From the Independent
Alan Curbishley: Impossible to Curb my enthusiasm
Charlton's plight is a Valley of tears but their former supremo still fancies return to Premier League madhouse
By Steve Tongue
The plaque on the wall of Charlton Athletic's North Stand lists the name of the manager and directors at the time of its completion, in April 2002. Having at that time just completed a double over both Chelsea and Tottenham, Alan Curbishley's side had gone into spring with an outside chance of a Uefa Cup place, then begun to fall away before finishing a respectable 14th.
Four years later, a candidate for the England job but worn out by ploughing uphill on the sloping pitch that is the Premier League, he was gone, and nobody could have foreseen how dramatic the effect would be. Last Wednesday he found himself reflecting disbelievingly on how a club universally admired for its ethic and organisation had just been condemned to a second relegation in three seasons, brought about by four different managers.
"If you'd sat down at the start of the season and said the bottom three in the Championship would be Charlton, Southampton and Norwich, no one would have believed it," he said. "As you can see by the scramble among clubs like Newcastle, pulling all the stops out and desperate not to go down, it shows the importance of staying in that Premier League."
That is a phrase he repeats more than once, yet not, he insists, as a rebuke to those Charlton fans who were growing impatient with having dreams of European football nurtured most seasons, then disappearing with the Easter bunny. "I don't think it was to do with the fans wanting more," he says of his departure from the club. "It was to do with the fact that I'd done the 15 or 16 years and [chairman] Richard Murray wanted me to commit, which I felt I didn't want to. It came down to what we thought was best for the club at the time. That's why the decision was made, so the new manager could go in in May and have three months before the season started. I had 15 years, Iain Dowie had 15 games. I don't know what went on but from having two managers in 25 years, myself and Lennie Lawrence, they had three or four in 18 months. That don't help."
Unwilling to blame either Dowie, the briefly employed Les Reed, Alan Pardew or the present manager Phil Parkinson for the rot, he nevertheless cannot resist pointing out that neither Dowie nor Pardew were exactly starved of funds. "It's not as if they had to sell everybody and got nothing in return. I understand they've spent quite a lot of money over the last three years. So something's gone wrong. The striking thing for me is the severity of Charlton's situation, how quickly it's happened. Not many people could have predicted that. It could have been Charlton, it could have been West Ham who went down."
Curbishley's West Ham that would have been, who appeared doomed that season when drubbed 4-0 at the Valley on an embarrassing return for him, but then saved themselves in controversial fashion thanks to Carlos Tevez's continued presence. But after little more than one full season at Upton Park, which the locals found too austere for their tastes, Curbishley the Canning Town boy walked out, following interference from above of the sort never contemplated at Charlton; an event still in the lawyers' hands and not up for discussion.
West Ham might be regarded by many as his spiritual home, yet interestingly when the word "we" is dropped into the conversation, it is still in reference to Charlton. He remains close to many people there and worries about them in the club's current footballing and financial predicament: "It's not all about me, I've got to stress that. It's a lot harder for other people. There are so many other people involved: the fans, staff at the training ground and the Valley, who I understand may come under pressure now. And the people involved in getting us where we were. It's time for them all to regroup and bounce back. I remember Man City going down there, Leeds and Leicester. You've got to jump back up."
And when will Alan Curbishley be jumping back into the madhouse? Relaxed, tanned and without a grey hair on his blond head, he looks a perfect advertisement for regular six-month breaks from management, even if the current one was not planned quite so soon. "People ask what it's like having a break but I wasn't expecting this one. I only had four games [this season]. But I've enjoyed it, done a couple of things I've never done before, like being at home over Christmas and New Year, which is a big difference. It's the way it is with football managers. It's what we've got to get on with when we're not working. The Premier League this season has probably been the most competitive yet. I've been an avid watcher, looking from the outside, and I've enjoyed it, wondering what I'd do and so on. We'll just have to see what happens, but it took Steve McClaren and Sam Allardyce a year to get back in. If I got back in you have to see where you go, but I just think the Premier League is where everybody wants to be."
Alan Curbishley was speaking at the opening of the new Hall Place sports pavilion and lecture hall in Bexley following a £1m grant from the Football Foundation
Life and times
Born Llewellyn Charles Curbishley in Canning Town, 8 November 1957.
Playing career West Ham from 1974-78 (96 games); Birmingham City from 1979-82 (155 games); Aston Villa from 1983-84 (41 games); Charlton from 1984-87 and 1990-93 (98 games); Brighton from 1987 to 1990 (132 games).
Managerial career
Charlton (jointly with Steve Gritt) from July 1991 to July 1995. Sole manager from July 1995 to May 2006. Record: Played 729 Won 280 Drew 183 Lost 266.
