Football: Hoddle's lessons from the Wenger handbook

GLENN HODDLE revealed yesterday the extent to which he was influenced to pursue a career in management by the Arsenal manager, Arsene Wenger.

Speaking to a group of London-based overseas journalists at the Foreign Press Association, the England coach said: "To be quite honest I had no thoughts of staying in football as a coach before I went to Monaco to play."

Hoddle, who went to Monaco in 1987 and experienced two years as a player under Wenger's management, added: "It was whilst I was there that I saw a different approach to the game - in many aspects, from the media to supporters to the coach and the players around you - which was more on a wavelength that I was tuned to.

"And to be honest he [Wenger] saw something in me that I didn't see at the time in myself and he mentioned it to me. He thought that I could go on to be a coach and then it started me thinking. And so I started to look at football a little bit differently."

Hoddle went on to win the French league championship as a Monaco player in 1988, which was the same year that he won his last cap as an England international. A knee injury the following year effectively ended his days as a top-class player, and in 1991, he followed Wenger's advice and became a manager, at Swindon Town.

Having steered Swindon to two promotions (and the Premiership) by the summer of 1993, he moved to Chelsea, and then, in 1996, took over as the national team manager.

Hoddle said yesterday that he had been influenced especially by Wenger's measured management style. "The balance in his team, the preparation and the alternative situations that were given to the players off the pitch and on the pitch," said Hoddle, were all things he was impressed by. "If you're successful, 50 per cent, if not more, comes from what happens off the pitch. You need good players but if you've got the same good players as the next coach it's the preparation and the focus that are more important. And this is something Arsene has been very strong on."

Meanwhile yesterday, England's 1966 World Cup heroes Bobby Moore and Sir Bobby Charlton were named as members of the greatest-ever European team. Some 130 journalists from across the Continent voted for the only Englishman to lift the Jules Rimet trophy and the man whose semi-final double against Portugal allowed Sir Alf Ramsey's side to reach that famous showdown with West Germany.

Fellow '66 veteran Gordon Banks missed out on a place in the team, edged out by Russia's legendary goalkeeper Lev Yashin, while Jimmy Greaves, Denis Law, George Best and Duncan Edwards were also among those who failed to gain selection.

Moore and Charlton were, however, joined in the side by their 1966 opponents Franz Beckenbauer and Eusebio, Hungary's Magyar genius Ferenc Puskas, and the epitome of total football, Johan Cruyff.