LoughboroBlade
Well-Known Member
After David Weir was appointed I decided to give his autobiography, Extra Time, a read to try and get a bit more background on his time in football and what we can expect to see from him as manager. I'm not going to do an in-depth review, but thought a few might be interested in some of what's in it.
First thing to probably say is that he had a less-than-orthodox route into playing for a British player. He hadn't been picked up by any major clubs in Scotland, had stayed in school, and by chance played in a tournament in Skegness with Scotland's U18 schoolboys team. From that he was offered a soccer scholarship by two people scouting for the University of Evansville in the US who happened to be at the tournament.
In his 3rd year at Evansville (when he was 20) Weir was actually converted into a "free-scoring centre-forward", scoring 24 goals in that season. This was alongside players at other US colleges at the time such as Alexi Lalas, Cobi Jones, Joe-Max Moore, Kasey Keller and Brad Friedel. As a result of this, he didn't get back to Scotland and play his first competitive game until he was 22, for Falkirk.
There are three key managers that influence Weir's footballing philosophy. I started the book thinking Moyes and Jefferies would be the main ones - based on the book, they're both probably behind Craig Brown and, in particular, Walter Smith - who signed him twice and brought him back to the Scotland squad. This may of course have altered in the past year as he's worked more closely with Moyes. His respect for Smith is visible throughout. I've put some exerts below on particular people mentioned. Virtually nothing in there on United, other than a tiny mention on one game he played in against us. His uncle on his mother's side apparently played for us very briefly in the 60s/70s - Graeme Crawford.
Suffice it to say that by the end of it, he came across as a thoughtful player that likes to see the game played the right way, who values honesty and commitment, and who is extremely driven towards success. He's dealt with high pressure situations in his career and has been planning on what to do next for some time. He's ambitious - if he succeeds I suspect his stay might not be a long one.
On Smith:
"The biggest thing for me is how good he is at analysing situations and predicting what's going to happen both for yourself and the other team, tactically he's always ahead of the game. He also puts the team first, he's not a showman. He doesn't do anything for effect, he does it to win games - that's his rationale first and foremost. He always says to me the key to being a football manager is to assess your players and set your team up to give yourself the best chance of winning. Recently, when he's not had the resources to bring in the people he would have wanted and liked to, he has set up his teams accordingly. He's definitely got a big respect for Italian football and a big interest in it. He likes the way they play. Personally, I am probably from that school as well. I think good defensive play is an art as much as good attacking play is."
When he left Hearts for Everton, Weir was already in Smith's car halfway there before he'd spoken to Jefferies to tell him he was off. A bit of a surprise that given Jefferies had given him his chance at Falkirk and then taken him with him to Hearts.
On 4-1-4-1 under Moyes:
"The manager had obviously been a defender when he played and when it was him and Alan Irvine together, he would always take the defenders and Alan would take the forwards. It was as if that wasn't his forte. He had his ideas on what he wanted and how he would like to play and he would go through that in detail but probably came at it from a defender's perspective"
"You have got to be an exceptional player to play up front on your own and the way our system was you had to work really hard. Probably the best, over a period of time, was Marcus Bent in that good season we had but you could only play four or five games at that level, with the work rate the manager wanted, while trying to score goals and then you needed a rest. We needed a Didier Drogba or somebody like that, but those players are few and far between. Marcus made a great fist of it, Beatts could do it but I don't know if he could do it for a length of time. Andy Johnson could do it, but it was hard for them all to keep doing it consistently."
On Lee Carsley:
"If I wasn't convinced the manager rated me, I had to admire his ability to weld a team together. He had three different sources for players - those he had inherited, those he signed and the best of a promising batch that had been coming through consistently from our youth system. He got most of the calls right and was able to marry them altogether so they brought the best from each other. The key player at the club for me was one who had tried to back out of joining it when he heard Walter Smith might get sacked. Walter had signed Lee Carsley before losing his job and Lee wanted out of the deal to go back to Coventry, but the deal was done. He flourished under David Moyes. What a job he did for us. He held the team together. He was outstanding, a great player and a funny lad. He was a Brummie and used to get pelters for looking like Harry Hill, but had the best sense of humour, so blunt with great expressions that could knock you down. He also got on really well with the staff and was the life and soul of the place. He helped me, and he also helped the likes of Tim Cahill and Gravesen, in particular, to do their job and Kevin Kilbane and Gary Naysmith. He covered everything, a multitude of sins, the gaps that everybody else created."
On Adam Owen:
"We never had a fitness coach at Everton, but when he came back to Rangers, the gaffer brought Adam Owen in, on Kenny McDowall's say-so, I think, and he has been a key member of the staff too. I don't think you can do without a guy like Adam at your club now with the game getting faster and more fitness-based all the time."
