sjb958
15 Apr 2004, 06:37 PM
Here is part one of the Over Land and Sea interview released Saturday 10 April. The Interviewer's speech is in normal writing with Alan Pardew's speech in italics: and speechmarks.
First of all Alan, I just want to say that you need to be aware that anything you say to us today, when it comes out in the fanzine on Saturday, could well be in Sunday's News of the World headline. It has happened many times in the past and has caught a few people unawares, likewise when we have doe interviews with previous West Ham managersm what we have tried to do is take things right back to the beginning, and with you, back to your days with Reading. Is that ok to start there?
"Yeah that's fine we can go back to that if you want."
Thanks. So starting off, when the vacancy came up at West Ham, your name was being banded about, but there was no official comment from West Ham about you, and there were no official comments coming out of reading about you leaving to come to us.
It looked to be all newspaper speculation. What was really going on in the background then, assuming things were happening that we weren't party to?
"Well a bit like the rest of you I guess, I was watching the press because that's the only way I could watch it really, and i could see that the reports linking me with the club were getting stronger, but the bottom line was that as soon as I knew that West Ham wanted me - it was simple, I wanted to come. There was no doubt in my mind at all."
And why was that then? Why were you so keen to come to West Ham?
“Why? It’s such a big club and is such a challenge. My best mate is a West Ham fan so I knew all of the club’s history and wanted to be part of that”
Really? Is that it?
“I know that probably sounds strange, but knowing your best mate is in your ear all the time, West Ham this, West Ham that – he was driving me mad.”
Didn’t you think about the consequences of a rash decision like that?
“Like what?”
Like if it all went tits up, you’d end up losing your best mate!
“Yeah and he gets on the phone regularly now, don’t worry about that, he’s well on the case.”
Well where you were at Reading, it looked ok to the outside. And on Saturday we saw Reading have a great stadium, I also know that they have great training facilities, and to the outside world a Chairman who wants to do well and you have come to West Ham obviously as a career move, but obviously for better wages too and more money for players?
“Look at Upton Park, now that’s a great stadium, you can’t beat the atmosphere at a home game. What really appealed to me was the position of the club. The fact that I knew it would be a challenge to get this club back in the premiership and build a dynamic young team and to be fair the Chairman has given me the resources to do this. And I think that is the kind of situation that suits me best. That’s where I do good. And I think that is a strength that I have.”
Did you feel then that you had taken reading as far as you could?
“No, I wouldn’t say that. Well I suppose I did and I didn’t. I did because we were in a great position but at the same token, to go to the next level I didn’t really get those sounds from the Chairman. I wasn’t really getting those messages.”
So you looked at West Ham, and you thought it was a job that you could really get your teeth into?
“I just felt that I am from London, they brought me back to London, I know the market in Division One, I knew where they were and where we wanted to go as a club and I still maintain that this team can get in the Premier League and those were the thoughts I had at the time”
So how did it come around then, I mean, this was you, scanning the newspapers, listening to your mate on his blower and all that, how did it all materialize from that? What happened, did West Ham go to you or to Madejski or what, Alan?
“They, West Ham, made an official approach for me”
West Ham approached reading as simple as that?
“Yeah, simple as that”
Alan, how did you know that West Ham were till prepared to seriously pursue you bearing in mind all the facts and the mess that was starting to build up around it all ?
“Well once I resigned, I could obviously talk to them”
But between that time and the time when you were told West Ham approached Reading for you, but you couldn’t talk to them how were you so sure that West Ham were still interested? West Ham might have decided to give up the chase and grab someone else?
“And I did think about that. That was the chance.”
You could have resigned and then had nowhere to go?
“I could have, yeah”
Did you see videos of the games and all that Alan?
“Things only changed after I had signed for West Ham after going to court. When I was West Ham it all changed.”
If I had been in your position and I knew I was coming to this club I would want to know about everything. I would want to know about the board, the players, the facilities, the fans, everything, strengths, weaknesses, all the things you needed to know that you had to put right. Were people sending you videos to watch the games?
“That’s what I’m saying. After I went to the court, and I was now the West Ham United manager, that’s when the gardening kicked in for three months, that’s when I did the videos, books the whole shebang. And I was also then able to speak to Trevor (Brooking) and find out everything I needed to know really”
But basically before then, nothing. Not even a sneaky look at a video?
“No. I could only look in from the outside.”
Going back quickly a minute, at the time there were some really heavy contenders floated about. And it looked to me as though Iain Dowie might come and nick it at the death.
“Yeah but that didn’t happen, they chose me. But also from that point, I knew that West Ham were prepared to pay a fee for me as well as just wanting me and waiting. So it’s the same at any time, if someone wants you that badly, that adheres you to them.”
Sure it’s always nice to be wanted. That sort of thing would give anyone a buzz.
“That’s right. So I was like ‘great someone really, really wants me’, I’m having that”
There were things you said the other week after the Milwall game that stood out. I don’t know what publications you read before that game with Milwall, but it meant a whole lot more than maybe you thought.