Manager of West Ham from December 2006 to September 2008. Record: Played 71 Won 29 Drew 14 Lost 28.
Education received honorary masters degree from Greenwich University in 1998.
Fascinating facts older brother Bill managed The Who when they played the Valley in 1974.
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Comments
and the 'we' bit says it all
As does the "It was to do with the fact that I'd done the 15 or 16 years and [chairman] Richard Murray wanted me to commit, which I felt I didn't want to" statement that a few should remind themselves of when the "Curb's was forced out by the boo boys arguement" comes around yet again.
Exactly. Where are Len and oooooh ahhhhh now?
Fair enough. But you yourself say that it was Murray who 'called time on it', contrary to what you often claim on here that the fans wanted him out.
Personally I admit that I wanted him to go but I also wanted him to help 'bleed-in' the new man
and curbs said the other night he wanted to help in the finding of a new man to takeover but murrray thought he knew best
Spoken as a man who 'obviously' knows Curbs egh ct.....how little you know the man if you think he's gloating...FFS!
how did he slate us ??
i mean he turned his beloved hammers down in 2001 to stay with us for another 5 years , still not enough for some clearly
gloating ffs he's constantly asked questions by the press about how crap we are and he answers them a lot more respectfully than i would and he always mentions that it wasn't just about him and there what lots of other people why charlton were a success but i suppose however he reacts wont go down well with those that weren't so keen on him when he took us through the GLORY YEARS and now can't handle the fact that the day he left was the start of our downfall .... FACT
He is bound to be asked questions about Charlton and he has answered them in a manner that is merely repeating the facts.
If you forget his Charlton connections and look around at which managers are available if Parky goes then Curbs is by far the best qualified in terms of success and relevant experience.
Would he come back? Who knows? "if the backing was there" is what I think he said. Quite a statement for the master of the non-committal but what does it actually mean?
I didn't want him to go but you can also see how much he needed a break so for his own sake he did the right thing. He left the club in a better state than he found it. Just a shame that Pardew and Dowie didn't take the time to learn any of his lessons on building a team which was more than the sum of its parts and being sure when you are spending the money.
Love curbs .... he will be back one day....
I think the mistakes were: putting in a management structure that does not work in this country; spending beyond our means; employing Muttonhead Dowie.
yes,our best run in the f.a. cup in 60ish years and more points than the previous season. what delusions of grandeur did we have? still it was good for us that we didn't keep him on.
I was more than content with what he achieved in the league but the failures, year after year, in both cups were so frustrating. And we had some real opportunities (boro at home, Bolton away) to make a semi in the FA Cup. Don't even mention the League cup.
If we had finished midtable but made a final or semi every three years it would have given everyone such a lift and might even have taken us in the UEFA cup.
Still, it's better than the Johnstones Paint Trophy ; - (
good signing
didn't he score on his debut for us at stamford bridge when we drew with the champions at the time during the same season darren bent was the top english striker in the premier?
That was a strange season:
Dynamic start until the end of October, frequently in 2nd position.
Then the wheels fell off, with a dreadful mid-season run.
Kudos to Curbs though, points were the priority to stabilise the freefall, so he reverted to grinding out results - remember
the "3 nought-noughts on the spin" phrase ....?
But even though the football was peurile and sterile for a while, he stopped the rot.
That took nous.
The salvation was the decent cup run, because it picked up the spirits of everyone at the club, although after Boro beat us, the season went into freefall again. But Curbs had done enough.
The overview shows though, without that barnstorming start to the season, we'd have got nowhere near 47 points and could have been well bogged down in the relegation mire.
And best cup run for 60 years ....?
What about Quarter Finals vs Man Utd in 1994,
and Bolton in 2000 ........?
Don't they count ? But they were of course, Curbs' cup runs after all.
Curbs left all the ingredients of a side ripe for relegation - but had he stayed, and had the benefits of Dowie's war chest, I'm sure he would have spent that money more productively.
Curbs was a spent force at that time. But remember, as has already been said - Curbs left Charlton in far better position than when he started. I was grateful for that.
Thanks, Curbs!
Hear hear!
I genuinely like Curbs and when he left I said at the time to my bros over there it was a sad day for the club when he left. Maybe I am sick of this season but I have seen 2 interviews over here about our downfall talking to Curbs. Its a bit like losing a girlfriend and see her looking blinding and she's saying that she was the best thing that ever happened to me oh and is now looking to date Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise. Ok bit over the top. I don't really want to hear any more post mortems about this season or the past couple of seasons. Let's hope there is a takeover and we hold onto Jonjo and bring in a few more players. Maybe they can even persuade Curbs to slum it down in the 3rd division. I'm done until next August see ya.
BTW are you really Mervyn Day ? As you obviously know Curbs well.........