Graham Spies interview with Steve Clarke

[kfc_superteam]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/steve-clarke-my-playing-career-means-a-hell-of-a-lot-more-to-me-than-my-career-as-a-coach-b38txdf08

[bornin65]

Great reading ! 

[Dillinger]

Love how he bats away stupid questions like this 

 

But surely, I suggest, you have to adjust, from working at Chelsea or West Bromwich Albion, to working at Kilmarnock? The players, for one thing, are of inferior quality. “No, the adjustment will have to be on their [the players’] part. I work the same way and I’ll apply the same training drills. But, if my Kilmarnock players apply themselves day in and day out, then they will get better as footballers.

[BlueKillie]

Can someone copy of over here, can't be bothered signing up just to read an article

[Killieboykfc]

When Steve Clarke chose to accept the Kilmarnock job three weeks ago, his dad, now in his 80s and still living in Saltcoats, said to him: “Are you crazy? Why don’t you just go and enjoy your retirement?” But that wasn’t an option. The zeal which has driven Clarke on for more than 40 years in football is still active.

The new Kilmarnock manager, even after all these years, remains elusive and almost an unknown quantity in his home nation. It is 30 years since Clarke left St Mirren for a £400,000 fee to join Chelsea, where he enjoyed 11 prolific seasons. We saw him on TV, we read about him in the papers, he got an occasional cap for Scotland, but still many Scots asked: “Just who is Steve Clarke?”

I just like to get on with my work and be left alone. I don’t need headlines

His image then took on near-mystical aspects when José Mourinho, the new hot thing in European football, plucked Clarke from his youth team position at Chelsea to be his assistant back in 2004. Suddenly this reserved, understated Scot was a confidant of the greatest coach in the modern game.

“I don’t go around throwing my name about, I’m not into self-publicity,” says Clarke. “It is pretty rare that I’m even doing an interview like this — it’s not something I do very often. But I understand that, right now, maybe I’m a hotter topic in Scottish football, just in coming to Kilmarnock. But I don’t put myself forward.

“I just like to get on with my work. I think in all the jobs I’ve had, the people I’ve worked with will all tell you that I’m a good, diligent worker, I’m professional, that I do my job properly. That is enough for me. I don’t need the headlines and I don’t need to be bummed up. I just like to do my job and be left alone.”

Clarke is now 54 years old. You have to be of a certain vintage to remember his playing days. He was beloved of Chelsea fans: strong, reliable, never shirking anything, a regular for over a decade at Stamford Bridge. A few seasons ago some Chelsea fans voted him their greatest ever right back.

Today Clarke has forged his reputation as a coach, but he has some surprising thoughts about that. “I don’t want my career to be defined by what I’ve done since I stopped playing,” he says. “My career as a player means a hell of a lot more to me than my career as a coach or manager. My playing days were my best days.

“I’ve experienced nothing to change my mind on that — and I’ve had some great times as a coach. But I wouldn’t swap one minute of my playing career for the times I’ve had as a coach.”

The misapprehension persists that, back in 2004, Clarke was in with the bricks at Chelsea and that Mourinho merely inherited him upon his arrival at Stamford Bridge. The truth is somewhat different. Mourinho had asked to speak to all the club’s coaching staff in his search for an assistant, including Chelsea’s youth coaches such as Clarke, and then took a few weeks before announcing that the Scot was the one he favoured as his number two. It was quite an elevation for the quiet Ayrshireman.

“I’d always had my own ideas about coaching,” he says. “But when José came in to Chelsea, not only did I feel he reinforced my ideas, but he took them to a different level. Working with José was an education.

“He was different from the way most British managers worked. He changed the mindset of most of the coaches over here. He came in with a totally different way of playing and a totally different philosophy. He showed more attention to detail, he was very meticulous, even in his training sessions. I think he raised the bar.

“Everybody commented on it. I think even if you spoke to Sir Alex Ferguson he would tell you that, suddenly, Chelsea had moved the goalposts with José’s arrival, and Manchester United had to respond to it.

“We worked well together. Wherever José has gone he has always wanted someone from the club there working with him, someone who knows the club well. So I think I was important to him in his early days in English football. I knew about the league, the players, the style of play. But he was a quick learner.”

In the years since a seemingly endless sequence of No 2 jobs came and went Clarke’s way — at Chelsea, West Ham and Liverpool — but when he did finally get the No 1 gig in 2012 at West Bromwich Albion his star shone briefly before his sacking.

In his one full season at the Hawthorns in 2012-13 Clarke took West Bromwich Albion to their highest Premier League position — eighth — before Romelu Lukaku left and the team ran out of steam. “We were as high as fourth at one point, but to finish eighth in the EPL, I would class that as almost akin to lifting a trophy,” he says. “That was not the norm for West Brom. The expectation there was simply to stay — survive — in the top flight. So I felt I had a really good start to my managerial career.”

