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365footballorg-blog · 5 years

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FA Cup first round: Haringey Borough eye AFC Wimbledon giant-killing

FA Cup first round: Haringey Borough v AFC Wimbledon Venue: Coles Park, Tottenham Date: Friday 9 November Kick-off: 19:55 GMT Coverage: Live on BBC Two, the BBC Sport website and app, live text commentary on the BBC Sport website

They are one of only a few clubs in the top seven tiers of English football to hand out free season tickets, they have a midfielder who has played against Luka Modric, and five years ago they attracted a crowd of just 17 (seventeen) to a league match.

On Friday, Haringey Borough will host a club record crowd of around 2,500 as the non-league team look to spring an FA Cup first-round shock by knocking out AFC Wimbledon, who play four leagues above them, in a match to be shown live on BBC Two.

Located on White Hart Lane, just over a mile from where Tottenham’s booming 62,000-seater stadium is taking shape, Borough’s Coles Park ground has a main stand with 270 seats.

The only team surviving from August’s preliminary round, Haringey have already created club history by reaching this stage for the first time.

Haringey v Wimbledon tie to be shown live on BBC[1]

FA Cup first round draw[2]

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Their run includes a 97th-minute winner at Brentwood Town in the first qualifying round and coming from behind in three of their five games. In doing so, the Isthmian League Premier Division club have earned £57,890 in prize money – a huge amount for a part-time club who cannot afford to pay a wage to all their players.

“We’ve got a few contracted players – the rest are on expenses which covers things like petrol money and buying a pair of boots,” said Tom Loizou, in his 11th season as Haringey manager.

“Even the contracted players are on a bare minimum when it comes to wages.”

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‘One of the fastest growing fanbases in the country’

On 26 February 2013, Haringey entertained Biggleswade United in the ninth-tier Spartan South Midlands League Premier Division. There were more players on the pitch than people who paid to watch.

Having spent around £1m on ground improvements, including a new 3G pitch, Borough took the bold decision to give away free season tickets in the summer of 2016 – despite requiring £140,000 a year to keep going.

“We’d spent all this money on a new stadium and had nobody to watch us,” Aki Achillea, a criminal defence solicitor and chairman of Haringey for the past 14 years, said. “I banked on the fact anyone with a free season ticket might buy food and drink.”

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The giveaway has been such a success that it remains in place today. Borough’s average league attendance has jumped from 58 in 2015-16 to 262 this season, and manager Tom Loizou said: “We have one of the fastest growing fanbases in the country.”

With little in the way of gate receipts, however, Haringey have had to be resourceful in terms of raising income.

The club receive a rent for hosting a car boot sale three times a week, while finances are also boosted by hiring out their £500,000 synthetic pitch during the week.

“A few years ago we couldn’t even get a sponsor, people just laughed at us,” 58-year-old Loizou, a former Leyton Orient caretaker manager, added.

“Now we’ve got a van hire company who are in White Hart Lane. Instead of cash, they have given us a mini bus to get the team to away games. We can’t afford a coach to every away match.”

The man who faced Modric

Four years ago Georgios Aresti was rubbing shoulders with the likes of Modric, Mario Mandzukic and Dejan Lovren.

The central midfielder, born in Limassol, made his one and only start for Cyprus in a 2-0 friendly defeat in Croatia in September 2014.

Four months earlier he had come up against then-Manchester United midfielder Shinji Kagawa when he appeared as a substitute against Japan in front of 58,000 in Saitama.

Aged 24, Aresti is a veteran of almost 100 top-flight Cypriot games – including 43 at Ethnikos Achnas where he was on a £40,000-a-year contract – and joined Haringey towards the end of last season before re-signing in July after a trial at Barnet ended without an offer.

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Desperate to earn a living playing professionally in England, the former AEK Athens player hopes his performances for Haringey, where he picks up around £100 a game, will lead to greater things.

In September, 18-year-old Haringey defender Themis Kefalas signed a one-year deal with Championship club Queens Park Rangers,[3] and Aresti hopes to follow a similar path.

