Sport
Scott Parker’s struggles at Club Brugge
Scott Parker was incandescent with rage but trying to stay calm and collected. His Bournemouth side had just been beaten 9-0 by Liverpool at Anfield in September, and frustrations with the direction of the team after promotion from the Championship boiled to the surface.
“At this moment in time, where we currently are, I can see some more to be honest with you,” he said in his final interview.
“It doesn’t surprise me. This is currently where it is at this moment in time.
“The players need help. Today proved too big a challenge. The levels were far too big.
“At times we couldn’t bear it, the intensity. We’ve got a decision to make as a club. There will be days like this.
“Time will tell. It’s a huge disappointment, a real humbling experience.”
It is hardly a shock that he was sacked as a result of those words. He was criticised for being too honest, and airing dirty laundry in public is never a good look, especially given the context. Yes it was a disastrous afternoon and yes Liverpool had struggled until them and have done since, but at such an early stage in the season it felt like a white flag. Gary O’Neil has picked up the baton and while Parker’s prophecy of a long season has rung true, it is harsh to say they’ve found the levels ‘too big’ this season.
It wasn’t the first time Parker had publicly voiced displeasure. He wasn’t very popular in his position at Fulham, with whom he also gained promotion from the Championship and suffered relegation, before leaving for Bournemouth. Marco Silva’s work this season has been a breath of fresh air; comparing his situation to Parker’s is slightly disingenuous, he has proven that existence as a yo-yo club is not Fulham’s destiny. In both cases, clubs have markedly improved from the position left by Parker. So is it something to do with him?
Soon after his Bournemouth exit, Parker found himself another job. As happens increasingly when English managers’ reputations sully at the top level domestically, there is an attempt to recreate it elsewhere. But to take over the reigning Belgian champions, with Champions League football on the agenda, was at best a tad fortuitous.
But an x-rated rant by highly-rated Dutch winger Noa Lang after a recent 2-2 draw in the city derby with Cercle Bruges has pointed to yet more frustration and disharmony at a club under Parker’s control.
“We’ve taken a backward step. A lot of things were unacceptable. We were not good enough on almost every level. We were too soft.”
Two further draws and a defeat to Benfica in Europe suggest problems are deepening. Parker is still waiting for the moment he proves himself at the highest level and doing so in that environment was supposed to be the best way forward. Brugge are fourth in the Belgian Pro League, 20 points off the pace set by Genk, with 10 draws from 27 matches. Defeats aren’t too much of an issue, but killer instinct sure seems like it is. That is a huge problem for Parker.
In a world where young managers have to wait a long time for their chances, he has been afforded a few. Not too surprising, it could be said, considering he was a household name with a Premier League career as a player.
But another observation could be that his coaching journey is one born out of a frustrated narrative about the lack of a pathway for Englishman. However true it was, the belief that they weren’t being given a chance was a legitimate consensus. Add to that the desire to improve overall philosophies and the result is Parker being thrust into position and willed on simply because he looked and sounded the part, with minimal substance to back it up.
Beyond buzzwords like energy, intensity and high pressure, it is hard to really decipher what a Parker team looks and plays like. The evidence is there to suggest he is not particularly motivational, and scoring goals has long been an issue; the manner in which he ostracised Aleksandar Mitrovic at Fulham now seems sillier by the day.
Perhaps it is overly simplistic to say Parker has the career he does because he simply appears as an archetypical ‘young, bright British coach’, but as he struggles in yet another high-end job, patterns are emerging, and it is high time he proved himself.
