Warnock Knockin’ On England’s Door?

When looking upon Neil Warnock, one cannot help wondering: Since leaving Sheffield United a legend in 2007, he has been a hit in South London with Crystal Palace; he’s on the verge of history in the West End with his well-honed Hoops closing in on promotion, having beaten his former charges 3-0 last night at Loftus Road. Now, with uncertainty surrounding the future of Harry Redknapp, the bookies’ shoe-in as Fabio Capello’s England hot-seat successor come 2012, could Warnock be the man to travel North to FA HQ on a mission to shake Gareth Southgate until something of worth falls out?

OK, let’s start with the obvious: The Yorkshireman is nobody’s cup of tea, having clocked up enemies and FA charges like some calamitous cocktail of Robbie Savage and El Hadji Diouf in his time. However, it seems necessary to try and gain some perspective when judging his style of leadership before we start believing Jack Wilshere's left foot can carry us to glory in Brazil.

Manager of the Year at the BBC London Sports Awards 2010, held in December, was none other than England manager-elect Mr Redknapp – a man who faces tax evasion allegations as soon as the season’s out; who swears like Wayne Rooney with a touch of the Tim Howard’s at the first mention of Del Boy; and whose self-styled ‘everyman’ image would suggest he would be rather better handling Wembley press conferences like Charles N’Zogbia handles driving tests.

If ‘Arry’s “I just told him to stop messin’ about and hit the thing” approach, combined with his happy knack of motivating wayward warriors is what you’re after, then never fear, because there is another solution – around eighty of them, in fact, in the Football League alone. But head of the queue is Sheffield-born Warnock, a man of the simplest pleasures whose most recent case of the career Heimlich was his handling of Adel Taarabt, now QPR Club Captain, which has been exemplary both on and off the field ever since defecting from Selhurst Park last March.

It was with Palace that the uber-experienced Warnock, 62, first showed his credentials in another key area of international management, namely,  dealing with dragons breathing down your neck, ready to scorch any misstep or word out of whack. In this case, it wasn’t former Millwall Chairman Theo Paphitis but the man who coveted the TV personality’s fame: sun-tan aficionado and investment anti-genius Simon Jordan, a friend with whom Warnock seemed destined to fall out upon arrival.

Having seen his health, reputation and even kinship survive the post, however, he moved on to Rangers in the spring and has so far coped admirably with the pressures imposed by owners boasting the wealth of some small countries around their executive dining tables, the World’s sixth richest man Lakshmi Mittal having only just finished extracting the shares of former Chairman, the ‘fit and proper’ Flavio Briatore, by the time our man Neil was hired. 

If half of the nation’s supposedly top job is in the dreaded ‘media gatherings’, and this is where he falls down, further than through his brand of football, the 1972 Hartlepool United Player of the Year would have to hit extraordinary heights of crassness or naivety to top the efforts of Graham Taylor, Glenn Hoddle or Steve McClaren in particular.

You may say anything’s possible with Warnock, but I’m a “the poisoned chalice is half full” kind of guy. If the taxman turns out to have Arry’s number, as the Department of Trade and Industry did for El Tel, you could do a lot worse than overlook another ex-England chief in the Championship and turn to a man who, for all his pitch-side shenanigans and pitch-fork aggression, perhaps deserves better than being treated by the bigwigs as no more than a sober Brian Clough; given neither the top job nor the character to get by without it.