“Of course I knew what it meant to the fans. I know what local derbies are all about, London derbies. I knew what it meant to palace to play Milwall, let alone a club this size. It was a disappointing result but we’ve addressed that and are looking at the games ahead.”
I was in bed at eight ‘o clock that night! That’s how much I hurt. You know what I mean? I have been to every Milwall game we have played, and I am now fifty years old, but I have been to every Milwall home and away, and I can’t tell you how painful that display was for me. Anyway, Alan, all of your teams have always reflected hard work and graft.
“Yeah , well, I’m not being funny but it is only since I have been here, and the early days at Reading, that I have had games like that. And it looks like people aren’t bothered but it’s not that, it’s all about confidence levels and you’re looking for someone to spark you off and on that day, it just didn’t happen. But we are still going right now. And this is what I am trying to explain to people. You have just had relegation, you have had a huge, huge blow to everybody at this club. No one thought you where going to get relegated. The players are too good, the club is too big, the fans are too loyal. Bang – you go down. Then players are going and there are more negative, and the players who are here are having to suffer all those negatives. All your fans saying ‘well what about Michael?, what about Jermain leaving? What about this?, what about that?, Bloody hell why did we go down?. And they get that wherever they go, they keep getting them knocks, you know what I mean?”
“So we are trying to turn them into a promotion, where everyone is going ‘you aren’t half a good player’. Look at today, we’ve got Walsall today, we’re going to thump them four-nil, go on Michael, go on such and such. And things don’t tilt that quickly. Look at Sunderland, and Sunderland have done really well lately; they had ten games at the back of last year, “Mick Mccarthy’s got to go, he ain’t won a game, it’s the worst run in the premiership’ you know?”
“Then he had a little mess about, then he had a preseason, the whole staff had changed by then already, but we are still going through that change with a new manager coming in. What have we had, three managers, Glenn, Trevor, Me? You know, it’s been a very traumatic time.”
Aren’t you accustomed to that though, because when you took over at Reading, weren’t they in the bottom three in Division Two?
“Yeah, but they only got to tenth that year. But then we were going from relegation, well potential relegation, to mediocrity.”
Sure, but that is still a good turnaround, Alan.
“Yeah it is, but what I am trying to say is that what we are trying to do this year, is to change……. To get a relegated club, who should never have been relegated, in terms of the club’s stature, that belief of everybody, and not just the fans, all the people who haven’t the belief in the club that they should have.”
You said about that after you first joined us if I remember correctly. You said that a few things surprised you about the place. One was the politics, and one was the atmosphere around the place with everyone feeling sorry for themselves. You said that was prevalent at the club.
“Well you get that if so and so gets injured, or if someone is ill. Or when Jermain gets sent off when he shouldn’t have got sent off, “it always happens to us’ that culture.”
I think you said it after the Sheffield United game when they scored the third late goal.
“That’s right, that’s when I said it, yeah, yeah.”
You said it was the culture of the club to say that something like that always happened to us and you wanted to change that.
“That’s right because if you go to any other club, and take Reading, we get into the playoff final and lose. It always happens to us. No it don’t. It don’t. And we have got to change that. And we are going to change that. We are going to go forward.”
Did you know it all about Jermain before you came to the club?
“Yeah I knew what was going on”
You knew that you had little chance of keeping him? That lock stock and barrel, there wasn’t a chance really of him seeing the season through with us?
“Yeah I knew that there was a problem with him staying at the club.”
Alan, even though you were a manager elsewhere, didn’t it shock you that the day after we were relegated he announced he wanted to leave. Even looking in as an outsider, didn’t you think that was real bad?”
“Yeah I think everybody in the game thought that was a move that hadn’t been well thought out. But you have to look at Jermain and say that he is with a big company. And the advice that he got at the time was obviously not the right advice for him.”
Ok, staying with Jermain now we are with him, were you certain that Jermain would be going or did you have some kind of hope that you could keep him at the club?
“I knew that he had to go this summer at the very, very latest because he only had one year left and he could get parked in Europe and we would not get one penny for him.”
So did you think that you could keep him until the end of this season?
“I thought that I would keep Jermain until the end of this year. That was my plan That’s what I really hoped I could do.”
He was the bullets for your gun for the First Division season?
“Yeah”
So who sold him, you or the club?
“He sold himself at the end.”
I spoke to him on the Saturday, at the Rotherham game and asked him if he was going, but he said he was happy to stay for the rest of the season. By the Sunday, he had gone.
“What happened was the sending off…… When I look back at this season, the thirteen games, the five and five and then a three. I mean I inherited his first suspension, well I think I did. But he got sent off – five games, then sent off again, five more games. I mean, West Brom, we were leading three-two and I maintain to this day that if he had stayed on the pitch we would of won that game. Or at the very worse we would have got a draw.”
