Originally Posted by celesti:
“Hiring Hiddink wouldn't be rewarding failure, it'd be because of his history of doing well at international level. Name the contenders with a spotless record, by all means.”
Correct. No guarantees of success no matter who you go for as the issues go deeper than the manager otherwise they wouldn't all fail in similar ways. Best thing you can do is try someone experienced, respected, and who has had relative success in the past. He's had failures like every other manager of course. Even if you found a manager who had never put a foot wrong that would be no guarantee they would get the results England thinks it should be getting.
I'd rather (if I was English and in the current situation) have a manager who had some successes and failures rather than someone with no discernible success to speak of. He's respected, calm, he can steady a ship for a couple of years.
Whether he could handle the hysteria that follows the job around I don't know but I'd give him more chance than any other names I've seen. I sort of doubt he would take it though. I wouldn't, in his position. Poisoned chalice.