Claudio Ranieri and the fickleness of modern football
A wise man once said, "Live your life without any regrets".
I doubt Leicester City will be able to do that now. How often have you thought about a decision you made and wondered how things could have turned out had you done things differently?
The pace of modern football is such that clubs are forced to make quick-fire decisions that may or may not turn out well for them but there isn't any time to think about the repercussions of these decisions.
I blame globalisation of football. There was a time when success was rewarded with patience and a chance at longevity. Sir Matt Busby and Sir Alex Ferguson immediately come to mind but then again that could just be my Manchester United bias kicking in.
A body blow
For a man like Claudio Ranieri, this sacking must have come as a body blow. From taking an average side at the bottom of the table, with little to no individual talent to the highest echelons of the Premier League is a feat no team will likely ever achieve again.
Ranieri showed that the financial might of the Premier League’s “Big 5” can be overcome with sheer hard work and a desire to win, a collective effort, like football was meant to be in the first place. The Leicester City fairytale is one which may be told for generations to come about how a tiny little club from a small East Midlands city in England rose to the pinnacle of the world’s most followed league.
From having created history to being unceremoniously dropped at the first sign of discomfort is not a position anyone would have envisioned for “FIFA’s Best Coach of the Year” at the start of the season. This sacking is a prime example of our low patience version of football.
Also read: The curious case of “Unwavering Support” by football club owners
No place for sentiments
I suppose, in a way, it is a justified sacking. A divided dressing room, players confused about playing time and positions, and a dejected manager who has seemingly lost his touch. But then again, if Leicester City’s fans were given the option of going down to the championship after winning a Premier League two years ago, I’m sure they would’ve taken it with both arms extended. But I doubt many of them are happy about the sacking now, they truly owe a lot to Ranieri for all he has done for the club in just a year.
Modern Football has no place for sentimental appointments and prolonged stays if it doesn’t satisfy a commercial purpose and I think poor Claudio is a victim of that mentality. The only person who probably goes under that radar is Arsene Wenger but his management has kept Arsenal in the Champions League for so long and his micromanagement has kept them out of debt after the move to the Emirates, and those are the only reasons he still commands a place on Arsenal's bench week-in-week-out.
Gone are the days when clubs craved for longevity and a certain style for long periods of time. Short term results are the order of the day and Leicester have fallen victim to that.
The reality
For all their success, Leicester City is still a club who will be fighting for places in the bottom half of the table, and we all know last season was a one-off where things clicked rather favourably for them. They bought the right players and the whole system caught the Premier League off guard. A lot of the credit should go to Ranieri, for it was his style that got the best out of players like Mahrez, Vardy, and Kante.
His appointment itself was brought about by the sacking of Nigel Pearson, the man who oversaw a dramatic escape and kept them in the league just before Ranieri had the opportunity to create history and it keeps bringing me back to my point about the fickleness of football.
I understand the benefits of a long-term management, having grown up watching Sir Alex dominate English football for so long, and I also understand the benefits of a “short term vision style” of football having seen Jose Mourinho dominate European Football for as long as he has. We need to find a method that successfully weds the two approaches into one beautiful system which benefits football in the years to come.
I don’t think I could imagine a world where Sir Alex could have been sacked after a few bad years before his meteoric rise. Had Manchester United fired him, we may have had a very different Premier League and a very different Manchester United. It is also true that he was given that much time only because it was in an era where patience wasn’t a luxury in football but a given for any club.
If we were to move away from that period, we could look at more modern examples where clubs may have pulled the gun too soon. Roberto Di Matteo, for all his shortcomings as a manager, did lead Chelsea to their first ever Champions League trophy and was sacked just six months later. Roberto Mancini, the mercurial Italian who oversaw Manchester City's ascendancy and guided them to their first league trophy in decades was sacked a little later. Same can be said of Manuel Pellegrini at Manchester City and Jose Mourinho at Chelsea.
A trigger happy football family
Far too many times we’ve seen clubs make hasty decisions regarding their managerial posts. The disappointing thing about this policy of “hire and fire” is that it isn’t localised to the top teams; bottom teams are more likely to pull the trigger sooner and it isn’t surprising because they have far too much to lose should they go down.
I suppose it is fair in that when a team succeeds and survives a relegation battle or wins a trophy, the manager is one of the first ones to be credited and if the same team suffers a humiliating defeat the manager is the first one to face the disgruntled fans, players, and the board.
This, though, is the vicious cycle of management in modern football. Anyone is dispensable. Everything is fine as long as you are winning, the minute that stops, all the cracks open up and chaos takes over. It is how it is, and not much can be done about it.
I feel for Ranieri, I truly do, but there are times when you feel the manager has come out of the sacking with more respect than the players and the club and this is one of those times.
Ranieri has been hailed as a magician in the Premier League for everything that he has achieved as a manager of Leicester City. And maybe one day we might still be able to hear some more “dilly ding, dilly dong” resonating from the King Power in remembrance of the man who changed the Premier League for the better.
Thank You, Claudio Ranieri.