“I want to progress my career and I think I can do it,” said Aresti, who scored in the 3-2 win at Brentwood Town in the first qualifying round. “Haringey is a small club in a small league but there are lots of scouts that come to our games.”

Despite only being at Haringey for a short time, Aresti has already established himself as a cult figure with fans.

“He makes goals and sees things other players at this level can’t see,” added Achillea. “Our fans love him and sing ‘George Aresti is a gift from the Gods’ at games.”

Achillea, too, is popular with Borough fans. One banner reads “The People’s Republic of Haringey Borough. Vote Aki Achillea Prime Minister!”

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Injured trying to empty a bin

Haringey’s team also includes Michael O’Donoghue, a 22-year-old defender who has played in League One for Colchester United, midfielder Rakim Richards, who works for the Tottenham Hotspur Foundation[4] and Michael Ademiluyi, a former Southend United youth forward who has recently worked in security at The Oval cricket ground.

Meanwhile, Portuguese midfielder Jorge Sambu is hoping to make an impression against Wimbledon after recovering from a work injury.

The 27-year-old refuse collector for Kensington and Chelsea London Borough Council missed the start of the season after damaging his knee while trying to empty a bin.

How Haringey got the FA Cup first round Preliminary round: H v Stanway Rovers 1-0 – Chinedu McKenzie First qualifying round: A v Brentwood Town 3-2 – Georgios Aresti, Chinedu McKenzie, Karl Akinwande Second qualifying round: H v Erith Town 2-0 – Joel Nouble (pen), Chinedu McKenzie Third qualifying round: H v AFC Sudbury 2-1 – Chinedu McKenzie (2) Fourth qualifying round: H v Poole Town 2-1 – Jorge Sambu, Joel Nouble

“My knee just gave way and I only started playing again last month,” said Lisbon-born Sambu, who is in his fifth season at Haringey.

“I came to London to live with my mum at the age of 14. At first I used to beg her to go back to Portugal but she said it’s a better life for us here. I love London now.

“I’ve had two promotions with Haringey and I’ve had an offer to sign for a team in a better division this year.

“I chose to stay at Haringey because I don’t think I will find another team like this. We’re a very close-knit group and we look after one another.”

‘We’re the only team in White Hart Lane’

Above the bar in Haringey’s six-year-old clubhouse is a sign that reads ‘White Hart Lane N17’.

It was paid for by Loizou, who says: “There’s only one senior club on White Hart Lane – and it’s not Spurs. Their official address is High Road, Tottenham.”

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Achillea has been a Tottenham season ticket holder for 30 years and travelled to the Netherlands in October to watch them against PSV Eindhoven in the Champions League.

One of his ambitions is to get Spurs boss Mauricio Pochettino down to watch Haringey. Another is to see Tottenham Hotspur Ladies, who currently play in Cheshunt, groundshare at Coles Park.

“Spurs Ladies playing on White Hart Lane would be fantastic,” he said.

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Borough have a women’s team of their own. Long-serving Haringey secretary John Bacon often acts as an assistant referee at their home matches in the Eastern Region Women’s Premier Division[5] – at the age of 80.

Haringey’s Brit Award winners

Former Haringey players include Ricky Otto,[6] later a Birmingham City winger, and Leon Rolle – also known as DJ Locksmith.

Rolle, who was Borough captain, Kesi Dryden and Piers Aggett were all registered with Haringey before helping launch Rudimental, the drum and bass band who won British single of the year at the 2014 Brits.[7]

“When I first took over they were in the process of forming a band and playing football for us,” added Loizou.

“They weren’t famous at the time and I didn’t take a lot of notice of them. It’s not my kind of music. If it had been Frank Sinatra playing centre-half it would have been very different!”

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Meanwhile, British singer-songwriter Emeli Sande[8] turned up in 2015 to watch Haringey win promotion from the Essex Senior League and even wrote a message on Facebook[9] after her visit to Coles Park.

Eight years ago, Ben Corbyn, son of Labour leader Jeremy, managed Haringey Borough’s under-18 team.

