McLeish is gambling with the gallus one

Published on Saturday 19 January 2008 19:13

'He is a scorer of great goals rather than a great goalscorer'

IT'S hard to find an Evertonian with a bad word to say about James McFadden. It's equally hard to find an Evertonian with something especially good to say about him. As he left Goodison Park last week there wasn't much emotion from the club's fans. There wasn't much of anything except mild surprise that somebody was prepared to shell out 4.75m up front for his services with a possible 1m to follow in add-ons. Ambivalence was the order of the day. 'Faddy's leaving? Yeah, whatever'.

His move to Birmingham was a transfer that was always likely to happen. Even when Alex McLeish's opening offer was turned down flat by David Moyes you just knew that an agreement would be reached down the line. Moyes knew this best of all. He was only too aware of McLeish's desire to sign the player who did most to electrify his months as Scotland manager. Moyes played this one nicely. Amarillo Slim in his pomp didn't have as good a poker face as the Everton manager has had these past weeks.

McFadden's move to Birmingham is no surprise but it is a major gamble on McLeish's part. We're guessing that this transfer is going to be his one big(ish) splurge in the January window, that McFadden is the guy McLeish thinks can create and score the goals that will keep the club in the Premiership. That's a huge amount of faith he's placed in his fellow Scot, particularly when you appreciate that as far as McFadden is concerned, McLeish is something of a recent convert. It was only back in September of last year that he left him out of his Scotland team that played Lithuania at Hampden in a European championship qualifier, opting instead to go with Gary Teale in that wide midfield berth.

The Birmingham manager used his favourite word again last week. No sentence he has ever uttered in relation to McFadden has been complete without the word 'gallus' being thrown in. McLeish reckons McFadden can be a reliable provider and scorer of goals once he feels secure in the team and has had a run of games under his belt. Then, says his manager, you'll see the real Faddy. You hope he's right. But I'm not sure. McLeish is staking his Premiership survival on a player who was described by an Everton diehard last week as "a luxury item". In their position, Everton can get away with such luxury. Given their precarious spot at the wrong end of the table Birmingham don't have that latitude. Having scored just 23 goals in their 22 league games before this weekend, they need to start finding the target on a more regular basis or this dogfight they are in could end badly.

McFadden is a scorer of great goals rather than a great goalscorer. Sure, he hasn't always played as a striker but nor has he been short of opportunities in that area. McFadden has spent hours upon hours as a goal-seeking forward as opposed to a wide midfield player and his record is, for Birmingham fans, rather alarming. The Brummies would be entitled to express something close to horror that McFadden took 1,600 minutes to open his account for Everton, the equivalent of almost 18 games.

Of course, the really galling thing for the Merseysiders was that while McFadden was firing blanks for his club he was scoring goals for his country.

He struck against Holland, Romania, Estonia and Sweden before he ever got off the mark for Everton. The club's supporters couldn't understand that.

Truth be known, they never figured out why McFadden could look so dangerous for Scotland and yet not do it for Everton.

They were not alone. McFadden is your ultimate enigma. Is it a confidence thing that has held him back in club football? That's what McLeish is banking on. You will not hear the manager dwelling on his new boy's past record, for instance. In his Scotland days McLeish used to joke that his press conferences were party political broadcasts on behalf of the Positive Party and he's trying to do the same at Birmingham. He'd hate us for mentioning it but McFadden played a total of 7,065 minutes for Everton and scored only 18 goals, among them just 11 in the Premiership. That's a goal every 392.5 minutes in all competitions and closer to a goal every 600 minutes if you just count his Premiership time. A sum of 5.75m (if indeed it rises to that) can be considered hefty when looked at in those terms.

Reinventing McFadden as a potent Premiership force is the biggest challenge now facing McLeish. He's had a few in his time but this one is a major project, one that he has to get right, not just for McFadden's future but for his own. There's that much riding on it. Kevin Keegan's adventures at Newcastle will captivate in the coming months but the high-wire exploits of the gallus one will be every bit as intriguing.

Brass neck bookies will win again

EVEN if they are the enemy some part of my being still admires bookmakers. Their brass neck is something to behold. Recently, some of the major betting firms have sent out regular e-mail bulletins on the next Scotland manager. Their object is to get some handy publicity and their hyperbole holds no bounds if there's a few column inches to be had.

It was less than a fortnight ago that a "flood of money" swept Tommy Burns into the reckoning, followed by a "wave of cash from respected sources" for Graeme Souness. The former Rangers manager, we were told, would prove "a disastrous result" for the layers, or put another way, "a doomsday scenario". Mark McGhee has been reinstated as favourite and his appointment would also prove a whopping loss for the beleaguered bookies.

Or so they say. How much has actually been gambled on the new Scotland manager? Buttons.

Here's one bet I wouldn't mind having. When the new manager is revealed an e-mail will pop up from a Ladbrokes or a William Hill or a Paddy Power announcing that they're hurting big-time after canny Scottish punters relieved them of obscene amounts of cash. And the greatest living certainty? That the bookies will somehow get over it.

Time-saving machine probably won't

ELECTRONIC rangefinders will be used at the Scottish PGA Championship at Gleneagles this summer. In the hope of speeding up the pace of play these devices are intended to give players their yardages in fairly rapid order thereby cutting down the time spent deliberating on distances and club selection. Their introduction is part of the drive to eliminate the five-and-a-half hour rounds that have become commonplace in the game.

Amen to that. But you have to be dubious about this development. Golfers are so paranoid about under/over-clubbing that I can't see many of them entrusting the job to a piece of technology, can you? When you're playing for your living and you're considering what weapon to use for a shot that might make a big difference to your career are you really going to look at a screen or your caddie's painstakingly put-together yardage book for guidance? You might do both, which rather defeats the point of rangefinders given the speed of play would remain pretty much as it is. I'm guessing this scheme won't catch on. But the battle against the slow coaches should continue.