Steve Coppell

[TonyD]

Well, if it deserves a headline in The Irish Times, and the likes of Howard Kendall can get a thread to himself, then this man certainly does too.

Coppell back in frame for Irish job
Paul O'Hehir
Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Former Everton manager Howard Kendall is interested in the Republic of Ireland job and if appointed would bring Peter Beardsley in as his assistant. However, he is not viewed as a serious contender, unlike Reading boss Steve Coppell who is now back in the frame.


© 2007 ireland.com

Peter Beardsley I mean seriously. A great player, but....

[Wolfie]

I think most would be happy if Coppell got the job - particularly considering some of the supposed alternatives that are reportedly in the frame.

Many of the supposed alternatives are into their 60's with their best days behind them - if they ever had any in the first place. The amount of has-beens and never were's emerging from the undergrowth is staggering.

As mentioned previously, Coppell is still relatively young but has 23 years of managerial experience, usually with limited resources and has had some successes during that period.

He is respected within the game and I'd imagine would have a network / working relationship established within the leagues where all of our players are currently situated.

A minor point but I mention this in relation to how a good working relationship and line of communication between an international manager and the club managers where the players are based doesn't do any harm.

The only minor concern I'd have would be in relation to his current hunger to succeed. The quotes attributed to him suggest a man who needs to take a complete break and recharge the batteries. International management is obviously less of a day to day role but attitude is an important factor.

[tetsujin1979]

Coppell to stay at the Madejski: http://www.football365.com/story/0,1...949228,00.html

"I find that I did an article and we were just chatting towards the end and that's where 'I will take a break soon' came out," Coppell told Sky Sports News"I was referring to the future not a specific time in future"

[Wolfie]

Coppell to stay at the Madejski: http://www.football365.com/story/0,1...949228,00.html

Once again, fortune vomits on our hopes

[Jerry The Saint]

Coppell to stay at the Madejski: http://www.football365.com/story/0,1...949228,00.html

"I find that I did an article and we were just chatting towards the end and that's where 'I will take a break soon' came out," Coppell told Sky Sports News"I was referring to the future not a specific time in future"

He was talking about going for a cuppa

[Drumcondra 69er]

He was talking about going for a cuppa

Nah mate. It was a kit kat!

[irishfan86]

The best part was when he was asked about becoming manager of England, and he said, they keep putting an "O" on the end of my name in the papers!!!

[pateen]

Peter Beardsley I mean seriously. A great player, but....

Ugly as a bug of hammers

[Stuttgart88]

In fairness, we owe something back to Beardsley for all those shots he put over the bar in Stuttgart.

[Stuttgart88]

Capable Coppell a worthy candidate
Andrew Fifield

On Soccer: English football is always in danger of collapsing under the weight of its own self-importance, but last week it may well have reached critical mass.

As if the frenzy surrounding the appointment of "Fab" Fabio wasn't enough, we then had to endure Sky's insufferable smugness as they promoted "Grand Slam Sunday" with all the hysterical gusto of a heavyweight boxing promoter. All Richard Keys needed was a Mr Whippy haircut and some chunky jewellery and he could have passed for Don King.

There is a very obvious irony to all this - namely that one of the reasons England need Capello's services is because their so-called golden generation proved nothing more than an over-hyped media artifice - although don't expect anyone to notice. Self-awareness is not exactly an English strong point.

At times like this, give thanks for men like Steve Coppell. There is no more effective antidote to the Premier League's pomposity than Reading's manager, whose tone rarely rises above the laconic. What's more, he speaks with the good sense fostered by one of the most successful, and underrated, careers in management.

If the FA had shown a shred of imagination, it might have been Coppello, rather than Capello, beginning his reign as England head coach this week. But England's loss might yet be another's gain: there is still a job going in Abbotstown, where the FAI are continuing to deliberate over a replacement for Steve Staunton.

After the chaos that accompanied Staunton's ill-fated tenure, Ireland need a steady hand and a level head and Coppell has both. He long since realised that football at the coal-face is no place for dreamers: when he embarked on his career at Crystal Palace in the mid-1980s, he harboured hopes of making his bunch of journeymen play football the Manchester United way. A five-goal drubbing by rough and ready Wimbledon soon exploded that fantasy and Coppell soon saw the light.