“And at Walsall we would have won comfortably. And we almost beat them with ten men. And don’t forget he got sent off inside ten minutes. So Jermain had ten games suspended and the two games missed when he got himself sent off, that is our season in big trouble. There is our catalyst player and we ain’t got him. So I had a six game suspension over me.”
Alan do you mind if I snap away with the camera?
“No, sure, is my hair alright!?”
No, it’s not, Anyway! Do you think that by that time he was so desperate to get away it didn’t matter which Premier League came in, he wanted to take it?
“Well I rang him up on the Sunday night and said ‘this doesn’t have to happen Jermain, it doesn’t have to happen.”
What did he say to you?
“He said he wanted to go. So that was it.”
So it was a case where you clearly wanted to keep him for the rest of the season, but he was just desperate to leave and you just had to let him go.
“There were three isssues. One, if he didn’t go in that window, he had to go in the summer window. Right? He had to go, and there was no doubt about that. He wasn’t going to sign for us, and he made that fundamentally clear, he wasn’t going to sign and we weren’t going to get any money. The second issue was the six game suspension hanging over his head, or five game or whatever it was, if he was sent off again.”
Wasn’t he unlucky to get sent off though?
“I have to be honest, I though the sending off at Walsall was awful. One of the worst decisions of the season.”
And even the West Brom one, you still defended him.
“I thought it was a booking, yeah.”
So if you felt that the Walsall one was awful and the West Brom one was a booking, then why are you assuming that he would get sent off again?
“Firstly because I thought referees were looking at him. The Walsall one in particular. Jermain Defoe, he’s been sent off once, he’s been sent off twice you know? So now, just one incident, just one tiny incident. I mean look at the Walsall one. If you had one more of them – six games. Hold on a minute. We ain’t gonna make this. So the bottom line, which I think you just can’t get away from, was that if he didn’t go in that window, then we could have gone to the summer, and he could have waited a year and we would have got nothing.”
What was attitude like in training, Alan?
“It was good”
He wasn’t a problem player to have around or anything?
“No he wasn’t a problem to me”
Fair enough. One thing with Jermain though, Alan, was when he was playing, was the early season stuff with him and David Connolly true-were there issues about them not passing to each other?
“No, this could apply to any pair of strikers, its difficult to pin someone down when they are in the boxes, they could have passed but they shot, because you want players to be direct, you want strikers to be greedy, and if it is just too difficult to try and pin someone down and say, you didn’t pass to him and we didn’t score. ‘But it was a clear chance for me gaffer.’ And there isn’t really an answer to that. There is no written rule, there is nothing that can be carved in iron in football, because everything is moving.”
I think a lot of the fans were upset on ITV’s late football night programme on the Thursday before he went saying that Defoe definitely wouldn’t be going and a couple of days later he went.
“I went on one of the channels and said that fingers crossed he wouldn’t go in the window, fingers crossed.”
But did you really know that he was on his way?
“I swear to God that I did not know he was going until Sunday when I got a call from Paul Aldridge.”
The next game we had after he had gone, we could see through your body language that you were pretty fed up about it.
“I was disappointed about it, of course I was. Forget about everything else, as a person, I like Jermain, he’s an alright guy.”
Do you think he will end up playing regularly at a very high level?
“Yeah, definitely. And I wasn’t lying when I said that in the press he would play for England. I have seen enough of him to know that. And he proved that last week.”
Is Martin Keown your type of player?
“Yes he would do a good job, although I don’t know where that one has just popped up from!”
It will keep! So what procedures did you really want to change and bring into the club when you joined then?
“ There are certain procedures that I feel work well for me as a manager that I wanted to bring in. One was an injury prevention programme which is about core strength and power and the causes, which I introduced straight away, and our injury record, which everyone said to me was a nightmare, it always happens to us, we always get injuries, etc, well we have hardly got anyone left. The only ones I have got left are the ones who are coming back from old injuries. I have got no muscular injuries at all.
“But don’t get me wrong, you get knocks and you get bad knees but at the moment we have got Rufus Brevett out, and we have got Steve Lomas just coming, and almost back, and that’s it. That’s our injury list.”
And Hutchinson as well.
“Hutch is on his way back from a knee op. And Rob Lee is just about to have a knee op. And you can’t change those. But you can stop muscular injuries, and that programme, the players can now see the benefit of because we are not getting muscular injuries. We had Connolly with a thigh strain not long after I had come and we are trying to eradicate that with this core strength and power. And you look at all the top clubs, the power of the player is very very important now. It is very important that these players have the stamina and the power to deal with top athletes. Go up against Arsenal in the tunnel – average height six foot one and not skinny Peter Crouch type players, proper physical specimens, and that is what we have to produce here.”
Out of David Connolly?
“Well David Connolly, I have to be honest, he doesn’t need much because he is right on his own personal programme anyway which was really good.”
Where did he pick that up?
“When he was over in Holland.”
Alan, it is more than clear when you watch the team that we need a new center back and if Jobi McAnuff isn’t your man for the right side of midfield, then a right midfielder as well.
“Well Jobi has been unlucky because he has been injured.”
