A couple of years ago Harry Redknapp put Rio Ferdinand’s name forward as a potential West Ham manager.
As ever with Harry, it wasn’t just a selfless pitch - this is a man who’s Twitter account says he’s ‘proper excited about Mobile Cryptocurrency!’. Not one to let a potential pay cheque pass him by, he said he’d go with Ferdinand to the club as director of football.
I’ve toyed with the idea of this partnership at the club for some time now, although with Redknapp as manager and Ferdinand as his assistant, and I think it is the solution we are now looking for.
Embracing his character flaws as personality quirks, I’ve long been a fan of Redknapp. It’s easy to get caught in the trap of thinking of him as a ‘wheeler dealer’ - although don’t tell him that - and to frame his career as one punctuated by leaning out of car windows, a cheeky pay day managing Jordan and his most recent failing at Birmingham, but just five years ago he was the man for the England job.
The FA shied away back then and Sam Allardyce’s acrimonious exit is probably illustrative of how a Redknapp reign could’ve ended too, but he truly earned the right to be favourite for the position. Mauricio Pochettino has transformed Tottenham Hotspur but it was Redknapp who picked them up from a similar position to where we currently sit and built the base from which Poch has sprung.
Redknapp gets players going, he gets the fans going, he’s clever in the transfer market and he plays a solid brand of football but also an attacking one. A fan of direct wingers, a maverick or two, a target man and a poacher, I think Harry could really do something with the likes of Michail Antonio, Andy Carroll, Chicharito and he may even be able to save the likes of Marko Arnautovic from becoming a very expensive flop.
He’s no Pep Guardiola-style philosopher but he does have a recognisable brand of football which we could all get behind. I’m not sure we want a Pep anyway. The fan behind me at the Liverpool game yesterday is unfortunately broadly representative of a fair few vocal Hammers and screeched ‘why are you passing it around!? Go forward!’ every time we played a bit of possession football, but then shouted ‘hoof!’ when we played it forward, summing up the directionless confusion which has already riddled our ground like a cancer.
Those negative fans, chasing this ‘West Ham way’ myth, frustrate me, but I do agree Slaven Bilic has to go. Whilst an honest and decent man, he has never shown any sign of an ideology and consequently we never impose ourselves on games. Redknapp would grab a game by the scruff of the neck and take it to the opposition in the intense way we are crying out for.
But the most important reason why I think Harry Redknapp would be a good fit is the fact he has his roots in our club. We are going through a clear identity crisis at the moment and walking away from that stadium towards the bright lights of John Lewis after each thrashing is leaving us in a very difficult place. Who are we anymore?
Redknapp knows who we are and, if not this ‘West Ham way’, I think he could bring the ‘West Ham feel’ back to the place.
While there are a significant numbers of doomsdayers, there are an admirable group of fans scraping around to make this place home, with grass roots initiatives from the new fanzine, to the boat events on the river, to the Hammers Social Club moving into trendy studios. Rather than rejecting the change they are gripping this new space and injecting it with ‘West Ham’.
Redknapp is someone who could engage with that process and like it or not, he is one of us. It makes sense to have a man at the helm who represents us and the club as we know it as we go through this struggle.
And I think having Ferdinand on-board would go some way to satisfying those who would inevitably turn their nose up at Redknapp as a manager of the past and, at 70 years-old, an appointment with no longevity.
Ferdinand is a classy operator, a modern man and would be an obvious heir to the throne. He’s the kind of statesman-like figure any owner would want representing the club on the national and international stage and, as perhaps our famous academy’s most esteemed graduate who went on to reach the pinnacle of the game, he has the rare trait of embodying both our club and raw, powerful success.
Ferdinand speaks intelligently as a pundit, is doing his coaching qualifications and Redknapp emphasises how he would regularly consult him as the pair were reunited at QPR towards the end of Rio’s playing career. He commands respect and, Redknapp aside, an upbringing under Tony Carr and the majority of his career under Sir Alex Ferguson will surely help his prospects.
There’s a lot of talk of a David Moyes and Phil Neville combination this morning - it’s a similar idea, but it’s Everton’s version. When we’re desperately clinging to our identity in a storm of total change, we need to be looking closer to our old home as we look to build our new one.
Follow me on Twitter @RichMaher93.