On David Unsworth, who was on the same UEFA pro licence course that DW went on, there is very little to be honest, other than a slight question on his genuineness in this bit:
"David Unsworth was from Preston, not a million miles away from Merseyside, yet always portrayed himself as a big Everton fan and an adopted Scouser. Now he's working for Preston, I notice he has managed to reinvent himself as extremely proud of his roots there. David's not daft."
On Kris Boyd:
"Kris divides opinion in football. He always judged himself on how many goals he scored, that was all he was interested in, it was almost like him against the world. If he scored a goal it was two fingers up to the world, two fingers up to journalists etc. I enjoyed his company and he made me laugh. He could laugh at himself as well, he never took himself too seriously. You only had to see the ridiculous moustache he had grown himself around the time of that final to see that.
"He was perceived by some to be fat, slow and with a poor touch and it was said he couldn't do anything bar score goals. He constantly felt that the world was against him, but he could laugh at himself within that.... It's no accident he scored so many goals with his movement and aggression in the box, even in training. If you are the defender and marking him it's a nightmare. If the ball is there, he'll be first to it, whether he's a yard slower than you or not because he wants to score a goal so badly.... He was a bit of an enigma as a player. Some of his attributes were of the highest class, while others were nowhere near the same standard."
People he's critical of:
- David Ginola, "you got the impression with Ginola that he wasn't interested, that he was doing you a favour just coming in."
- Steven Pressley, I felt there were a few moments in the book where he targeted him for a bit of criticism, "I'd definitely decided to leave Hearts by this point. The atmosphere at the club had soured after our Scottish Cup win. Steven Pressley and Gary McSwegan had come in from Dundee United on more money than many of the existing players were on and that created resentment. Pressley, in particular, was unpopular. The culture we had created, the one that had taken us to the Cup win, became more 'them and us'." I'm sure he'll have been delighted by taking Carsley from him - could be an interesting couple of matches vs Coventry this season.
- Mitch Ward and Terry Phelan were part of a group of malcontents bringing the atmosphere down at Everton when he joined. " There comes a time when you are not playing when you just have to accept it and move to a club where you will start games."
- Berti Vogts, who he fell out with leading to him temporarily retiring from Scotland: "You could understand Berti to a point, but you couldn't get the detail he was trying to put across - if there was any. Maybe that was his way, but it felt to me like he was constantly frustrated by his lack of English, that he couldn't communicate what he knew to us. Jim Jefferies, for instance, wouldn't be a great tactician or a great theorist on how the game should be played, but you would certainly know what he was trying to say, whereas with Berti there was a bit of ambiguity as to what he was saying or where you were actually playing."
First thing to probably say is that he had a less-than-orthodox route into playing for a British player. He hadn't been picked up by any major clubs in Scotland, had stayed in school, and by chance played in a tournament in Skegness with Scotland's U18 schoolboys team. From that he was offered a soccer scholarship by two people scouting for the University of Evansville in the US who happened to be at the tournament.
In his 3rd year at Evansville (when he was 20) Weir was actually converted into a "free-scoring centre-forward", scoring 24 goals in that season. This was alongside players at other US colleges at the time such as Alexi Lalas, Cobi Jones, Joe-Max Moore, Kasey Keller and Brad Friedel. As a result of this, he didn't get back to Scotland and play his first competitive game until he was 22, for Falkirk.
There are three key managers that influence Weir's footballing philosophy. I started the book thinking Moyes and Jefferies would be the main ones - based on the book, they're both probably behind Craig Brown and, in particular, Walter Smith - who signed him twice and brought him back to the Scotland squad. This may of course have altered in the past year as he's worked more closely with Moyes. His respect for Smith is visible throughout. I've put some exerts below on particular people mentioned. Virtually nothing in there on United, other than a tiny mention on one game he played in against us. His uncle on his mother's side apparently played for us very briefly in the 60s/70s - Graeme Crawford.
Suffice it to say that by the end of it, he came across as a thoughtful player that likes to see the game played the right way, who values honesty and commitment, and who is extremely driven towards success. He's dealt with high pressure situations in his career and has been planning on what to do next for some time. He's ambitious - if he succeeds I suspect his stay might not be a long one.
On Smith:
"The biggest thing for me is how good he is at analysing situations and predicting what's going to happen both for yourself and the other team, tactically he's always ahead of the game. He also puts the team first, he's not a showman. He doesn't do anything for effect, he does it to win games - that's his rationale first and foremost. He always says to me the key to being a football manager is to assess your players and set your team up to give yourself the best chance of winning. Recently, when he's not had the resources to bring in the people he would have wanted and liked to, he has set up his teams accordingly. He's definitely got a big respect for Italian football and a big interest in it. He likes the way they play. Personally, I am probably from that school as well. I think good defensive play is an art as much as good attacking play is."