I think we are desperate for someone to take the role of leader on the pitch. Would you agree with that? Anyone in mind?
“I am hoping that Lomey is going to come back.”
So has he still got a future at the club?
“Well the future lies with Lomey really. He has a fight on with himself right now more than anything with his injury.”
And what about Nigel Reo-Coker, Alan?
“Nigel was brought here because I knew that he was a bargain at that price. And I know he is going to be a player. And he is only nineteen, that’s all he is. And he needs a rest now really. Lomey would be ideal.”
I mentioned Martin Keown earlier, his professionalism and leadership qualities and the way he would be with the youngsters, and the likes of Chris Cohen who I reckon is eighteen months away….
“Might not be that long…..”
But it would be good for Chris and the rest of the youngsters if we brought someone in like that. And players like Keown are few and far between.
“They are, And there is also Gareth Southgate whom is a big pal of mine at Middlesbrough, and a lot of clubs are interested in Gareth, purely because of what he brings to the club. You have got to have your senior pros backing up what you are about. And most of the senior pros here, I have inhereited and to be fair, most have them have brought in and that is crucial that you get the right leadership.”
The players you have brough in , and there have been quite a lot of comings and a fair amount of goings too. The players that you have brought in, you are aiming for a certain type of player obviously, take the guys you brought in from Wimbledon, you said you were looking for aggressive players, your Reo-Coker, Nowland and McAnuff. How aggressive would you say they are in the shape of things?
“Well Nigel needs to be aggressive and has got a great voice too. He is a natural leader and looks a great player and remember he is only nineteen. Adam Nowland is a different kind of player. But I have been very pleased with him as well. He is actually a better player than I knew he was. And he will offer us something. I think that if Michael got injured, Adam Nowland might be the one who has to get in there and get on it for us.”
Do you think Steve Lomas can get in there and do the holding role now too?
“I think if Steve Lomas was fit, there would be no doubt that he would be playing in the midfield and I have said that to him. With all due respect to the players we have got here, when Steve Lomas is fit, he is a level above some of these players. And I have made it very clear to him that we need him back. Now we might get him back at a crucial time when we need him. Now this team who have just come together, because if you think about it we come together and we went on that run where we went about ten games and didn’t really get beat. This is the first time where we have been beat three times…..”
They have been crucial times as well.
“Yeah”
Alan I know we’re running out of time but before we wrap this up this first part mate, as it’s current and topical, we have to mention Marlon Harewood.
It has to be said that the majority of fans are baffled as to why you play him out wide when he is the division’s top scorer, What is the thought pattern behind that?
“Well most of his goals have come from the right hand side. And the bottom line, when you look at your team is, where do your goals come from? And you need eighty goals if you are going to be promoted in the first two. Well my gut feeling is, if I can get Marlon to play on the right hand side, and to be honest, if you remember Wolves away and Fulham away when he played there and there wasn’t a problem then, and no-one mentioned it then and he was offering us a goal from that side.”
Well, whenever we have spoken to him Alan, he has always said to us when we have asked him about being out on the right and he always give us the impression that he is happy to fit into the side wherever he is asked to play.
“Absolutely!”
But we expect to hear him say that, or any player to say that come to think of it.
“That’s right.”
You took Marlon off after twenty minutes or something at Reading. That was a tactical decision you said.
“Yeah”
Not any other reason?
“No, the role wasn’t working. And that’s how I manage. I don’t look at Marlon Harewood any differently to how I look at Darryl McMahon or I look at Christian Dailly or I look at Steve Lomas, they are in the team to do a job. My job is to make them understand the role and make sure the role is working.”
So we have established that you are looking players to do a certain job and stick to it.
“There are certain jobs in any establishment that are cast in iron and there is no grey area. You know what that job is. And it’s down to the coaching staff to correct these positions and we do. Anyway the last point that we are going to get onto now, because time is running well short is Hayden Mullins. I want to mention Hayden Mullins and you know I didn’t realize what Hayden Mullins is all about. Hayden Mullins was skipper for Crystal Palace for eight years.”
Alan I think he is a good player, I really do.
“And I think we have really missed him, by the way. When he came here I think he got caught in the headlights of this club. And they are bright headlights here. Over the years at Palace he was a model pro and was consistently good. Now at palace he was captain and nothing fazed him. But when he came here and I think he was overawed and I think that by his own admission he would say that and with that was with the place, with the fans, with the big players that were in the dressing room when he arrived when we first signed him. And I have seen what that can do. Now on top of that, I have brought in a nineteen year old a lad from Forest, I brought Adam Nowland and maybe it’s a little bit, you know, we have had a bit of a down spell and it’s my job to get us through it. And that’s why I explained to Hayden when he signed, that he was coming to a big set up and a big club. I told him that and that he was going to have to deal with it first and foremost before anything else. Now I think he is there. Lads, this is where we have to pull it…..”
And so we did….