References

^ Haringey v Wimbledon tie to be shown live on BBC (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ FA Cup first round draw (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ one-year deal with Championship club Queens Park Rangers, (www.qpr.co.uk)

^ Tottenham Hotspur Foundation (www.tottenhamhotspur.com)

^ Eastern Region Women’s Premier Division (fulltime-league.thefa.com)

^ Ricky Otto, (www.bcfc.com)

^ British single of the year at the 2014 Brits. (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ Emeli Sande (www.bbc.co.uk)

^ wrote a message on Facebook (www.facebook.com)

BBC Sport – Football

FA Cup first round: Haringey Borough eye AFC Wimbledon giant-killing was originally published on 365 Football

#Borough #first #giantkilling #Haringey #Round #Wimbledon

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celticnoise · 6 years

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LEIGH GRIFFITHS has told Celtic’s over-the top critics: “Get off our backs!”

The striker and his team-mates are crestfallen following their Champions League exit against AEK Athens only three days after losing to Hearts at Tynecastle.

Brendan Rodgers has now sampled defeat in back-to-back games for the first time as the Hoops gaffer and he is also being forced to deal with the non-appearance of Dedryck Boyata in the Greek capital.

Snipers have now opened fire on the manager, the board and the players with some claiming the bubble has burst.

But Griffiths hit back: “It does say it all about the standards set here.

“People will jump on that bandwagon that Celtic’s in crisis, blah, blah, blah. But it’s been two losses on the bounce for the first time since the manager took charge.

“That’s over two years now. As disappointed as we are to be going out of the Champions League, that’s not bad, is it?

“Does that not say it all about us as a squad? Yes, people might jump on it and say the squad’s not good enough and everything else.

GRIM BHOY…Leigh Griffiths can’t hide his disappointment in Athens.

“But it’s still the bulk of the squad that won the double treble which is an incredible feat.

“We’ve not had this kind of disappointment in a while and it’s hard to take.

“Given circumstances, the things surrounding the club at the moment, everyone seems to be saying there’s a bad spirit with the manager and the board and everything else.

“But all I can say is that everyone is still together. We’re fighting for the same cause.

“Yes, we’ve had two bad results. But we need to pick ourselves up. As players, we need to stick together, get back on the training pitch, work hard and recover well. We’ve got a busy couple of weeks coming up.”

Rodgers felt let down by Boyata’s no-show, but  Griffiths said: “To be fair, the boys weren’t really concentrating on that.

“We had a job to do, regardless of what’s been said about Dedo and his agent. Whatever happens to Dedo is up to him, his representatives and the club.

“We had a job to do – and we failed.”

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#CelticNoise #Celtic #CelticFC #CelticQuickNews

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zeroviraluniverse-blog · 6 years

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Mourinho gets it right vs. Liverpool, pitch invasion chaos, Napoli slip

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Mourinho gets it right vs. Liverpool, pitch invasion chaos, Napoli slip

Sometimes, there’s a simplicity to good management. Sometimes it’s about picking the right guys at the right time and executing the right plan. That’s being pragmatic, and while the modern game often looks down its nose at it, Jose Mourinho does not.

Hosting Liverpool on Saturday, Mourinho took some steps that, with hindsight, appear basic but would make all the difference. He switched Alexis Sanchez into a central position, where he had the option to run behind the Liverpool defence when in possession and disrupt the build-up when the opposition had the ball. He dusted off Marcus Rashford, who hadn’t made a Premier League start in 2018 and hadn’t scored in three months, and unleashed him down the left, knowing his pace would keep Trent Alexander-Arnold honest. And he broke the Liverpool press by directing long balls to Romelu Lukaku, whom he instructed to target Dejan Lovren rather than Virgil Van Dijk.

Both of United’s goals came from that approach, and other than a Van Dijk header off a set piece, Liverpool weren’t particularly dangerous in the first half. The visitors did somewhat better after the break and should have had a penalty when Marouane Fellaini brought down Sadio Mane, but equally they were somewhat fortunate that Eric Bailly deflected the ball into his own net.

