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Tuesday, 11 December 2007 |
Capello in pole position after Mourinho says no
Fabio Capello looks increasingly likely to be given the chance to turn the impossibe job into an Italian job after Jose Mourinho definitively ruled himself out of contention to succeed Steve McClaren as the England manager. The Football Association has turned its focus on to Capello as the leading possibility to take England towards the 2010 World Cup.
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The FA is still considering "three or four genuine" candidates, and sources stress that nobody has been offered the post yet, and that Mourinho was not offered the job before announcing he did not want it.
Those in the running are Capello, Marcello Lippi, Martin O'Neill and Jürgen Klinnsman, although it is understood that one or more FA executives were pursuing "movement in Italy" yesterday and that a firm offer to a candidate is drawing close.
 Capello, 61, who has already made public his enthusiasm for the job, has been a serial winner at club level, leading three different teams to seven titles in Italy's Serie A as well as winning Spain's La Liga twice and the Champions League once. An informed source said last night that he was still waiting formal contact with the FA's hierarchy – presumably the FA's chief executive, Brian Barwick in person – although he has held talks about the job. He spent yesterday is Madrid helping his wife to move house.
Lippi, 59, has won the Serie A title five times, the Champions League once, and also, significantly, has lifted the World Cup as the coach of his national team, last year.
 Fabio Capello, the man who describes the Impossible Job of managing England as a "beautiful challenge", will meet the Football Association in the next 48 hours as clear favourite to succeed Steve McClaren. Capello will inform the FA's chief executive, Brian Barwick, that he wants to bring in Gianfranco Zola as his assistant and that he would be willing to have an English presence in his coaching staff, either Alan Shearer or Stuart Pearce. The FA are keen to nurture English coaching talent - Shearer is currently completing his badges while Pearce has impressed in overseeing the Under-21s.
The FA stress that these are preliminary discussions and that Barwick, and Soho Square's director of football development Sir Trevor Brooking, also intend seeing other candidates, notably Marcello Lippi.
The FA is determined not to get itself into the kind of situation that transpired when it was looking for a replacement for Sven Goran Eriksson and farcically chased Luiz Felipe Scolari, who ultimately rejected the approach. Instead, options will remain open until Barwick is virtually certain that the man he wants will say "yes", and only then will a firm offer be put forward, and presumably be accepted.
 "We've made it clear all along that we're talking to a variety of people, and that's still the case," a source said last night. "Nobody has been offered the job. We talked to Jose Mourinho but he was not offered the job. You're never going to find out whether someone wants the job without talking to them, and the process is ongoing."
Mourinho made a public declaration to rule himself out of contention on the website of his agent, Jorge Mendes. The former Chelsea manager said: "After Steve McClaren left the England football team, my representatives maintained contact with the FA. In that sense, I had myself useful discussions with Brian Barwick and Trevor [Brooking] where we exchanged ideas to evaluate the entire situation about the England squad and set the goals in case of a real invitation being addressed to me.
"After deep and serious thinking, I decided to exclude myself from being England manager despite it being a fantastic position for me. I'm sure the FA will hire a great manager, one able to place the team back where it belongs. I reiterate my respect for English football and, after three good years in England, I firmly believe that the England squad will soon be back to their usual great results." The FA was never certain whether Mourinho's interest in the job was genuine or whether the Portuguese maverick was merely using the vacancy as a platform on which to advertise his availability for a big club job.
 His motives are no clearer this morning. Sources insist he was serious enough about England to prepare a detailed dossier for the FA about how he would take England forward. But equally they acknowledge the England job was an option for him, not a necessity. Where the 44-year-old ends up next remains to be seen but there have already been unconfirmed reports that he has signed an agreement to take over at a major European club.
Real Madrid was one name being bandied around last night, and Barcelona another, while other sources insisted he would prefer to work in Italy, perhaps at Milan or Juventus. If Mourinho was indeed using the England job to stir interest, it seems to have worked, with one suggestion that he was veering towards Soho Square late last week but was then offered a bumper deal – in excess of £5m a year – to pledge his future elsewhere.
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