When good players go bad, there's only one man who will not give up on them ...
With so much column inches these days being used to dissect and discuss who would be the perfect candidate to step into the Stamford Bridge hotseat come summer, I decided to jump in on the "let's play Russian gazillionaire playing Sim Manager" and throw in my choice of a candidate.
And since everyone's either going for the conventional choices such as Pep, Benitez, Jose, Capello or at wildest, Mick McCarthy ... I decided to free my mind from the shackles of conventional wisdom and go for a really wild gamble. A gamble which ... might ... just ... work.
Enter Cesar Millan.
[cue to the Dog Whisperer's whistling theme song in the background whilst a stocky, diminutive Mexican (who isn't Chicarito) walks into Stamford Bridge with calm, assertive energy.]
See, it dawned on me that Chelsea's problem was not that it didn't have enough good players. Rather, it had players who had conveniently forgotten that playing in a team within the confines of a team sport essentially means they belong to a pack.
When you're in a pack, you have to move with the pack, attack other packs, defend the pack's territory, live, breathe and respect the pack as if your life depended on it. The pack is you and you are the pack. All great teams are essentially great packs comprised of players who all know that the pack as an entity is greater than any of them individually.
Who better to whip them into shape other than the man who makes a living out of (in his own words) "training humans to be better pack leaders and rehabilitating dogs to be calm, submissive pack followers"?
Watching Chelsea this season is akin to watching a bunch of powerful, experienced and highly capable dogs all put together with no pack leader. Every week, the players take to the pitch like unruly dogs with no clear direction or job to do, ending up with each doing their own thing from chasing postmen to harrasing stray cats to humping fire hydrants (all metaphorically, of course).
Putting a Number 2 type leader like AVB (see previous post) in charge of them was like getting a mild-mannered geek to reason with a bunch of dogs why they should not be chasing cars or their own tails. AVB's inevitable sacking was the equivalent to a dog handler getting ripped a new asshole by a pitbull he clearly can't control.
So there I was (probably just over an hour ago), watching yet another episode of Dog Whisperer come to its conclusion with yet another satisfied pet owner marveling at how Cesar managed to turn his teeth-barring, mouth-foaming, demonic 4-legged spawn of Satan into a cuddly, tail-wagging, docile Santa's little helper ... when it suddenly dawned on me that Cesar's ENTIRE philosophy is what those dogs in Blue really, really need today.
Picture this:
... John Terry decides to stroll into training 5 minutes late one day ... and starts ordering some young defender to lace his boots for him... Cesar walks up to him and reprimands him for his behaviour. John mockingly asks "Well, what are you gonna do about, homey?" ... the rest of his dawgs like Lamps, Drogba, Cech and Ashley Cole guffaw and go "ooooohhhh" like how them jocks in American teen movies do when the star quarterback picks on someone in the cafeteria ... without warning, Cesar corals a hissing Terry into the corner ... Terry snarls ... Cesar doesn't back down ... inching nearer ... and nearer ... all the while staring him down ... after about 20minutes of this 'dance' ... Terry is exhausted ... calms down a little ... Cesar calmly but authoritatively jabs Terry's ribs and simultaenously "mock-bites" Terry's neck with the other hand whilst emitting his trademark "tschh" ... Terry is stunned but subdued ... Cesar ends the move by laying the former England Captain sideways to the ground until he calms down... the other players start doing laps around the field without even being asked....
Ok, maybe the scene may play out a little differently in real life ... but you get the drift.
In short, Chelsea players need a strong pack leader. Someone who has calm, assertive energy whom the players can trust and ultimately follow.
Putting the jokey-ness of this post aside, the bottomline is that the players must follow a pack leader otherwise you have ... what is happening in Chelsea today. Just like dogs, players can sense an absence of a dominant pack leader. And just like dogs, players will instinctively "step up" to fill such a role uninvited. Players with alpha tendencies like Terry, Drogba, Cech, Lamps ... they will try to challenge the authority of any manager who walks into the club. Unless of course the manager layeth the smackdown from the word go.
And just like Cesar with his pack at his Dog Rehabilitation Centre, the manager of Chelsea, whoever it will be, must from day one show the players who's the boss. He must give them training, discipline and affection - in that order. The training will keep them physically primed and prepared for the weekend's game, the discipline will instill a sense purpose and focus in their lives and the affection, given sparingly, will make them want to do well and feel part of the club.
One needs to only cast a glance over at Old Trafford to see that all those dogs in Red respect, fear, love and want to fight for only one pack leader .... Sir Alex Ferguson. If he wasn't a football manager, he would probably have put Cesar, or any other form of Whisperer, out of a job already. Credit where credit is due. Despite my hatred for all things Red, there has been no one in the history of football management who has gotten it so right as much as him.
Until and unless Chelsea gets a pack leader willing to rehabilitate its wayward sons, they will carry on tumbling their way down the ladder of greatness and respect.
And so, even if Cesar Millan turns down the offer to rehabilitate the world's most expensively assembled pack of motley mongrels, his philosophy should rightly be remembered and instilled at this club.
All together now ... TSCHHHHHHHTTTTTTT.
Hissssssssss!!!! Spat spat! Hate dogs!
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