Premier Passions

With Steve Bruce out of the Sunderland job it looks like we have seen the last of the old school generation of football managers that retired from playing in the early nineties, went into management and failed to move with the times.
For example Sunderland gave Bruce an iPad to do tactics and statistics on, but he claimed that he didn’t do much tactics. Also he said like a badge of honour that he has email but doesn’t know how to log on.
I can’t see Bruce getting another job at a Premier League club, no more than say Brian Robson, Terry Butcher or Peter Reid.

If you don’t know who Peter Reid is, well when Diego Maradona scored that great solo goal against England in the 1986 world cup, Reid is the first player who chases after him and finally gives up as Maradona reaches the penalty area.
He was actually a very decent player in his day but his stock as a manager has gone. I’m singling him out because I’ve just watched an episode of Premier Passions on Google video. It’s a five part documentary series that follows Sunderland in the 1996-1997 season when Peter Reid was the manager. With access to the dressing room you get to see pre match and half time team talks which basically consists of “Don’t fucking hesitate out there, get fucking right in their fucking faces and don’t fucking let them fucking settle. Lets fucking get them fucking tackles in.”

I’m not exaggerating at all when I say that even the manager of my school football team gave us a more insightful team talk. And a whole lot less unnecessary swearing.