"They gave us the ultimate lesson," he recalled. "If you can't innovate, imitate: we became more direct."

Palace duly became an even more spiky version of their south London neighbours and Coppell was rewarded with an FA Cup final appearance, third place in the old First Division and a clutch of England international players.

Football has changed since then, of course. You only need to stand next to one of Arsenal's beefcakes to understand that the best teams are now able to marry muscle and guile, but Coppell - a graduate in economics history - is intelligent enough to adapt his own managerial methodology to the demands of the modern game.

Reading would never be classed as great entertainers but neither are they cloggers. They have speed, skill and subtlety up front but still possess the sort of ball-winners who make opposing strikers go weak at the knees. It is a simple formula that has turned a grey blur of a football club into a Premier League force.

Coppell's penchant for transformation - he achieved similarly miraculous results at Brentford and Brighton - should make the FAI even more determined to lure him across the water. Shay Given and Robbie Keane may be 24-carat professionals, but the rest of the squad is made from base metals and only a master-alchemist like Coppell can hope to achieve results with such resources.

There is also every indication that he would be open to offers. Coppell has already spoken of being weary of club management and suggested he could take a sabbatical from football when his Reading contract expires in 2009.

Ireland would not be strange soil to the Reading supremo. When Coppell joked last season that he only made Irish scouting trips for the Guinness, nobody was fooled. He has long plundered the country for its footballing resources, first with Palace and then with Reading.

His academy director Eamonn Dolan alerted him to the availability of Kevin Doyle, who was signed along with Shane Long, and only last year he raided Cork again for Alan Bennett.

The one doubt which still shrouds Coppell is his willingness to deal with the froth and nonsense that accompany the position of a national coach. All his best work has been at clubs who drift beneath the media's radar and his critics are never slow in pointing out that he lasted just 33 days at Manchester City.

But to dwell on these concerns would be desperately unfair. It is true that Coppell dislikes the peripheral irritations of management - the press briefings and being hassled by agents - but his passion for football is undimmed and, despite his public utterances at the time, it was not pressure that drove him out of City.

Coppell remains an outsider. In job hunts, it is often those who shout loudest who laugh longest and Coppell's steadfast refusal to inflate his public profile could count against him. But wouldn't it be refreshing for the Quiet Man to get his chance on the international stage?

© 2007 The Irish Times

[livehead1]

Would love it to happen, maybe if his contract was due to expire in 2008 it would be more possible. However, whenever asked he has said "no", normally in these circumstances a reply would have been "i haven't been contacted" or "i have a job to do here"

[osarusan]

If the FA had shown a shred of imagination, it might have been Coppello, rather than Capello, beginning his reign as England head coach this week. But England's loss might yet be another's gain: there is still a job going in Abbotstown, where the FAI are continuing to deliberate over a replacement for Steve Staunton.

That's a bit of an exaggeration I'd say.

No doubt Coppell is a quality manager, but to say hiring Capello ahead of him is a mistake goes a bit too far.

That said, I hope England's decision is Ireland's gain, as I'd be very happy with Coppell as Irish manager.

[citizenerased]

please let coppell get the job...

[DmanDmythDledge]

Interview with Coppell a few weeks ago from Dail Telegraph- very good read.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/mai.../sfnwin101.xml

Most of the flaws that he points out regarding the structure of English football can also be said for football in this country so I doubt he would be interested in managing us.

[NeilMcD]

I dont buy into the whole just cause you played or worked with somebody you are going to favour them, i.e. Howe and Venables etc but I think Houghton was at Palace when Coppell was there.

[tricky_colour]

Interviewed recently on Sky after Reading were tonked by Arsenal, Steve Coppell was asked to what he attributed the defeat.

Thinking for a second or two (as he does), he said "...Arsenal were better than us"

We could do with an honest manager, for a change

Ha ha I bet that stumped the interviewer
Must have been the last answer he was expecting.
I'd love him to take the job but I don't think he would be interested whilst Reading is in the Premiership. It would be a double edged sword in a way if he took the job when you look as the number of Irish players who have flourished at under him at Reading.