The power of perceptions and PR in football management

“Iwon’t ever be going to a top-four club because I’m not called Allardice, just Allardyce,” joked Sam Allardyce nearly a decade ago. He was the West Ham manager at the time and was fielding a question before a match with Manchester City. He quickly qualified that what he said was “tongue ” but there was a ring of truth to what he said. Allardyce had a PR problem, an issue that has only exacerbated in the nine years since he made that jibe to the roomful of reporters. Many other managers have struggled with the same issue in recent years.

Even if manager PR is not a tangible thing, there is no doubt it affects coaches’ job prospects, especially in an era when the sheer mention of a club being linked with a new boss can inspire a huge reaction online. Terrace opinions have always influenced the game, but social media only magnifies perceptions, whether they are factual or not.

Allardyce’s comment suggests this issue is an exclusively British problem but it’s not. And it doesn’t always have to be a negative thing either, with just as many managers benefiting from positive PR when it comes to being in the frame for a job. There is a fair case that British managers are starting from a position of disadvantage, though. Allardyce has long been typecast as an old-school manager with dour, defensive values – “Fireman Sam” who is good for bludgeoning his way out of a relegation scrap but not a long-term fix for a forward-thinking club.

Some of this impression is caused by his demeanour and the jobs he has taken – particularly in recent years – although, inside the game, he was once considered at the forefront of the sports science revolution and, when given time, he has been successful in more jobs than not. But, as he lamented when being called in to do the West Brom job last December, his work in moulding Bolton into a star-studded team that finished in the top eight of the Premier League for four consecutive seasons does not get the recognition it might if another manager had achieved it.

“In the early years, it was about building your reputation as a good manager through all the divisions and finally building a reputation by taking Bolton to where they were. But most of that has been forgotten again now. It’s about who I am at this moment in time,” he said. “I’ve already had texts from my mates calling me Red Adair. I can’t get away from that tag.”

It seems he is not even respected for that anymore. Allardyce’s PR is in such bad shape that the Baggies’ relegation was almost celebrated by many on social media as a sign that his out-of-date tactics no longer work. The reality is, once he had some real-time on the training pitch with his players, their results began to pick up as winter turned to spring – although it was too little too late to save them by then.

Allardyce is not alone. Recently appointed Newcastle boss Eddie Howe risks the same happening to him. Look at the reaction to reports of his appointment on social media and you would be forgiven for thinking the 43-year-old was arriving after failing at Bournemouth due to their relegation in 2020. Short shrift is given by some to how he guided the club from League Two to the Premier League and kept them there for five seasons.

There are reasonable questions about Howe’s suitability for the job given their current plight – his ratio of conceding an average of 1.74 goals per game in the Premier League for one thing – but there is little substance to the criticisms that dog him online. That potential deficiency leads us back to how manager PR can influence a club. Howe’s predecessor, Steve Bruce, was considered too defensive even though he played in a similar style to previous fans’ favourite Rafa Benítez, who curried more favour due to a better perception.

Across their two full Premier League seasons in the role, Bruce and Benítez’s sides achieved the same number of points, with the Englishman’s side outscoring the Spaniard’s and progressing further in the cups. What was the difference? Manager PR. It doesn’t have to rely on facts. Turning to another pragmatic manager was not a palatable option for Newcastle for this hire, even if it’s what the team needs most.

Once the swell of perception is against a manager, it can be hard to turn. Disapproval at their appointment means coaches are immediately starting on the back foot, narratives build and, when incidents play into those perceptions, they take on greater significance.

England manager Gareth Southgate is perhaps a victim of that too. He is the most successful England boss since Alf Ramsey, having led them to a World Cup semi-final in 2018 and the Euro 2020 final but Southgate is considered too conservative and too reactive with his substitutions in key moments. Of course, there’s no smoke without fire. But considering England have only been behind for nine minutes in normal time in the tournament knockout matches Southgate has managed, the reputation he has been given seems to unfairly accentuate the negative. When he eventually leaves his post, his caution will be cited as a key reason.

A fair proportion of the sentiment that drives a manager power ranking is hype. Two seasons ago, Nuno Espírito Santo was on the up after guiding Wolves to two seventh-place finishes. After a bottom-half finish without talisman Raúl Jiménez last year and a short stint at Tottenham this season, he has been moved towards the Premier League undesirables. Paulo Fonseca, on the other hand, is a relative unknown to most English fans but, due to his links to vacancies in recent months, he has built an online reputation among some as the coveted hire.

There is still hope for those bosses trying to improve their PR, though, and it comes in the form of David Moyes. The West Ham boss – who managed his 1,000th game earlier this month – had almost become a laughing stock after leaving his successful tenure at Everton to take over Manchester United in 2013. So much so that, by the time he was given the Hammers job midway through the 2017-18 season, he was not trusted enough to be given it permanently. Since returning in 2019, he has proved he didn’t become a bad manager overnight. Far from it.

Instead, one of Moyes’s biggest deficiencies seemed to be the jobs he picked. He couldn’t refuse the opportunity to succeed Alex Ferguson at Old Trafford, but it was always a poisoned chalice; adapting to La Liga at Real Sociedad was always going to be a challenge, and the least said about the decision to take over Sunderland the better.

By the time he walked out of the Stadium of Light, following a relegation that was years in the making, his reputation was in tatters and his manager PR rating was rock bottom. But if we can take anything from his renaissance in the past two seasons, it’s that, in a world of extremes where we make strong judgements quickly, we should not be so speedy to write managers off. Even if their name is Allardyce.