Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Wade Davis: Why Ayahuasca Is Still Having a Moment
Revealed: The Insane Reality of Managing a Football Team
Which manager gives the best team talk?
When Brian Clough was at Nottingham Forest, he had a few tricks to inspire his players. Normally, just before kick off, the dressing room is an emotionally-charged place, with players pacing around, getting pumped up, and there’s music going at a million decibels. But Cloughie told everyone to be quiet, then he got down on his hands and knees and crawled slowly and silently across the floor. He laid a towel out and carefully put a football on top of it. Everyone was spellbound, they thought he’d gone mad. But then he pointed at the ball and whispered just three words: “Look after her.” That was his entire team talk, but that simplicity got the message across – look after the ball and the result will look after itself.
What other methods do managers use to inspire their players?
The age of furiously throwing teacups has gone. Managers today have to be emotionally intelligent, not least because dressing rooms are far more multi-cultural. There are certain cultures, like the South American, the Spanish, the far Eastern, where you cannot criticize and humiliate someone in public because they lose face and they will never forgive you.
So what do the managers do instead?
Gary Monk says it’s all about balance. If he went mental and spent five of the ten minutes he’s got at half time just bollocking someone, it won’t help the player or the group. It’s better to calmly get three bite-sized points across. The tone and feel of your words are as vital as what you actually say – that’s why Mark Hughes will watch TED talks on his day off, or study neuro-linguistic programming. Gary Monk is miked up at every training session he gives, so he can play his words back afterwards and see whether his points were made with clarity.
It all sounds very gentle compared to Fergie’s “hairdryer”…
Karl Robinson, who’s manager of MK Dons, goes to a behavioural expert. He cited one example where he’d tried to make eyeball contact with a player who was performing badly and called him a p**** because he wouldn’t return his gaze. The expert told him to be careful – you don’t what’s happened to this lad in his upbringing. He might come from an abusive background – your anger might impact and damage him. Anyway, what’s the point of screaming and shouting? If you don’t believe me, try this at home: think about a really important decision you need to make, one that could affect your job or family – and scream your lungs out at the same time. It doesn’t work, it’s a distraction.
Is being a manager easier these days?
The opposite. Last season, there were no fewer than 62 managerial changes out of 92 clubs. 47 were sacked, 15 resigned. The average tenure of a manager is less than 15 months. Shaun Derry told me about his sixth game in charge at Notts County. He’d had a tough start to the season and he looked behind him at the club chairman’s “guest” seats and saw seventeen unemployed managers sitting there, all willing him to fail so they could have his job. It was like a row of vultures. The pressure is mental.
Who copes with it best?
Paul Tisdale, the manager at Exeter City, is very strong. He’s actually the second longest serving manager, after Arsene Wenger. He told me what it’s like when you’re 1-0 down and there’s only ten minutes to go. The crowd are bellowing at the players to get stuck in, but you have to block them out and make decisions that you know will get you booed. You have to take off the bloke who’s hurling himself into tackles but not actually doing much positive. His feeling is that the crowd think about football for two hours a week, but he thinks about it for sixteen hours a day.
Have you seen managers crack?
Sometimes it’s the reverse. There’s a famous story about Jimmy Sirrel, who was a taciturn Scottish coach of Notts County in the 1980s. His wife Cathy died late on a Friday night, but he came into work as usual on Saturday morning, said nothing to anyone, gave his team talk, and won the game. Afterwards he went to the club bar and someone asked how Cathy was. He said, “Oh, she died about twelve hours ago.”
That can’t be healthy…
Brendan Rodgers told me that managers have to separate their private and professional lives. He’d just had the most successful four years of his life as a manager, with Swansea and Liverpool, but personally, he was in tatters. His mum and dad had died, he’d divorced from his wife of 23 years, and his son was on trial at the Old Bailey for sexual assault.
So fans should be more sympathetic to managers rather than shouting for them to be sacked?
