I Can Do The Job, Boss - It's Just That I Can't Prove It

Imagine if you turned up for an interview for a job you had no qualifications for, claiming that you would have got the qualifications if you hadn't been so busy and that you can do the job anyway. Experience ? No, none of that, either. But, honest, boss, I can do it, really I can.

You would get laughed out of the building, wouldn't you.

Except that this is exactly what has happened with Middlesborough's recent appointment of Gareth Southgate as manager. To manage a Premiership football team, you need a UEFA Pro License. Southgate hasn't got one.

Steve Gibson, Middlesborough Chairman, claimed that Southgate was unable to obtain this license because of this long, successful career with England. "Why should he be penalised for being remarkable", Gibson commented.

If that's your logic, Mr Gibson, then I am the perfect candidate to manage Middlesborough myself. My long and successful career in marketing and advertising, unfortunately, got in the way of me becoming a professional footballer and taking the appropriate managers' licences.

Gibson says he prizes "... character, the intellect and the determination ..." over a certificate. Well, I have those qualities to. I am, quite literally, as well qualified as Gareth Southgate to manage Middlesborough.

I don't doubt that at some point Mr Southgate might make a good manager. But there are thousands of coaches out there who have the qualifications required for the job right now. Appoint one of them. Or does the Middlesborough board really believe that the rules are there only as an inconvenience and that the UEFA Pro License is a meaningless piece of paper.

Show some respect to qualified, professional managers and appoint one before the F.A or UEFA force you to do so.