It wasn’t a master-class from Mourinho necessarily; more like doing the right things and executing them well to give yourself an edge. And it’s broadly what Liverpool failed to do. Both of United’s goals came direct from big David De Gea boots up the pitch. Why you would have Lovren (rather than Van Dijk) pick up Lukaku in those situations (not once, but twice!) is something that should give Klopp cause to reflect. And even if you wanted Van Dijk elsewhere, for whatever reason, surely there were ways to help Lovren (who himself could have done better), whether it was screening Lukaku or getting someone to sweep behind.

OLI SCARFF/AFP/Getty Images

From United’s perspective, you wonder what happens when Paul Pogba (who missed the game after picking up a knock in training) returns. If you go back to the midfield three — which Mourinho himself said, rightly, was Pogba’s best position — then you either have to switch Sanchez back out wide or change to a 4-3-2-1 or 4-3-1-2 scheme forgoing wingers. Personally, I think that’s the best solution. It will be interesting to see how Mourinho plays it.

As for Liverpool, they slip to fourth place, one point behind Tottenham and four ahead of Chelsea. There’s no reason for them to panic: you can budget for defeat at Old Trafford. But what you don’t want is to find yourself in a situation where the trip to Stamford Bridge on the second-to-last day of the season becomes make-or-break for a top four finish.

The Reds still have a bit of a cushion: Klopp needs to manage it.

Napoli aren’t finished yet despite slip

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With Juventus now ahead of Napoli in Serie A, Gab Marcotti examines whether the Partenopei are still capable of ending Juve’s six-year run as champions.

Napoli were held to a scoreless draw away to Inter, which means they slip into second place one point behind Juventus, who also have a game in hand. Coach Maurizio Sarri reiterated after the game that they still believe, they still played well, they have no intention of giving up, and since they have neither the most expensive nor the best squad in Serie A, they’re not the ones with the pressure.

In many ways, he’s right. Lorenzo Insigne missed a couple of chances that could have given them the win (although, equally Milan Skriniar hit the woodwork at the other end), and Inter never really threatened Pepe Reina’s goal.

Napoli are playing with house money: they’re on pace to collect 95 points, which would be the third-highest total in the history of Serie A. If Juventus can outperform them, good for them: Napoli did their part.

As for Inter, Luciano Spalletti set up not to concede, did it cleverly (as he often does) and got the job done. He pointed out that his team is low on quality, so this is the best they can do right now. He’s right, of course, although it’s always jarring to hear a manager talk about how unremarkable his players are. But points like the one gleaned on Sunday are valuable when it comes to keeping them on track for their goal this season: a place in the top four and access to some Champions League prize money next year.

Pitch invasions blot the weekend

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Alison Bender and Peter Walton discuss the hostile environment that plagued the West Ham v Burnley match over the weekend.

This past weekend saw European football return to the 1980s — and not in a good way. Several West Ham supporters invaded the pitch during their side’s home defeat to Burnley on Saturday, while hundreds others overwhelmed stewards and harangued the club’s owners, David Gold and David Sullivan, in the directors’ box.

That same day, hundreds of angry Lille fans stormed on to the pitch following a 1-1 draw with Montpellier. Several Lille players were hit by their own supporters, who vented their anger at owners Gerard Lopez and Marc Ingla.

There’s not much to say here. Pitch invasions of this sort are dangerous and unacceptable. At the same time, there are reasons why these supporters are so angry, and the situation at both clubs goes well beyond fans simply being angry at under-performance on the pitch.

Lille aren’t just in danger of relegation. The club are under a financial cloud after being acquired by Lopez and Ingla and are being investigated by the DNCG, French football’s financial control authority. As for West Ham, many supporters are angry at the move away from the Boleyn Ground and the way Gold and Sullivan have run the club. There’s also tension between different fan groups after a protest march was called off, with some supporters claiming they’ve been threatened by other supporters. Some have criticised vice chairman Karren Brady for meeting with certain supporters’ groups with dubious pasts.

Football doesn’t need a return to the violence and chaos of the past. But equally, football needs responsible owners who respect supporters, many of whom will still be there after they’re long gone.

