NFR Football Managers' Wit

[Neil D]

It's hard to be sure how genuine the stories are which circulate concerning football managers' witticisms.  There's the one about the player who was so badly concussed that he no longer knew who he was and had to come off, according to the medical staff.  This provoked Brian Clough's 'Tell him he's Pele and keep him on.'  That's also attributed to the former manager of Partick Thistle.

I read one today in the Grauniad obit on Howard Kendall which I would dearly love to be true.  During his second stint as manager of Everton in the early 1990s he decided to introduce a team bonding session in a Chinese restaurant one Tuesday, after a run of poor results.  This involved a lot of drinking (Kendall seemingly liked a drink or two) and Everton went on to win the next three matches.  It was agreed the Tuesday sessions were responsible and would happen every week.  But when they lost, Kendall gathered the team together and said: 'Right lads, this Tuesday routine is clearly not working any more.  How  do you feel about Wednesdays?'