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Debate: Is race a factor in hiring managers in the English game?
Patrick Barclay, Chief Football Correspondent
Every time John Barnes loses his job, the chorus swells: do managers who are not white get a raw deal in the English game?
To me the answer is straightforward. Because we have no way of knowing, there is no point in asking. And I find the subject an especially irksome waste of time and energy because it does not matter if we have 92 white managers or none.
There is nothing better in English football than the disregard for racial origin that has formed over the past quarter of a century, since bananas were thrown at Barnes.
He is entitled to be proud of having helped to civilise the game as well as play it beautifully and, because he is also an amusing and intelligent companion, the natural impulse is to wish him well in management.
But Barnes is not the first exceptionally gifted footballer to struggle. It is not as if equal opportunity has been denied; you have to be considerably more equal than others to start at Celtic. Having failed there, and spent a sentimental sojourn with Jamaica, he ended up with Tranmere Rovers and, while it was sad that he went so quickly, the racial element should be ignored.
That of the 92 managers only three are now non-white — Paul Ince (Milton Keynes Dons), Keith Alexander (Macclesfield Town) and Chris Hughton (Newcastle United’s caretaker) — fills me with indifference.
The same indifference as I should encounter on being told that non-white players were over-represented in the Premier and Football Leagues because they made up, on average, 25 per cent of squads.
Or if someone reminded me that professional-standard players of Asian or part-Asian origin remained so close to non-existent that the name of Michael Chopra leaps out. That is an interesting subject, but not cause for concern.
The game is a meritocracy or it is nothing. When Ruud Gullit was made Chelsea manager, attention concentrated on his personality, playing pedigree and attitude to the sexiness of football. And when Jean Tigana arrived at Fulham, few dwelt on the aspect that he was not white. Yet Andrew Cole, the former Manchester United striker, has a theory to cover that; he suspects chairmen of discriminating against English non-whites.
No doubt in a year or two, we shall hear Cole pleading for a chance to manage and wondering why it does not come.
I remember Herman Ouseley, the affable former chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, telling me about the first time he attended an FA Council meeting 18 months ago: “The last time I was in a room with so many grey-haired white men was in 1988. There was a reception for Margaret Thatcher after she had laid the first brick at Canary Wharf. It was a room full of bankers, financiers and developers. There was one woman — Mrs Thatcher. And one black face — mine.”
While it is tempting to imagine English football’s boardrooms being full of rednecks, a few things should be borne in mind. One is that most chairmen would sacrifice even the most perverted principle for success. Another is that, to their credit, they have made football one of the more inclusive areas of our society. Another is that white managers are prevalent even in the black countries that can afford them. Since Zaire and Haiti booked their places in the 1974 World Cup, a total of 21 predominantly black countries from Africa or the Caribbean have qualified for the finals and only four have had black managers (Haiti in 1974, Nigeria and South Africa in 2002 and Angola in 2006). They have tended to prefer white French or Yugoslavs in charge. Does this reflect racial prejudice or a desire to have the best man in the job?
Once again, I’m happy to pass. I just don’t think there is any need for the English game to be beating itself up, let alone introducing American-style quotas. Whatever will be will be.
Debate: Is race a factor in hiring managers in the English game?
Every time John Barnes loses his job, the chorus swells: do managers who are not white get a raw deal in the English game?
To me the answer is straightforward. Because we have no way of knowing, there is no point in asking. And I find the subject an especially irksome waste of time and energy because it does not matter if we have 92 white managers or none.
There is nothing better in English football than the disregard for racial origin that has formed over the past quarter of a century, since bananas were thrown at Barnes.
He is entitled to be proud of having helped to civilise the game as well as play it beautifully and, because he is also an amusing and intelligent companion, the natural impulse is to wish him well in management.
But Barnes is not the first exceptionally gifted footballer to struggle. It is not as if equal opportunity has been denied; you have to be considerably more equal than others to start at Celtic. Having failed there, and spent a sentimental sojourn with Jamaica, he ended up with Tranmere Rovers and, while it was sad that he went so quickly, the racial element should be ignored.
That of the 92 managers only three are now non-white — Paul Ince (Milton Keynes Dons), Keith Alexander (Macclesfield Town) and Chris Hughton (Newcastle United’s caretaker) — fills me with indifference.
The same indifference as I should encounter on being told that non-white players were over-represented in the Premier and Football Leagues because they made up, on average, 25 per cent of squads.
Or if someone reminded me that professional-standard players of Asian or part-Asian origin remained so close to non-existent that the name of Michael Chopra leaps out. That is an interesting subject, but not cause for concern.
The game is a meritocracy or it is nothing. When Ruud Gullit was made Chelsea manager, attention concentrated on his personality, playing pedigree and attitude to the sexiness of football. And when Jean Tigana arrived at Fulham, few dwelt on the aspect that he was not white. Yet Andrew Cole, the former Manchester United striker, has a theory to cover that; he suspects chairmen of discriminating against English non-whites.
No doubt in a year or two, we shall hear Cole pleading for a chance to manage and wondering why it does not come.
I remember Herman Ouseley, the affable former chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, telling me about the first time he attended an FA Council meeting 18 months ago: “The last time I was in a room with so many grey-haired white men was in 1988. There was a reception for Margaret Thatcher after she had laid the first brick at Canary Wharf. It was a room full of bankers, financiers and developers. There was one woman — Mrs Thatcher. And one black face — mine.”
While it is tempting to imagine English football’s boardrooms being full of rednecks, a few things should be borne in mind. One is that most chairmen would sacrifice even the most perverted principle for success. Another is that, to their credit, they have made football one of the more inclusive areas of our society. Another is that white managers are prevalent even in the black countries that can afford them. Since Zaire and Haiti booked their places in the 1974 World Cup, a total of 21 predominantly black countries from Africa or the Caribbean have qualified for the finals and only four have had black managers (Haiti in 1974, Nigeria and South Africa in 2002 and Angola in 2006). They have tended to prefer white French or Yugoslavs in charge. Does this reflect racial prejudice or a desire to have the best man in the job?
Once again, I’m happy to pass. I just don’t think there is any need for the English game to be beating itself up, let alone introducing American-style quotas. Whatever will be will be.
Debate: Is race a factor in hiring managers in the English game?
How is Dionne? 
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