The Plight of the English Soccer Manager – The Atlantic

“When you see a player,” Martínez argues, “you’ll watch his warm-up, the way he speaks to the referee, the way he speaks to other teammates after missing a chance, the way he celebrates a goal, the way his teammates react when he scores. Data might help you narrow the margin of error, but the decision is still a feeling. It’s a gut instinct.”

What managers may not realize is the chairman’s decision to sack them is also often a gut instinct, born out of fear and an inability to discern the difference between a poor run of luck and incompetent management. But this is where statistical analysis can clear the fog a little. Converting shots to goals for example is a notoriously messy business, and more often the result of chance than intention. There are several ways in which good analysts use that information to tell the difference between an unlucky streak and a true slump.

Armed with this kind of data, managers could ward off nervous chairmen with reassurances the tide will turn, or at least provide them with concrete evidence of areas where the team needs improvement that goes beyond simply firing the person in charge. In the end, some chairmen might be induced to take their finger off the trigger and trust that this too shall pass. That might eventually take some of the pressure off the person in charge so they can take the kind of daring risks that are sometimes necessary to win.

By accepting help with player recruitment or in data analysis, managers might be able to get back to what Aidy Boothroyd called “the football stuff.” He, like most of the figures interviewed by Calvin throughout Living on the Volcano, seems to strongly echo the words of the Chelsea and Feyenoord manager Ruud Gullit: “Being a football manager is no fun at all. You have to put up with all the hassle. It is not surprising that so many turn grey or have heart attacks. I enjoyed working with the players, creating the team—that was fun. But all the rest I hated.”

Today, “the rest” is simply too much for most English soccer managers to handle; thankfully there’s help available, if only they’ll put pride aside and accept it.