I happened to watch Jack to a King – The Swansea Story on iPlayer the other day, unwittingly kicking off a feast of sporting documentaries that has included Leicester’s Impossible Dream, England in the 90s, and Jimmy Hill: A Man for All Seasons. All of which were excellent, but the Swansea one is a particularly good story, well told – another welcome heart-warming tale in the cold-hearted world of professional football. It is also a reminder, in the cartoon villain Tony Petty, that we can produce our own unfit and improper persons to own football clubs, and, coming a few days after he was shown the door at Everton, it was interesting to get an insight into Roberto Martinez.
It was at Swansea that Martinez cut his managerial teeth, winning the League 1 title in 2008. And winning it in style. Even losing in style, according to Kev Johns, official hype man at the Liberty Stadium: “It’s very rare that you go home from a game that you’ve lost and you say ‘what a great game of football that was.'”
Rare for a reason, as Everton fans like my pal Joe will attest. Losing great – “phenomenal” – games of football wears a little thin after a while. Especially when the manager is seemingly unable and, most frustratingly, unwilling to arrest the slide by compromising his philosophy. Especially when Leicester – Leicester! – are winning the league.
Leicester winning the league has held up a mirror to the Premier League, showing up the stale sense of entitlement at so many clubs. Aside from Leicester, who else should Everton have finished ahead of? There has been a lot of talk of this Everton squad being the strongest since the glory days of the mid to late 1980s, but what does it matter when every other team, flush with TV money, can say the same?
And just how good is this current Everton squad? What if Tim Howard, Phil Jagielka, Leighton Baines and Gareth Barry are no longer the players they were? What if John Stones and Ross Barkley are yet to be the players they will be? What if there is an over reliance on Romelu Lukaku? What if he’s not that much better than Luis Saha?
But expectations had been raised. Mostly, it must be said, by Roberto Martinez. Firstly, by his actions – steering Everton to a fifth place finish and a record Premier League points haul in his first season – and then by his words. It is here, like Brendon Rodgers at Liverpool, where Martinez was the architect of his own downfall. Certainly, without Martinez’s guff about phenomenal progress, two cup semi-finals and a disappointing mid-table finish could have been more acceptable.
There is another telling moment in the Swansea film. 2-1 down to Hull in a game they needed to win to avoid relegation to the Conference on the last day of the 2000/01 season, Swansea striker James Thomas said this about his then team-mate: “If there’s anyone you want out on the pitch to try and gee you up and, you know, take the positives out of a bad situation, you know – Roberto Martinez.”
It seems a little jarring to be critical of ambition and positivity, but with Martinez, by the end, it bordered on delusion.
Talking of delusion, here’s a theory. It was inspired by Frankie Boyle’s latest piece in the Guardian, in which he wrote that he understood “Cameron saying he thinks Britain is still a great country (talking something up is a good way to get the best price when you’re selling it)”. Bill Kenwright has been trying to find an investor for ever. Perhaps it is no coincidence one was found during Martinez’s reign.
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On the subject of Everton, I would like (somewhat ironically) to put up a defence for John Stones. In fact, he put up a pretty succinct argument in the home game against Spurs earlier this season, Cruyff turning his way out of trouble in his own penalty area. Having won a free kick, Stones gestured to the fans, who had been howling for him to get rid it of it, to calm down.
That the fans were howling says much of the attitude in this country to ball-playing centre-halves – and perhaps, more broadly, to skill and risk. When we’re not bemoaning the lack of ball-playing centre-halves, we’re yelling for our centre-halves to lump it in Row Z.
That’s not to say Stones shouldn’t be subjected to criticism, and Martinez had every right to drop him, but don’t lose sight of the fact that Stones is still only 21. And, as 3 centre-halves (ball-playing or otherwise) in the squad for the Euros suggests, the defensive cupboard is pretty bare. Gone are the days – I was going to say glory days, but they weren’t that glorious – of Rio Ferdinand, Sol Campbell, John Terry, Ledley King and Jamie Carragher vying for a starting spot.
Unless I’m guilty of swallowing Martinez’s hype, I’d play Stones in the Euros. Let’s face it, England are going to struggle defensively, whoever plays. Why not play Stones alongside Smalling? There is a case to be made that Stones’ game is better suited to the less hectic international game, and he will look a better player in a better team. Stones’ last cap, against Holland, should not be remembered for one slip when everything else he did was so compelling.