definitely an interesting piece (and series) and well worth taking a look. Also interesting to see that Hunt has most definitely not taken the usual career path of an ex-pro either.
2 comments:
This seems to be the case with far too many managers.
For those of us in normal jobs, we are inundated with training and development about good managers listening to and respecting their team, though still leading and making decisions when needed.
Football is back in the dark ages though. Players often can't speak to their 'manager', he doesn't always attend or lead training, and the player has little recourse if the manager decides you are surplus.
Then again, they get paid up to £100k a week so I'm sure they'll cope.
We've just returned from a trip to Germany and whilst there we went and did the museum and tour at the AOL Arena, home to Hamburg football club. He is very much a legend there, with loads of KK stuff in the museum. It was really nice to see.
(Yes, I realise I am going off at a tangent,sorry)
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