Thank you to Gary Firmager, Bill Gardener, Dave Terries and Neil Clack for allowing us to publish the Alan Pardew interview (part one) on the Big Soccer West Ham messageboard.
First of all Alan, I just want to say that you need to be aware that anything you say to us today, when it comes out in the fanzine on Saturday, could well be in Sunday's News of the World headline. It has happened many times in the past and has caught a few people unawares, likewise when we have doe interviews with previous West Ham managersm what we have tried to do is take things right back to the beginning, and with you, back to your days with Reading. Is that ok to start there?
"Yeah that's fine we can go back to that if you want."
Thanks. So starting off, when the vacancy came up at West Ham, your name was being banded about, but there was no official comment from West Ham about you, and there were no official comments coming out of reading about you leaving to come to us.
It looked to be all newspaper speculation. What was really going on in the background then, assuming things were happening that we weren't party to?
"Well a bit like the rest of you I guess, I was watching the press because that's the only way I could watch it really, and i could see that the reports linking me with the club were getting stronger, but the bottom line was that as soon as I knew that West Ham wanted me - it was simple, I wanted to come. There was no doubt in my mind at all."
And why was that then? Why were you so keen to come to West Ham?
“Why? It’s such a big club and is such a challenge. My best mate is a West Ham fan so I knew all of the club’s history and wanted to be part of that”
Really? Is that it?
“I know that probably sounds strange, but knowing your best mate is in your ear all the time, West Ham this, West Ham that – he was driving me mad.”
Didn’t you think about the consequences of a rash decision like that?
“Like what?”
Like if it all went tits up, you’d end up losing your best mate!
“Yeah and he gets on the phone regularly now, don’t worry about that, he’s well on the case.”
Well where you were at Reading, it looked ok to the outside. And on Saturday we saw Reading have a great stadium, I also know that they have great training facilities, and to the outside world a Chairman who wants to do well and you have come to West Ham obviously as a career move, but obviously for better wages too and more money for players?
“Look at Upton Park, now that’s a great stadium, you can’t beat the atmosphere at a home game. What really appealed to me was the position of the club. The fact that I knew it would be a challenge to get this club back in the premiership and build a dynamic young team and to be fair the Chairman has given me the resources to do this. And I think that is the kind of situation that suits me best. That’s where I do good. And I think that is a strength that I have.”
Did you feel then that you had taken reading as far as you could?
“No, I wouldn’t say that. Well I suppose I did and I didn’t. I did because we were in a great position but at the same token, to go to the next level I didn’t really get those sounds from the Chairman. I wasn’t really getting those messages.”
So you looked at West Ham, and you thought it was a job that you could really get your teeth into?
“I just felt that I am from London, they brought me back to London, I know the market in Division One, I knew where they were and where we wanted to go as a club and I still maintain that this team can get in the Premier League and those were the thoughts I had at the time”
So how did it come around then, I mean, this was you, scanning the newspapers, listening to your mate on his blower and all that, how did it all materialize from that? What happened, did West Ham go to you or to Madejski or what, Alan?
“They, West Ham, made an official approach for me”
West Ham approached reading as simple as that?
“Yeah, simple as that”
Alan, how did you know that West Ham were till prepared to seriously pursue you bearing in mind all the facts and the mess that was starting to build up around it all ?
“Well once I resigned, I could obviously talk to them”
But between that time and the time when you were told West Ham approached Reading for you, but you couldn’t talk to them how were you so sure that West Ham were still interested? West Ham might have decided to give up the chase and grab someone else?
“And I did think about that. That was the chance.”
You could have resigned and then had nowhere to go?
“I could have, yeah”
Did you see videos of the games and all that Alan?
“Things only changed after I had signed for West Ham after going to court. When I was West Ham it all changed.”
If I had been in your position and I knew I was coming to this club I would want to know about everything. I would want to know about the board, the players, the facilities, the fans, everything, strengths, weaknesses, all the things you needed to know that you had to put right. Were people sending you videos to watch the games?
“That’s what I’m saying. After I went to the court, and I was now the West Ham United manager, that’s when the gardening kicked in for three months, that’s when I did the videos, books the whole shebang. And I was also then able to speak to Trevor (Brooking) and find out everything I needed to know really”
But basically before then, nothing. Not even a sneaky look at a video?
“No. I could only look in from the outside.”
Going back quickly a minute, at the time there were some really heavy contenders floated about. And it looked to me as though Iain Dowie might come and nick it at the death.
“Yeah but that didn’t happen, they chose me. But also from that point, I knew that West Ham were prepared to pay a fee for me as well as just wanting me and waiting. So it’s the same at any time, if someone wants you that badly, that adheres you to them.”
Sure it’s always nice to be wanted. That sort of thing would give anyone a buzz.
“That’s right. So I was like ‘great someone really, really wants me’, I’m having that”
There were things you said the other week after the Milwall game that stood out. I don’t know what publications you read before that game with Milwall, but it meant a whole lot more than maybe you thought.