When he left Hearts for Everton, Weir was already in Smith's car halfway there before he'd spoken to Jefferies to tell him he was off. A bit of a surprise that given Jefferies had given him his chance at Falkirk and then taken him with him to Hearts.
On 4-1-4-1 under Moyes:
"The manager had obviously been a defender when he played and when it was him and Alan Irvine together, he would always take the defenders and Alan would take the forwards. It was as if that wasn't his forte. He had his ideas on what he wanted and how he would like to play and he would go through that in detail but probably came at it from a defender's perspective"
"You have got to be an exceptional player to play up front on your own and the way our system was you had to work really hard. Probably the best, over a period of time, was Marcus Bent in that good season we had but you could only play four or five games at that level, with the work rate the manager wanted, while trying to score goals and then you needed a rest. We needed a Didier Drogba or somebody like that, but those players are few and far between. Marcus made a great fist of it, Beatts could do it but I don't know if he could do it for a length of time. Andy Johnson could do it, but it was hard for them all to keep doing it consistently."
On Lee Carsley:
"If I wasn't convinced the manager rated me, I had to admire his ability to weld a team together. He had three different sources for players - those he had inherited, those he signed and the best of a promising batch that had been coming through consistently from our youth system. He got most of the calls right and was able to marry them altogether so they brought the best from each other. The key player at the club for me was one who had tried to back out of joining it when he heard Walter Smith might get sacked. Walter had signed Lee Carsley before losing his job and Lee wanted out of the deal to go back to Coventry, but the deal was done. He flourished under David Moyes. What a job he did for us. He held the team together. He was outstanding, a great player and a funny lad. He was a Brummie and used to get pelters for looking like Harry Hill, but had the best sense of humour, so blunt with great expressions that could knock you down. He also got on really well with the staff and was the life and soul of the place. He helped me, and he also helped the likes of Tim Cahill and Gravesen, in particular, to do their job and Kevin Kilbane and Gary Naysmith. He covered everything, a multitude of sins, the gaps that everybody else created."
On Adam Owen:
"We never had a fitness coach at Everton, but when he came back to Rangers, the gaffer brought Adam Owen in, on Kenny McDowall's say-so, I think, and he has been a key member of the staff too. I don't think you can do without a guy like Adam at your club now with the game getting faster and more fitness-based all the time."
On David Unsworth, who was on the same UEFA pro licence course that DW went on, there is very little to be honest, other than a slight question on his genuineness in this bit:
"David Unsworth was from Preston, not a million miles away from Merseyside, yet always portrayed himself as a big Everton fan and an adopted Scouser. Now he's working for Preston, I notice he has managed to reinvent himself as extremely proud of his roots there. David's not daft."
On Kris Boyd:
"Kris divides opinion in football. He always judged himself on how many goals he scored, that was all he was interested in, it was almost like him against the world. If he scored a goal it was two fingers up to the world, two fingers up to journalists etc. I enjoyed his company and he made me laugh. He could laugh at himself as well, he never took himself too seriously. You only had to see the ridiculous moustache he had grown himself around the time of that final to see that.
"He was perceived by some to be fat, slow and with a poor touch and it was said he couldn't do anything bar score goals. He constantly felt that the world was against him, but he could laugh at himself within that.... It's no accident he scored so many goals with his movement and aggression in the box, even in training. If you are the defender and marking him it's a nightmare. If the ball is there, he'll be first to it, whether he's a yard slower than you or not because he wants to score a goal so badly.... He was a bit of an enigma as a player. Some of his attributes were of the highest class, while others were nowhere near the same standard."
People he's critical of:
- David Ginola, "you got the impression with Ginola that he wasn't interested, that he was doing you a favour just coming in."
- Steven Pressley, I felt there were a few moments in the book where he targeted him for a bit of criticism, "I'd definitely decided to leave Hearts by this point. The atmosphere at the club had soured after our Scottish Cup win. Steven Pressley and Gary McSwegan had come in from Dundee United on more money than many of the existing players were on and that created resentment. Pressley, in particular, was unpopular. The culture we had created, the one that had taken us to the Cup win, became more 'them and us'." I'm sure he'll have been delighted by taking Carsley from him - could be an interesting couple of matches vs Coventry this season.
- Mitch Ward and Terry Phelan were part of a group of malcontents bringing the atmosphere down at Everton when he joined. " There comes a time when you are not playing when you just have to accept it and move to a club where you will start games."
- Berti Vogts, who he fell out with leading to him temporarily retiring from Scotland: "You could understand Berti to a point, but you couldn't get the detail he was trying to put across - if there was any. Maybe that was his way, but it felt to me like he was constantly frustrated by his lack of English, that he couldn't communicate what he knew to us. Jim Jefferies, for instance, wouldn't be a great tactician or a great theorist on how the game should be played, but you would certainly know what he was trying to say, whereas with Berti there was a bit of ambiguity as to what he was saying or where you were actually playing."