It would be nice if they at least recognized that managers were people, not supermen. Take Ian Holloway, here’s a guy whose parents told him he was a “mistake”, whose own three daughters were born deaf, and whose wife was told she would die of cancer. On top of that, his career means he’s had to move house 33 times. The fans have no idea of the mental anguish.
Are any managers good at losing?
They all hate it. Even a cerebral man like Arsene Wenger turns into Basil Fawlty. If he could find a stick to beat his car with, he would.
Michael Calvin’s new book Living on the Volcano: The Secrets of Surviving as a Football Manager, £16.99, is out now.
Monday, October 26, 2015
The War on Bacon Heats Up
Life Lessons From Bond Villains
Until they get taken down in an explosive-filled set-piece, Bond villains tend to be pretty successful. You don’t get to own your own private island, build an evil lair inside a volcano, or employ a voodoo spirit without being pretty organised. Here are some lessons to be learned from everyone’s favourite megalomaniacs.
Follow your passions
Auric Goldfinger bloody loved gold. He was determined enough to turn that passion into a livelihood, becoming a massively successful gold smuggler. When you do what you love, it doesn’t even feel like work.
Hey, pets are nice!
There are loads of health benefits to pet ownership, which Ernst Stavro Blofeld was presumably aware of when he got his cat – the man’s unwell, look at his gammy eye. Playing with pets helps increase serotonin and dopamine levels, making relaxation easier, which is perfect considering an elevated stress level is the last thing you need when taking over the world.
Everyone needs a hobby
All work and no play would make Gustav Graves from Die Another Day a dull boy, so he takes the time to indulge in a bit of fencing. He’s evil, but just imagine how much worse he’d be without that as an outlet.
Nobody can do everything
Elliot Carver from Tomorrow Never Dies knows there's nothing wrong with playing to your strengths and getting help where you need it – he runs a multinational media conglomerate, but when it comes to fisticuffs he gets his burly henchmen involved.
Look after your damn teeth
You probably won’t need them to bite through metal cables like Jaws in Moonraker, but keeping your gnashers in good nick can help stave off heart disease.
Don’t be over-reliant on technology
Raoul Silva from Skyfall is a computer genius, an expert hacker who manages to infiltrate MI6 with an intricately planned scheme. He presumably has all the apps in the world on his phone ensuring everything goes to plan, but when the going gets tough, ultimately he relies on his wits, fists and feet.
Think outside the box
Max Zorin from A View to A Kill had concerns about rival companies in Silicon Valley muscling in on his turf. Most people would try to improve their business strategies, but not Max – he attempts to trigger a super-earthquake to destroy the whole area and kill millions. Don’t do that – it’s really mean – but there’s a lot to be said for seeking out unorthodox solutions to problems.
Accessorising well never hurt anyone
Without his hat, Oddjob from Goldfinger is just a kinda fat dude, but once he’s got his bowler he’s a badass assassin, the henchman of all henchmen. The right hat is crucial, though - a trilby, fedora or fez just wouldn’t send the right message. 'Dress for the job you want, even if that job is ‘murderous right-hand-man.'
Friday, October 23, 2015
Transform Your Boring Office
Coach Eats: How to Pimp a Tin of Beans
Baked beans, AKA the most versatile comfort food ever, just got a whole lot cooler. The best part is you can be useless and hungover from the night before and still bash this out in 10 minutes with minimal effort. All you need is some brown sugar, barbecue sauce, barbecue seasoning, any random beans you like (eg pinto/kidney/chickpeas/black beans), and any meat that takes your fancy (chicken and pulled pork is a good shout).
We’ve signed up Richard Coates, co-founder of London’s best barbecue joint Bodean’s, to school us in the art of manly cooking. He’ll be covering everything including culinary hacks like pimping a humble can of baked beans, full-blown meal inspiration like searing a steak to perfection, and essential kitchen skills like this 60-second masterclass in baked bean badness.
Want Coach to teach you a particular skill in the kitchen? Follow us on Twitter here and hashtag your culinary request #CoachEats.