“Of course I knew what it meant to the fans. I know what local derbies are all about, London derbies. I knew what it meant to palace to play Milwall, let alone a club this size. It was a disappointing result but we’ve addressed that and are looking at the games ahead.”
I was in bed at eight ‘o clock that night! That’s how much I hurt. You know what I mean? I have been to every Milwall game we have played, and I am now fifty years old, but I have been to every Milwall home and away, and I can’t tell you how painful that display was for me. Anyway, Alan, all of your teams have always reflected hard work and graft.
“Yeah , well, I’m not being funny but it is only since I have been here, and the early days at Reading, that I have had games like that. And it looks like people aren’t bothered but it’s not that, it’s all about confidence levels and you’re looking for someone to spark you off and on that day, it just didn’t happen. But we are still going right now. And this is what I am trying to explain to people. You have just had relegation, you have had a huge, huge blow to everybody at this club. No one thought you where going to get relegated. The players are too good, the club is too big, the fans are too loyal. Bang – you go down. Then players are going and there are more negative, and the players who are here are having to suffer all those negatives. All your fans saying ‘well what about Michael?, what about Jermain leaving? What about this?, what about that?, Bloody hell why did we go down?. And they get that wherever they go, they keep getting them knocks, you know what I mean?”
“So we are trying to turn them into a promotion, where everyone is going ‘you aren’t half a good player’. Look at today, we’ve got Walsall today, we’re going to thump them four-nil, go on Michael, go on such and such. And things don’t tilt that quickly. Look at Sunderland, and Sunderland have done really well lately; they had ten games at the back of last year, “Mick Mccarthy’s got to go, he ain’t won a game, it’s the worst run in the premiership’ you know?”
“Then he had a little mess about, then he had a preseason, the whole staff had changed by then already, but we are still going through that change with a new manager coming in. What have we had, three managers, Glenn, Trevor, Me? You know, it’s been a very traumatic time.”
Aren’t you accustomed to that though, because when you took over at Reading, weren’t they in the bottom three in Division Two?
“Yeah, but they only got to tenth that year. But then we were going from relegation, well potential relegation, to mediocrity.”
Sure, but that is still a good turnaround, Alan.
“Yeah it is, but what I am trying to say is that what we are trying to do this year, is to change……. To get a relegated club, who should never have been relegated, in terms of the club’s stature, that belief of everybody, and not just the fans, all the people who haven’t the belief in the club that they should have.”
You said about that after you first joined us if I remember correctly. You said that a few things surprised you about the place. One was the politics, and one was the atmosphere around the place with everyone feeling sorry for themselves. You said that was prevalent at the club.
“Well you get that if so and so gets injured, or if someone is ill. Or when Jermain gets sent off when he shouldn’t have got sent off, “it always happens to us’ that culture.”
I think you said it after the Sheffield United game when they scored the third late goal.
“That’s right, that’s when I said it, yeah, yeah.”
You said it was the culture of the club to say that something like that always happened to us and you wanted to change that.
“That’s right because if you go to any other club, and take Reading, we get into the playoff final and lose. It always happens to us. No it don’t. It don’t. And we have got to change that. And we are going to change that. We are going to go forward.”
Did you know it all about Jermain before you came to the club?
“Yeah I knew what was going on”
You knew that you had little chance of keeping him? That lock stock and barrel, there wasn’t a chance really of him seeing the season through with us?
“Yeah I knew that there was a problem with him staying at the club.”
Alan, even though you were a manager elsewhere, didn’t it shock you that the day after we were relegated he announced he wanted to leave. Even looking in as an outsider, didn’t you think that was real bad?”
“Yeah I think everybody in the game thought that was a move that hadn’t been well thought out. But you have to look at Jermain and say that he is with a big company. And the advice that he got at the time was obviously not the right advice for him.”
Ok, staying with Jermain now we are with him, were you certain that Jermain would be going or did you have some kind of hope that you could keep him at the club?
“I knew that he had to go this summer at the very, very latest because he only had one year left and he could get parked in Europe and we would not get one penny for him.”
So did you think that you could keep him until the end of this season?
“I thought that I would keep Jermain until the end of this year. That was my plan That’s what I really hoped I could do.”
He was the bullets for your gun for the First Division season?
“Yeah”
So who sold him, you or the club?
“He sold himself at the end.”
I spoke to him on the Saturday, at the Rotherham game and asked him if he was going, but he said he was happy to stay for the rest of the season. By the Sunday, he had gone.
“What happened was the sending off…… When I look back at this season, the thirteen games, the five and five and then a three. I mean I inherited his first suspension, well I think I did. But he got sent off – five games, then sent off again, five more games. I mean, West Brom, we were leading three-two and I maintain to this day that if he had stayed on the pitch we would of won that game. Or at the very worse we would have got a draw.”
“And at Walsall we would have won comfortably. And we almost beat them with ten men. And don’t forget he got sent off inside ten minutes. So Jermain had ten games suspended and the two games missed when he got himself sent off, that is our season in big trouble. There is our catalyst player and we ain’t got him. So I had a six game suspension over me.”
