Sven just won’t go away. He has not been the manager of the England football team for the best part of a year now, yet the media circus goes on. There was his recent appearance on Inside Sport (May 21), where he claimed (as usual) that he was value for money. There is the astonishing fact that the FA has paid him £25m and he is still on a salary for doing zilch.
And then there was that Sunday Times magazine cover story from April 29. In which they dish little dirt, reveal a few “facts” to make him seem like a philanthropist (He apparently turned down over 40 appearances worth over £2m in fees), and set his record straight.
According to Sunday Times and their England manager’s league table, “Even counting two draws that went to penalty shoot-outs as defeats, Eriksson was England’s most successful coach of the modern era. The table only counts competitive matches, not friendlies”
Well, this is an interesting point of view. (By modern era, I presume they count all the managers in the table.) What exactly is success here? I have amended the table to include points and points per game, which work on the basis of 3 pts for a win and 1 for a draw, and I have moved two of Eriksson’s draws into the lost column as the STimes suggests.
Played Won Won% Drew Drew% Lost Lost% Points Points per game Trophies Eriksson 38 26 68.4 7 18.4 5 13.2 85 2.2 0 Greenwood 26 17 65.4 5 19.2 4 15.4 56 2.2 0 Robson 44 22 50.0 15 34.1 7 15.9 81 1.8 0 Taylor 19 8 42.1 8 42.1 3 15.8 32 1.7 0 McClaren 6 3 50.0 2 33.3 1 16.7 11 1.8 0 Hoddle 15 9 60.0 3 20.0 3 20.0 30 2.0 0 Revie 10 6 60.0 2 20.0 2 20.0 20 2.0 0 Winterbottom 29 15 51.7 8 27.6 6 20.7 53 1.8 0 Ramsey 33 20 60.6 6 18.2 7 21.2 66 2.0 1 Keegan 11 4 36.4 3 27.3 4 36.4 15 1.4 0 Venables 5 2 40.0 3 60.0 0 0.0 9 1.8 0 Wilkinson 1 0 0.0 1 100.0 0 0.0 1 1.0 0
(C) Times Newspapers Ltd, 2007
Eriksson’s record is very similar to that of a premiership winning team. The exact same number of games – 38 – as in a season, and a similar number of wins and points as required to win the league. To compare, the recent winners of the premiership:
year Team Pld W D L F A GD Pts 2007 Man United 38 28 5 5 83 27 56 89 2006 Chelsea 38 29 4 5 72 22 50 91 2005 Chelsea 38 29 8 1 72 15 57 95 2004 Arsenal 38 26 12 0 73 26 47 90 2003 Man United 38 25 8 5 74 43 40 83 2002 Arsenal 38 26 9 3 79 36 43 87 2001 Man United 38 24 8 6 79 31 48 80
Eriksson’s England fits right in there.
So that’s all good. Except it isn’t. Look at the table again. Eriksson has the same points per game as Greenwood, with Hoddle, Revie and Ramsey not far behind on 2.0, so this points idea is a bit misleading. It was my way of trying to help out the Times with a bit of proper data analysis. But this is all a giant red herring.
International football is not about points, or tables. It’s about competitions and trophies. And in this regard, Eriksson has 3 quarter-finals and that’s it. The key column is Trophies – and only one manager has anything in there: Ramsay and the ’66 World Cup.
If semis “count” towards success, Robson is next with Italia 90, along with the European championship teams of ’96 (Venables) and ’68 (Ramsey again). And then there are a bunch of quarter-finals, of which Eriksson has three.
Success can be measured in many ways. Eriksson had an excellent record in competitive matches, right up until the point that his team lost. And in that sense, they were failures. The players were good enough to win big cups, and he didn’t deliver. Arguing that his win-loss record puts him at the top is an interesting diversion, but that’s all. Reputations and records are measured in cups, and Sven, like everyone except Ramsey, has a zero in that column.
