Exposing the myth of Harry Redknapp

Harry Redknapp looks on prior to the Barclays Premier League match between Wigan Athletic and QPR at the DW Stadium on December 8, 2012 in Wigan, England. (Getty Images)

When Harry Redknapp was being heavily touted as a potential England manager this time last year, it appeared to many to be a fitting pinnacle to an outstanding career. Well, that is what the media would like you to think. The reality is that as a manager, Redknapp has won one trophy. That’s it, just one. The same as Juande Ramos, Alex McLeish, Brian Little, Joe Royle and Bobby Gould. So why is Redknapp constantly touted as some kind of saviour and managerial genius? It’s time to expose the myth.

Beginning his career on the south coast of Bournemouth, Redknapp made a name for himself with the Third Round scalp of FA Cup holders Manchester United in 1984. He stayed on at Bournemouth until 1991, having clinched promotion to the old Division Two (Championship) in 1987, which we must say is a notable achievement. However, it is from his time at West Ham onwards that I suggest we focus on in more detail.

West Ham have a reputation as plucky underdogs. Good, honest East End boys, trying their best to compete with their richer counterparts across the capital. This suited Redknapp down to the ground, to the extent that any small success could be exaggerated and turned into an almighty triumph. Take the 1998-99 season where they finished fifth, their highest placed finish under Redknapp.

A squad featuring the experience of Shaka Hislop, Neil Ruddock and Ian Wright, the youth of Frank Lampard and Rio Ferdinand, combined with likes of Paolo Di Canio, Eyal Berkovic, John Hartson and Marc-Vivien Foe should be capable of a top five finish. The fact that this was the peak of that team illustrates Redknapp as a competent manager, but far from being a ‘great’ one. That they finished 9th and 15th in the following two seasons indicates that this was a one-off, rather than a stepping stone on the way to success. It is also worth pointing out that despite Redknapp’s reputation for cup success, West Ham did not go further than the Quarter Final stage in either the FA or League Cup.

To summarise his time at West Ham, Redknapp did a reasonable job. He brought in a lot of exciting players and oversaw the beginning of a wave of gifted players from the academy system. However, be in no doubt that he was no Ron Greenwood or John Lyall. He kept the team ticking over in a mid-table position for seven seasons, something that the likes of Tony Pulis or Alan Curbishley have proved equally adept at.

And on to Portsmouth, part one. Credit where credit is due, Redknapp took Portsmouth out of the Championship as league winners. Relying heavily on the experience of Paul Merson, Steve Stone, Gianluca Festa and Arjan de Zeeuw and with the emergence of younger players such as Yakubu and Gary O’Neill and the goals of Svetoslav Todorov, Portsmouth stormed to success. A successful season of consolidation followed with a 13th place finish before a massive fallout with Milan Mandaric lead to his resignation in November 2004. To summarise, promotion followed by consolidation, similar to what Sam Allardyce has achieved at West Ham. The work of a steady, competent manager? Absolutely. The work of a managerial icon? Maybe not.

With scant regard for the Portsmouth fans, in December 2004 Redknapp took the reins at hated rivals Southampton. For the remainder of the season, Southampton won four league games. Four. This time of Redknapp’s career has been seemingly erased from history by his supporters but this is the type of record that got Steve Kean vilified at Blackburn.

There have been managers this season with better records than that but have still got sacked. In typical Redknapp style, he brought in several players during the winter transfer window including Olivier Bernard, Henri Camara and his son, Jamie. The sale of James Beattie to Everton deprived him of a genuine goal-scoring threat and relegation was sealed on the final day of the season by a defeat to Manchester United. Back to the Championship, and surely the chance for Harry to regroup, to wheel and deal and build a squad to climb back up at the first attempt?

No.

A series of eight successive draws epitomised their season, despite the promise shown by the young Theo Walcott. In December, Redknapp resigned and headed back to Fratton Park. The only way to look back on Redknapp’s time at Southampton is as an unmitigated disaster. Joining a struggling team mid-season and getting them relegated and leaving them in a worse position than he found them in. Sound familiar, QPR fans?