Alan do you mind if I snap away with the camera?
“No, sure, is my hair alright!?”
No, it’s not, Anyway! Do you think that by that time he was so desperate to get away it didn’t matter which Premier League came in, he wanted to take it?
“Well I rang him up on the Sunday night and said ‘this doesn’t have to happen Jermain, it doesn’t have to happen.”
What did he say to you?
“He said he wanted to go. So that was it.”
So it was a case where you clearly wanted to keep him for the rest of the season, but he was just desperate to leave and you just had to let him go.
“There were three isssues. One, if he didn’t go in that window, he had to go in the summer window. Right? He had to go, and there was no doubt about that. He wasn’t going to sign for us, and he made that fundamentally clear, he wasn’t going to sign and we weren’t going to get any money. The second issue was the six game suspension hanging over his head, or five game or whatever it was, if he was sent off again.”
Wasn’t he unlucky to get sent off though?
“I have to be honest, I though the sending off at Walsall was awful. One of the worst decisions of the season.”
And even the West Brom one, you still defended him.
“I thought it was a booking, yeah.”
So if you felt that the Walsall one was awful and the West Brom one was a booking, then why are you assuming that he would get sent off again?
“Firstly because I thought referees were looking at him. The Walsall one in particular. Jermain Defoe, he’s been sent off once, he’s been sent off twice you know? So now, just one incident, just one tiny incident. I mean look at the Walsall one. If you had one more of them – six games. Hold on a minute. We ain’t gonna make this. So the bottom line, which I think you just can’t get away from, was that if he didn’t go in that window, then we could have gone to the summer, and he could have waited a year and we would have got nothing.”
What was attitude like in training, Alan?
“It was good”
He wasn’t a problem player to have around or anything?
“No he wasn’t a problem to me”
Fair enough. One thing with Jermain though, Alan, was when he was playing, was the early season stuff with him and David Connolly true-were there issues about them not passing to each other?
“No, this could apply to any pair of strikers, its difficult to pin someone down when they are in the boxes, they could have passed but they shot, because you want players to be direct, you want strikers to be greedy, and if it is just too difficult to try and pin someone down and say, you didn’t pass to him and we didn’t score. ‘But it was a clear chance for me gaffer.’ And there isn’t really an answer to that. There is no written rule, there is nothing that can be carved in iron in football, because everything is moving.”
I think a lot of the fans were upset on ITV’s late football night programme on the Thursday before he went saying that Defoe definitely wouldn’t be going and a couple of days later he went.
“I went on one of the channels and said that fingers crossed he wouldn’t go in the window, fingers crossed.”
But did you really know that he was on his way?
“I swear to God that I did not know he was going until Sunday when I got a call from Paul Aldridge.”
The next game we had after he had gone, we could see through your body language that you were pretty fed up about it.
“I was disappointed about it, of course I was. Forget about everything else, as a person, I like Jermain, he’s an alright guy.”
Do you think he will end up playing regularly at a very high level?
“Yeah, definitely. And I wasn’t lying when I said that in the press he would play for England. I have seen enough of him to know that. And he proved that last week.”
Is Martin Keown your type of player?
“Yes he would do a good job, although I don’t know where that one has just popped up from!”
It will keep! So what procedures did you really want to change and bring into the club when you joined then?
“ There are certain procedures that I feel work well for me as a manager that I wanted to bring in. One was an injury prevention programme which is about core strength and power and the causes, which I introduced straight away, and our injury record, which everyone said to me was a nightmare, it always happens to us, we always get injuries, etc, well we have hardly got anyone left. The only ones I have got left are the ones who are coming back from old injuries. I have got no muscular injuries at all.
“But don’t get me wrong, you get knocks and you get bad knees but at the moment we have got Rufus Brevett out, and we have got Steve Lomas just coming, and almost back, and that’s it. That’s our injury list.”
And Hutchinson as well.
“Hutch is on his way back from a knee op. And Rob Lee is just about to have a knee op. And you can’t change those. But you can stop muscular injuries, and that programme, the players can now see the benefit of because we are not getting muscular injuries. We had Connolly with a thigh strain not long after I had come and we are trying to eradicate that with this core strength and power. And you look at all the top clubs, the power of the player is very very important now. It is very important that these players have the stamina and the power to deal with top athletes. Go up against Arsenal in the tunnel – average height six foot one and not skinny Peter Crouch type players, proper physical specimens, and that is what we have to produce here.”
Out of David Connolly?
“Well David Connolly, I have to be honest, he doesn’t need much because he is right on his own personal programme anyway which was really good.”
Where did he pick that up?
“When he was over in Holland.”
Alan, it is more than clear when you watch the team that we need a new center back and if Jobi McAnuff isn’t your man for the right side of midfield, then a right midfielder as well.
“Well Jobi has been unlucky because he has been injured.”
I think we are desperate for someone to take the role of leader on the pitch. Would you agree with that? Anyone in mind?