Shameful scenes in Greece

The Greek Superleague has been suspended indefinitely, and it’s the only reasonable action that could have been taken after what happened on Sunday when PAOK hosted league-leading AEK.

Fernando Varela put the ball in the net in the 89th minute, giving PAOK a lead that would have meant leap-frogging AEK to the top of the league. Then referee Giorgos Kominis appeared to disallow the goal, leading to a melee on the pitch. PAOK officials — including the owner, Ivan Savvidis — twice went on to the pitch to confront the match officials. On the second occasion, a holstered handgun was clearly visible on Savvidis’ belt.

Savvidis, a Russian billionaire, apparently has a licence to carry a firearm. That’s fine. However, a licence to carry does not mean you can take it with you wherever you like, nor does it entitle you to wander uninvited on to a football pitch. If, on top of that, he also threatened the referee while armed, as AEK officials allege, things get more serious still.

Greek football has had a rocky time over the past decade. Greek football deserves better. Meanwhile, Savvidis should not be allowed near a football stadium ever again.

Who should play up front for Chelsea?

Chelsea were a bit fortunate with their goals in their 2-1 victory over Crystal Palace, but given the amount of chances they created, you’re not going to hold it against them. Now, the worry is about the center-forward.

Alvaro Morata hasn’t scored at all since Dec. 26 while Olivier Giroud hasn’t scored in the Premier League in more than three months, including five Chelsea appearances. On Saturday, he again wasted a couple of opportunities.

Obviously, having a center-forward who converts chances is better than having one who squanders them. But given the way they play, simply having a big body up front to tie up central defenders is often as important as having a prolific central striker. And both Morata and Giroud bring a range of skills beyond goal scoring to the table.

Real might have deepest squad in Europe

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Cristiano Ronaldo continued his impressive scoring run by netting a brace to guide Real Madrid to a late 2-1 victory against Eibar.

If part of being a good coach is knowing how to turn negatives into positives, then Zinedine Zidane’s cup runneth over. Real Madrid are 15 points behind Barcelona in La Liga, which means they won’t be winning it. But they’re also 12 points clear of Sevilla, who were beaten 2-0 at home by Valencia, which means they don’t need to worry about being back in the Champions League last year. Therefore Zidane can spend the rest of the season tinkering and finding the right combinations based on the opponent. The only concern is getting it right, because this might be the deepest squad in Europe.

For the tricky away trip to Eibar, he opted for Gareth Bale and Cristiano Ronaldo up front with Isco, Toni Kroos and the returning Luka Modric behind. Modric, who hadn’t played since Valentine’s Day, dominated the middle of the park while Ronaldo grabbed both goals, taking his seasonal tally to 33. Throw Lucas Vazquez, Karim Benzema, Mateo Kovacic and Marco Asensio into the mix and he has a head-spinning range of permutations. Modric, Kroos and Ronaldo may be the only two guaranteed a spot.

Is Lewandowski leaving Bayern this summer?

The last time Bayern played at home they were tied in knots by Hertha and had to settle for a scoreless draw. That was unlikely to happen against Hamburg, a relegation threatened side that hasn’t won since November, and in fact, it did not.

Bayern were 3-0 up inside of 20 minutes and cruised to a 6-0 win. They could end up winning the league by April Fool’s Day. Robert Lewandowski’s hat-trick means he now has 100 league goals (in just 120 appearances!) for Bayern and the rumours linking him to a summer move are kicking into gear. He’s 30 in August. If it’s going to happen, it’s going to be this summer.

Coutinho, Dembele ease Barca to victory

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Ousmane Dembele was one of Barcelona’s top performers in their win at Malaga, but the FC crew are not convinced it’s a sign of things to come.

Barcelona’s last league defeat came against Malaga but that felt like a lifetime ago. This time, Barca went into the game a whopping 56 points clear of their last-placed opposition. And that, coupled with Lionel Messi’s mini-paternity leave, gave Ernesto Valverde the opportunity to do some tinkering. It looked like a 4-2-3-1 with Paulinho, Philippe Coutinho and Ousmane Dembele behind Luis Suarez and it yielded a comfortable 2-0 win with goals from Suarez and Coutinho.