Portsmouth, part two. This is a period of his career that is viewed as one of Redknapp’s most successful, saving Pompey from almost certain relegation in the 2005-06 season and going on to build an FA Cup winning side. On paper, it all looks like the stuff of fairytales. In hindsight, we can see Redknapp’s time at the club as the main factor which drove them to financial ruin. An interesting comparison here is to look at Fleet Street’s treatment of David O’Leary and Peter Risdale compared to Redknapp and Peter Storrie.

File: Harry Redknapp manager of Portsmouth lifts the trophy with Sol Campbell at Wembley Stadium on May 17, 2008 in London, England. (Getty Images)

Leeds are often held up as the benchmark on how spending beyond their means can cripple a club. O’Leary has been tarred with this brush and since his time at Aston Villa, has disappeared off the UK football landscape. Redknapp on the other hand appears to have walked away without a care in the world. His claims that he doesn’t look after the financial side can be seen as naïve at best, arrogant and destructive at worst. As it is, Redknapp has been given an incredibly easy ride by the media, almost a case of “Poor old Harry, let down by these nasty financiers with no money”. Surely an “old school” football man such as Redknapp would take the Sir Alex Ferguson viewpoint of ‘spending the club’s money as if it were my own’? Obviously not.

So well done Harry Redknapp. You won the FA Cup with Portsmouth, you kept them in the Premier League and you signed some good players. You were also a key element of destroying that football club through reckless spending of club funds. And while the supporters were left to pick up the pieces, Harry strolled on to North London.

Two points from eight games, two points from eight games, two points from eight games. That appeared to be the sum of Redknapp’s interaction with the media for a vast majority of the 2008-09 season. There can be no argument that Spurs had a wretched start to the season under Juande Ramos. Yet, this was still a team that contained the likes of Luka Modric, Jonathan Woodgate, Ledley King, Roman Pavlyuchenko, Darren Bent, Aaron Lennon and Gareth Bale.

Don’t overplay Redknapp as some sort of managerial genius here. Dave Bassett lead an incredible recovery for Sheffield United in the 91-92 season, yet I don’t recall him ever being considered as the second coming of Rinus Michels. Working with a big chequebook made Redknapp’s task all the easier, as the £40m spent in January on Robbie Keane, Jermain Defoe, Wilson Palacios and Pascal Chimbonda proved.

During Redknapp’s reign, Spurs finished in the top four on two occasions. A decent feat, but this is Tottenham Hotspur we are talking about here. One of the biggest clubs in the country finishing their season not with a trophy, but a top four finish. Yes, Spurs qualified for the Champions League and performed acceptably before being ruthlessly outclassed by Real Madrid.

He took Spurs as far as he could before being dismissed by Daniel Levy in the summer of last year. Now, if you were to believe some journalists, this was one of the most treacherous, unjustified decisions the footballing world has seen. Yet from a neutral perspective, it appears that Redknapp took the club as far as he could and didn’t have the tactical know-how to take the club into the highest echelons of club football.

That leads us to where we are now – QPR. Again, the perfect sound bite about what he inherited – four points from 12 games was heard throughout, leaving 26 games to get the 36 points or so that normally ensures survival. Nine wins, nine draws and eight defeats would be enough to ensure survival – surely not too much for an escapologist such as Redknapp? To be quite honest, it has been too much and Redknapp has embarrassed himself with some of his comments during the last few months.

File: Harry Redknapp, from his time at Spurs. (Getty Images)

Relegation is almost confirmed and it is hard to see where Redknapp can go from here. At 66 years of age, the time may come to retire gracefully from top flight management. A record of one FA Cup win, many years top flight management, offset by two relegations is not a bad career record. However, it is not the type of record that draws the kind of plaudits that Redknapp has. Being ‘good copy’ appears to make you bullet-proof in terms of key decisions and performances coming under close media scrutiny. One could compile a list of managers with similar or better records to Redknapp, who have been left open to ridicule: Gerard Houllier, Rafa Benitez, Andre Villas-Boas and Steve McClaren to name but four.

So how will Harry Redknapp be remembered? Probably in the media and to a lot of the footballing public as a master escapologist, transfer wizard and motivator extraordinaire. I will remember him as a competent manager who got two teams relegated, nearly bankrupted another while all the time hawking his cliched opinions and sound bites around the written and spoken media. But once again, the myth is sure to outlast the reality.