“I am hoping that Lomey is going to come back.”
So has he still got a future at the club?
“Well the future lies with Lomey really. He has a fight on with himself right now more than anything with his injury.”
And what about Nigel Reo-Coker, Alan?
“Nigel was brought here because I knew that he was a bargain at that price. And I know he is going to be a player. And he is only nineteen, that’s all he is. And he needs a rest now really. Lomey would be ideal.”
I mentioned Martin Keown earlier, his professionalism and leadership qualities and the way he would be with the youngsters, and the likes of Chris Cohen who I reckon is eighteen months away….
“Might not be that long…..”
But it would be good for Chris and the rest of the youngsters if we brought someone in like that. And players like Keown are few and far between.
“They are, And there is also Gareth Southgate whom is a big pal of mine at Middlesbrough, and a lot of clubs are interested in Gareth, purely because of what he brings to the club. You have got to have your senior pros backing up what you are about. And most of the senior pros here, I have inhereited and to be fair, most have them have brought in and that is crucial that you get the right leadership.”
The players you have brough in , and there have been quite a lot of comings and a fair amount of goings too. The players that you have brought in, you are aiming for a certain type of player obviously, take the guys you brought in from Wimbledon, you said you were looking for aggressive players, your Reo-Coker, Nowland and McAnuff. How aggressive would you say they are in the shape of things?
“Well Nigel needs to be aggressive and has got a great voice too. He is a natural leader and looks a great player and remember he is only nineteen. Adam Nowland is a different kind of player. But I have been very pleased with him as well. He is actually a better player than I knew he was. And he will offer us something. I think that if Michael got injured, Adam Nowland might be the one who has to get in there and get on it for us.”
Do you think Steve Lomas can get in there and do the holding role now too?
“I think if Steve Lomas was fit, there would be no doubt that he would be playing in the midfield and I have said that to him. With all due respect to the players we have got here, when Steve Lomas is fit, he is a level above some of these players. And I have made it very clear to him that we need him back. Now we might get him back at a crucial time when we need him. Now this team who have just come together, because if you think about it we come together and we went on that run where we went about ten games and didn’t really get beat. This is the first time where we have been beat three times…..”
They have been crucial times as well.
“Yeah”
Alan I know we’re running out of time but before we wrap this up this first part mate, as it’s current and topical, we have to mention Marlon Harewood.
It has to be said that the majority of fans are baffled as to why you play him out wide when he is the division’s top scorer, What is the thought pattern behind that?
“Well most of his goals have come from the right hand side. And the bottom line, when you look at your team is, where do your goals come from? And you need eighty goals if you are going to be promoted in the first two. Well my gut feeling is, if I can get Marlon to play on the right hand side, and to be honest, if you remember Wolves away and Fulham away when he played there and there wasn’t a problem then, and no-one mentioned it then and he was offering us a goal from that side.”
Well, whenever we have spoken to him Alan, he has always said to us when we have asked him about being out on the right and he always give us the impression that he is happy to fit into the side wherever he is asked to play.
“Absolutely!”
But we expect to hear him say that, or any player to say that come to think of it.
“That’s right.”
You took Marlon off after twenty minutes or something at Reading. That was a tactical decision you said.
“Yeah”
Not any other reason?
“No, the role wasn’t working. And that’s how I manage. I don’t look at Marlon Harewood any differently to how I look at Darryl McMahon or I look at Christian Dailly or I look at Steve Lomas, they are in the team to do a job. My job is to make them understand the role and make sure the role is working.”
So we have established that you are looking players to do a certain job and stick to it.
“There are certain jobs in any establishment that are cast in iron and there is no grey area. You know what that job is. And it’s down to the coaching staff to correct these positions and we do. Anyway the last point that we are going to get onto now, because time is running well short is Hayden Mullins. I want to mention Hayden Mullins and you know I didn’t realize what Hayden Mullins is all about. Hayden Mullins was skipper for Crystal Palace for eight years.”
Alan I think he is a good player, I really do.
“And I think we have really missed him, by the way. When he came here I think he got caught in the headlights of this club. And they are bright headlights here. Over the years at Palace he was a model pro and was consistently good. Now at palace he was captain and nothing fazed him. But when he came here and I think he was overawed and I think that by his own admission he would say that and with that was with the place, with the fans, with the big players that were in the dressing room when he arrived when we first signed him. And I have seen what that can do. Now on top of that, I have brought in a nineteen year old a lad from Forest, I brought Adam Nowland and maybe it’s a little bit, you know, we have had a bit of a down spell and it’s my job to get us through it. And that’s why I explained to Hayden when he signed, that he was coming to a big set up and a big club. I told him that and that he was going to have to deal with it first and foremost before anything else. Now I think he is there. Lads, this is where we have to pull it…..”
And so we did….
Thank you to Gary Firmager, Bill Gardener, Dave Terries and Neil Clack for allowing us to publish the Alan Pardew interview (part one) on the Big Soccer West Ham messageboard.