Dembele did his part, especially in the first half. Whether he’ll live up to his price tag over the long-term remains to be seen, but the glimpses of play-making and pace he showed suggest a bright future. Coutinho will likely take more time to settle, though his clever back-heel for Barca’s second goal proves he can contribute in multiple ways. At the stage, it’s all about Chelsea and their visit to the Camp Nou anyway.

Dybala, Juve keep rolling

You can split Paulo Dybala’s season up into three chunks pretty neatly. Through the end of September, he had 12 goals in nine games. Then came the barren spell, the benching and the injury: from Oct. 1 to Mar. 1, he managed just five goals in 21 games.

But now he has started three games in a row, against Lazio, Tottenham in the Champions League and Udinese on Sunday, and he’s been key in all three, playing a huge part in delivering the three victories. Against Udinese, he conjured up a majestic free-kick and converted the second after some nice hold-up play by Gonzalo Higuain.

Juve’s season has been very much stop-start but if Max Allegri can harness this Dybala the rest of the way, the future’s bright, not just domestically but in Europe too.

What could have been for Atletico…

Atletico Madrid’s 3-0 thumping of Celta keeps them seven points clear of Real Madrid in second place and highlighted Antoine Griezmann’s torrid period of form. Goals alone aren’t a great metric by which to judge him but the fact that he had a distinctly sub-par first half of the season and yet has already matched last year’s Liga total offers some context.

You wonder where this club, winners of 10 of the past 11 games, could be if Vitolo and Diego Costa had come on board in the summer. It also makes you look at the Barcelona defeat a bit differently. Should they have been more aggressive given that in reality, they had nothing to lose?

Batshuayi’s having fun at Dortmund

It was a wild one in Dortmund on Sunday. Borussia Dortmund took an early lead and then Eintracht Frankfurt equalized before Michy Batshuayi put the home side ahead again. And then, after Eintracht made it 2-2 in injury time, Batshuayi — who else? — popped up with the winner, deeper still in injury time.

After his blistering start, which saw him grab five goals in three games, Batshuayi looked to have cooled off to the point that he went five starts without scoring. Then came Sunday’s heroics, neatly set up by stuff like this to which the self-styled “#BATSMAN” responded with more Twitter shenanigans.

Batshuayi is obviously having fun and after some 18 months rooted to the Chelsea bench, you can only be happy for him.

#Football

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celticnoise · 6 years

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Sevco’s consideration of various names is quite impressive, especially as only a handful of manager’s have actually publicly thrown their hats into the ring. Whenever a job in football comes up you get all manner of desperados announcing their intent …

Sevco’s are more desperate than most.

Thankfully our favourite Sevco website, Ibrox Noise, has been keeping a running count on who out there has said they want the job … none of these guys have been approached but their overall standard is, to use the Glasgow vernacular, boufin.

Here they are, so far, along with their respective records.

It is, as the headline suggests, comedy gold.

Leading the pack is Henning Berg. He’s had five managerial jobs since his career began, and although he had one wildly successful spell in Poland where he won a league and a cup (that’s how the Scottish press will describe it anyway) it has been dismal overall. He was “mutually consented” by his first club, which is as good as it got for him. In all four other cases he was fired; that’s the word the club’s used and the one I use. His most memorable failure came the last time he was the manager of a team based on this island, at Blackburn Rovers, which ended in spectacular ignominy and shame when he was sacked after just ten matches.

His career win percentage is 45%. In 319 games he has lost 97.

The guy a lot of their fans seem to want is Frank De Boer; his own managerial career thus far has been sterling. He appears woefully underequipped for the task, but has the virtue of a famous name, one the fans think could probably attract decent players if only they could afford those. Indeed, he will command quite a salary, which alone suggests it’s a non starter. His record at Ajax was very good, but then he had an outstanding squad to work with and was able to spend money. He got a move to Inter on the back of it and his managerial career should have been set up to take off like a rocket, but without all the structural advantages he enjoyed at home it was an unmitigated disaster; he lasted 14 games, losing seven and drawing two. Yet that was sweet comfort and blazing success next to his spell at Crystal Palace; managed five and lost four for one of the shortest managerial stays in the history of the sport. Wow.