Having been sacked by West Bromwich the following season, Clarke then took on a disastrous situation at Reading, where he lasted 12 months as their manager. The team was in upheaval and wages needed slashed. Yet he took Reading to within minutes of an FA Cup final in 2015 when a disastrous goalkeeping error by Adam Federici cost his team against Arsène Wenger and Arsenal.

Suddenly, following a second sacking, Clarke’s reputation looked damaged. “So I took time out,” he says. “I needed a period of reflection. I can’t really control how people judge the job I’ve done as a manager in the two positions I’ve held. But what I’ve always had are my beliefs and principles about coaching, about how to make players better.”

I don’t look at the environment, I look at the job. The challenge of Kilmarnock appealed to me

After life at Chelsea, West Ham United and Liverpool — where he was No 2 to Kenny Dalglish — has Clarke had to adapt to the more humble setting of Rugby Park?

“Nope. I don’t look at the environment, I look at the job. I was attracted to this job. It’s a challenge on a different scale from what I’ve been used to, but that appealed to me.

“It doesn’t feel small. I’m still the manager, I’ve got players to look after, I’ve got staff to look after, I’ve got games I need to win.

“The size of the football club doesn’t matter to me. The challenge is there, it is the same job, giving you the same problems, requiring the same solutions. Hopefully, it will give me the same enjoyment, but I’m sure there will be the same disappointments too. That’s the life of a football manager.”

But surely, I suggest, you have to adjust, from working at Chelsea or West Bromwich Albion, to working at Kilmarnock? The players, for one thing, are of inferior quality. “No, the adjustment will have to be on their [the players’] part. I work the same way and I’ll apply the same training drills. But, if my Kilmarnock players apply themselves day in and day out, then they will get better as footballers.

“My goal right now is to try and get three points on Sunday against Hearts. Then, medium term, just keep us safe in the league this year. After that, it is about speaking to the board and, hopefully, trying to build a stronger Kilmarnock FC in order to move forward, on and off the pitch.

“It is important for me to engage with the fans. The other night against Hibs they were magnificent — they won’t always clap us off after a 3-0 defeat. But I think they enjoyed the way we tried to play. I want to build up the crowds here and, hopefully, entertain the Kilmarnock public.

“I remember Kilmarnock crowds in the past of 14,000 or 15,000. I know it has been a tough time in recent years for Kilmarnock and parts of Ayrshire. But if we can coax some of them back, and put a smile on their faces some Saturdays, that would be a good thing. I want to help this club to grow again, maybe try to get it back to where it was 20 or 30 years ago.”

[Scooby_Doo]

Given the choice, lets go for 20 years ago please! 

[gdevoy]

9 hours ago, Dillinger said:

Love how he bats away stupid questions like this 

 

But surely, I suggest, you have to adjust, from working at Chelsea or West Bromwich Albion, to working at Kilmarnock? The players, for one thing, are of inferior quality. “No, the adjustment will have to be on their [the players’] part. I work the same way and I’ll apply the same training drills. But, if my Kilmarnock players apply themselves day in and day out, then they will get better as footballers.

The "The ball is still round and the pitch is still a rectangle." quote has achieved near Shankleyesque status.

[Merk]

1 hour ago, Scooby_Doo said:

Given the choice, lets go for 20 years ago please! 

Don't be so greedy.  10 years but get an apprentice coaching staff in place and allow him to instil his methodology throughout the club and give us a framework for the future.

[Candygram for mongo]

Graham Spiers should've asked him:

Did you not fancy taking on a job at a bigger club in the English Premier, Championship....or Falkirk? 

[Squirrelhumper]

4 minutes ago, Candygram for mongo said:

Graham Spiers should've asked him:

Did you not fancy taking on a job at a bigger club in the English Premier, Championship....or Falkirk? 

Ha, John Barnes has been giving him tight about that!

[Scooby_Doo]

15 minutes ago, Merk said:

Don't be so greedy.  10 years but get an apprentice coaching staff in place and allow him to instil his methodology throughout the club and give us a framework for the future.

I was meaning that I'd rather we got back to where we were 20 years ago, rather than where we were 30 years ago!! 

[Scouser2]

very impressive interview (again) from our new Manager.... can only hope things continue to improve both on and off the pitch at our club going forward

Over the past 5 years or more we have had to put up with some depressing viewing as fans and the club has wasted so much money on bad managers' and coaches- and we have witnessed a large swathe of vastly over rated and poor signings come and go very quickly most not making any impressing or value at all ---- luckily we somehow have kept in this league despite this but for most of the time its not been much fun to watch

[Merk]

35 minutes ago, Scooby_Doo said:

I was meaning that I'd rather we got back to where we were 20 years ago, rather than where we were 30 years ago!! 

