Sir Bobby –a tribute
Football players are loved by their fans and followers but managers are quite often, not. But, there are some exceptions and Sir Bobby will come into that category. He was more loved as a manager than as an international football player. Of course, he played for England for not less than 20 times but his biggest contribution was taking the English team to the quarter finals of the World cup in Mexico in 1986 and upgrading them to the Semi Final in the next edition in Italy in 1990. After 1966, this was the biggest height which English football team managed.
He was well known for his parallel love affair, first with football as a profession and next with the club New Castle, where he use to watch football matches from the terrace along with his father and brother. Later, he materialised his dream of becoming part of Newcastle United by managing the team from 1999 to 2004. He took the reins of Newcastle United from the flamboyant management style of Rudd Gullit, where the club was positioned close to relegation, and made them as title contenders in another couple of years.
I consider him as the most courageous English manager of my generation. His decision to move out of England made him different from others. He took responsibility of four football clubs in three different countries. This is very rare in English football. Now, the great football nation who is having the strongest football league is struggling to find a successful English manager and so far appointed two foreign managers for their national team. Outside England, Robson successfully managed Dutch club PSV Eindhoven, Portuguese clubs Sporting Lisbon and Porto, and Spanish giants Barcelona. Interestingly, the present premier league is dominated by non-English managers.
May be the greatest achievement and the most heartbreaking event in his life could be the same one. Facing full flowing Maradona in the quarter finals is a remarkable achievement but losing to his team through a cheated goal by the same legend was too much for anyone and not different to Robson. After the game, the goal which Maradona made with his hand known as ‘hand of God’ but after the match, unimpressed Robson put it as ‘hand of a rascal’. He ever questioned the genius of Maradona but never pardoned him for his hand of god achievement.
When English clubs are going for “Galactic signings” to strengthen the teams, they should stop a moment and think how Sir Bobby shaped a squad without spending much money and took them to the first four positions. He inherited an Alan Shearer in Newcastle United but also a club scooping down to the relegation table. First, he steadied the ship then sailed it out of rough weather and took gained the position of title challengers for nearly four years. He never signed any big stars, spent money on talented young players and built a strong squad which challenged the domination of Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool.
His most important gift to the beautiful game was decision to extend his managerial position by Alex Ferguson at Manchester United and introduction of Jose Mourinho to the managerial career. When Sir Alex started thinking about his retirement at the age of 60, Robson commented that he is 70 and going ahead. This forced Sir Alex to rethink and he is still continuing in that position with more glory. Jose Mourinho was his assistant at Porto, Sporting Lisbon and Barcelona and he went on winning Champions League with Porto and leading Chelsea to two Premier League titles.
Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger also found a supporter in Sir Bobby when the fans and supporters of Arsenal started criticising Wenger for not signing big names and also for losing to small teams. In his column in Daily Mail, he attacked the opponents of Wenger and stated that it is their manager is the most valuable item in Arsenal side and if they force him to move out, they will end up in relegation.
While having retrospectives of World Cup football tournaments, few matches strike in my mind. Each edition of the Word Cup has its own star, emerging star and extraordinary player who has some thing extra to offer etc. This is very much personal choice and for me the most important revelation of 1990 edition was Paul Gascoigne. Sir Bobby was lucky enough to have a striker like Gary Lineker in his team but he was luckier to introduce a talent like Gascoigne against their Semi Final against West Germany. It was Gazza who controlled the entire game from the midfield and I still fail to remember any other player produced that impact like him in 1990.
For me, his Ipswich days were episodes I learned from journals and periodicals but his England and Newcastle days were very much in my memory. Saddest thing in football, especially managerial level is the parting shot with the team. Very rarely a manager gets his chance to have a nice farewell and to say good bye to his team. Robson managed the Newcastle for more than four years and achieved the best span of achievements in their premier league career. Still, one fine morning, the club decided to sack him, without having a look at what he has gained for them. In fact, it was parting shot for the Newcastle United from its premier league position. Five years after his removal, the legendry club slipped down to the relegation table and moved to the championship.
Through out his career, he never showed any bias towards any player or to any team. When we see all managers’ complaints about the decision of match officials in league matches, Robson stood as different. He kept his cool through out the match and encouraged his team and appreciated the work of match officials. He always stood for the better side of the game and never believed in negative tactics. Whatever he achieved in the league football was not with help of deep pockets of present day. He started with small clubs in the league and proved his mettle in the profession by taking them to the top places in the league. Even, in his last club, Newcastle United, he never tried to splash money to get any football stars. He spent the money prudently by choosing capable players to form a good team. The moment the club started spending big money for big stars, their decline started. He proved that, it is the game is more important and the football is a teamwork rather than display of individual talent. I hope this will remain as his message to the big clubs engaged in present day Football Business.
Now the lover of the beautiful game has gone. He left the beautiful game here for the next generation to make it better. He will definitely remain in the hearts of all football lovers around the world. Thanks Sir Bobby, for all you did for the game. Thanks a lot.
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