It’s fair to say that his managerial career is in shreds and no club with a serious reputation will touch him in the near future. Which is why he’s interested in a basket case Scottish team where the fans at least still think he has the magic.

Next up is Tim Sherwood, a hilariously low-key figure who’s had two managerial jobs and been sacked in both before his first season was out. Although not as spectacular a failure in England as De Boer was, he doesn’t have four Dutch titles to boast about either. His time at Spurs was abysmal; the swashbuckling, attack minded team that have now was a far cry from the turgid, awful stuff the fans had to put up with when this guy was in charge and he fared no better at Aston Villa where a place in the FA Cup Final didn’t come close to excusing a managerial dip which included a mind-boggling ten games without a win. And Sevco thought they had it bad with Pedro. His team were relegation certs when the Villa board finally pulled the plug.

He applies everywhere; this isn’t a “big job” for him. If they were hiring for milkmen he’d stick in an application form, as evidenced by his comments; “Yeah I would consider any job at the moment. I will talk to anyone and see if their ambitions meet mine, so yeah certainly.”

Much the same can be said for Gus Poyet, who said “yeah it’s one of a number of jobs I’m interested in” whilst adding, as others have, that no-one has picked up the phone. The other jobs he’s interested in presumably include Secretary General of the United Nations – if it came up – being head of Goldman Sachs and a shot at running the country. He could not do worse than the Brexiteers teetering on the brink right now. All are about as likely as us seeing him in the dugout at Ibrox; even they are not so desperate as to hire someone who’s most recent job was in China, and who’s been sacked by Brighton, Sunderland, AEK Athens and Real Betis … fired in four countries; that’s his managerial record summed up nicely.

He too is applying everywhere. No-one’s breaking his door down.

Which brings us to Steve McClaren, another guy who would take work anywhere and who can’t find a gig in England, even in a league which recycles more tired rubbish than UK Gold. He, too, had a spell of success in Holland; like De Boer it has haunted him ever since as clubs hire him hoping to re-find the spark and find out only that he got lucky once. His list of failures is long and extraordinary, including a spell as England boss and two at Derby. His most disastrous tenure has got to be the one at Notts Forest, which came to a crashing ending after just 13 games, although Newcastle fans would beg to differ after the tailspin he put their club in; a 22% win ratio over 31 Hellish games in 2015-16; he doomed them and even the genius of Rafa Benitez couldn’t turn their campaign around.

McClaren would want big money, both for himself and for his signings. That is unlikely to materialise; he seems to be interested merely as a means of advertising his availability to anyone who might be daft enough to consider it. In England a lot of clubs are, but he’s been out of work there since Derby took a punt on him and then lived to regret it last season … he’s been without a club since March. Even the crazy English sides who usually hire guys like him are keeping well clear. He’s about as popular with club chairman as dandruff is with catalogue models.

And finally there’s Graeme Murty, who’s got five wins in eight games as stand-in boss, two of them in the last two matches. If he can make it six wins for nine he’ll have as good a chance as any of the jokers featured above, but a dark horse candidate has emerged tonight who’s name and face and record will be hilariously familiar to us all …..

Alex McLeish has moved into pole position as the bookies favourite, for reasons passing all understanding. He “knows the club” and so many of the fans would accept him, but his past history should give them reason for concern. Not only did his term end in abject failure but the successes he did have he, himself, personally, and with no equivocation, freely admits were mostly a result of cheating. He is quite up front about how without EBT’s the club could not have maintained even a challenge to Celtic during his time in charge.

I wonder how he thinks they could afford to sign big name players today?

He would certainly take the job – his career since leaving Scotland has been a white-knuckle ride of catastrophe; his seven matches in charge of Notts Forest is one of the shortest in managerial history; 40 days long and not a good point to be had.

These are the names who will (not) be keeping Brendan Rodgers and Peter Lawwell up at night … and the other, of course, is Derek McInnes, still, if you believe The Daily Record, sitting there desperately waiting for the phone to ring.

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