Ha I’m a moron as I thought that when I originally read the article but took your comment differently when i read it 

[piffer]

He speaks very well. Others have talked about instilling a big club mentality but I have high hopes we might actually see it now. As a relative stranger coming into the league and having been at such a high level there is no fear factor for any opponent. Hopefully it stays like that.

[Dillinger]

See on the BBC article today he was asked about the standard of Scottish football and he's said folk need to stop talking it down. Makes the point the English are good at doing the opposite and talking their game up, even though the standard is often poor 

[Mark Robertson]

3 minutes ago, Dillinger said:

See on the BBC article today he was asked about the standard of Scottish football and he's said folk need to stop talking it down. Makes the point the English are good at doing the opposite and talking their game up, even though the standard is often poor 

I'm on here or the old site, in a previous incarnation, where I stated that Scottish football was as good, if not more exciting than English football and the English game was s**te overall and only got so much attention because of Sky and other media hype. I got slated for it but many people are coming round to my way of thinking now, nice to read that our demigod like manager feels the same as me lol

[carpetfitter]

6 hours ago, Scouser2 said:

very impressive interview (again) from our new Manager.... can only hope things continue to improve both on and off the pitch at our club going forward

Over the past 5 years or more we have had to put up with some depressing viewing as fans and the club has wasted so much money on bad managers' and coaches- and we have witnessed a large swathe of vastly over rated and poor signings come and go very quickly most not making any impressing or value at all ---- luckily we somehow have kept in this league despite this but for most of the time its not been much fun to watch

Agree. When you consider how cack we've been, it's amazing that we're still in the top league.

[Wrangodog]

"My Kilmarnock players". I love how that sounds, a simple statement but I don't recall many previous Killie managers saying it. 

[casual observer]

If he does what Rodgers has done at Celtic ~ fundamentally made their players better than when he joined, taking their results out of it, then he’ll have more than earned his salary and enhanced his reputation. We need to expect a few bumps in the short term though while he gets his messages across and the players adapt. The future’s bright!

[skygod]

Nothing wrong with talking the game up but don't kid yourself that it rivals the EPL.

The ball was given away too easily too many times yesterday, which I'm sure they would acknowledge and the players' technique isn't good enough consistently. 

The period of play leading up to the second goal, either side of the Hearts chance, is what we should be aiming to reproduce more consistently - short passing on the ground, progressing up the pitch. It was textbook. 

Too many long hopeful punts still at the moment but it's early days. 

 

 

[bute-killiefan]

The difference has already been great. I was convinced our squad was decent, it just needed a better coach, but to think about the caliber of player he is likely to bring in is exciting. Feel like a 10 year old again, I'm going out the back to play with my coca cola ball

[Ken T]

Every time I hear or read this guy I am even more in love with him!!

[livvy]

So many of the incumbents we had before came in and talked us down. Highlighted our weaknesses.

Clarke has walked in the door and made it very clear he is the manager, it is his squad and that he is responsible. What a weight that must be off the players shoulders...especially some of the younger ones.

Edited November 6, 2017 by livvy
Typo

[skygod]

This was the most interesting section for me:

"But surely, I suggest, you have to adjust, from working at Chelsea or West Bromwich Albion, to working at Kilmarnock? The players, for one thing, are of inferior quality. 'No, the adjustment will have to be on their [the players’] part. I work the same way and I’ll apply the same training drills. But, if my Kilmarnock players apply themselves day in and day out, then they will get better as footballers.'"

 

It should boost the players' self-confidence that they are being trained the way the stars were, with no concessions for ability.

Unfortunately, some of them will either not adapt to the higher standard required and some might not even apply themselves. I think that more will succeed than fail though.

One thing I don't think SC has spoken about is his attitude towards loans. I hope he will use that market selectively and not take the Lee Clark approach. I can't see the latter happening though.

 

 

[bute-killiefan]

30 minutes ago, skygod said:

This was the most interesting section for me:

"But surely, I suggest, you have to adjust, from working at Chelsea or West Bromwich Albion, to working at Kilmarnock? The players, for one thing, are of inferior quality. 'No, the adjustment will have to be on their [the players’] part. I work the same way and I’ll apply the same training drills. But, if my Kilmarnock players apply themselves day in and day out, then they will get better as footballers.'"

 

It should boost the players' self-confidence that they are being trained the way the stars were, with no concessions for ability.

Unfortunately, some of them will either not adapt to the higher standard required and some might not even apply themselves. I think that more will succeed than fail though.

One thing I don't think SC has spoken about is his attitude towards loans. I hope he will use that market selectively and not take the Lee Clark approach. I can't see the latter happening though.

 

 

Fantastic point, for a player looking at this, knowing the training is on the level of the English Premiership, the Special One himself, will be a massive boost