EX-IRELAND INTERNATIONAL David Meyler has joined The42 as our new football columnist for this season.
Every Friday, the former Hull City and Sunderland midfielder will give expert insight and his predictions ahead of the weekend’s Premier League action, alongside the latest William Hill prices.
In his latest piece, Meyler shares his thoughts on his time at Reading and Frank Lampard’s managerial career so far before looking ahead to the meeting of Arsenal and Manchester United.
Chelsea v Burnley, 12pm Sunday
I got a call from my agent one day, saying Reading were interested in signing me.
After five years, two promotions and an FA Cup final, I had left Hull City in May 2018 and was looking for a new club.
Paul Clement was the Reading manager at that time, and I had worked with him briefly at the Ireland U21s — although I still wasn’t hugely familiar with him.
He flew over to meet me at a hotel beside Dublin airport before my Uefa B licence coaching course was due to start one morning and we spent a half hour chatting. He felt the culture at the club wasn’t right and he needed to iron out some problems. He believed I’d be able to help change things, so I agreed to sign a two-year deal.
In the opening league game of the season, we played Derby County at home. I was picked to make my debut while, over in the away team’s dug out, the recently-appointed Frank Lampard was managing in a competitive match for the very first time.
I remember Jon Dadi Bodvarsson scored a header early in the second half and we were comfortable enough. Mason Mount then equalised and a few fellas had a go over the goal, as I could have got tighter to him before he took the strike.
Leandro Bacuna came on for me with five minutes remaining, and we ended up conceding in the 94th minute to lose 2-1. Derby were impressive that day — they had a lot of young lads and were well organised.
I continued to play but when you’re not winning you start to question things and the manager began to chop and change his team. Unfortunately, I was one of the players to miss out.
There was an international break coming up in September and Paul said he didn’t want me to go away with Ireland. He was looking for me to get familiar with my team-mates and do some work on the training pitch to learn what way he wanted us to play, which was completely understandable.
However, he was talking to the wrong person. I was regularly picked in Martin O’Neill’s squads and was always going to make myself available as playing for your country is the greatest honour you can have. I made that clear to him and he wasn’t happy about it.
A year on from captaining Ireland in the win in Cardiff, we faced Wales again but this time I wasn’t selected to play. I was desperate to be involved, so I was annoyed when I didn’t get on and we lost 4-1. I ended up having a run-in with Martin in training the following day and, to make matters worse, I picked up a slight hamstring problem during the session.
When you go away on international duty, the manager always says ‘Good luck in your game, but don’t come back injured’. As it turned out, I didn’t play for Reading again after that international break. I still trained with the first team after recovering but I felt like I was beating my head off a wall at times as I wasn’t getting an opportunity.
Results weren’t going our way, there were a few players creating problems and they weren’t being addressed properly. In December, Paul was sacked and replaced by Jose Gomes. A month later, I went out on loan to Coventry City — the last club I would line out for before retiring.
To be fair to Paul, he is an exceptional coach. His training sessions were fantastic and there was variety everyday. He kept players on their toes.
Having progressed through the youth teams at Chelsea, he became Carlo Ancelotti’s assistant and would go on to have great success under the Italian — also working with him at Paris Saint-Germain, Real Madrid and Bayern Munich.
You could see why he was Ancelotti’s number two as everything he did during his sessions was phenomenal. However, as a number two, you don’t have to show your man-management skills and deal with 20-odd egos in a dressing room.
I think that’s what let Paul down. His ideas were fantastic and he is one of the best coaches I worked under but when push comes to shove, you have to make the hard calls.
Lampard’s Derby side went on to reach the play-off final that season but just missed out on promotion after losing 2-1 to Aston Villa at Wembley.
He was handed Chelsea job in the summer of 2019 and earned praise for the work he did there in his first year — bringing through a number of young players during their transfer ban — but this week finds himself unemployed.
I feel sorry for Frank but he will know as well as anyone that owner Roman Abramovich doesn’t give managers time and there was always going to be pressure after they spent over €200 million in the summer.
There’s no doubting Timo Werner, Kai Havertz and Hakim Ziyech will come good but it’s taking them longer to settle than Frank would have hoped.
The Chelsea players I talked to all spoke really highly of him and as recently as December they were top of the table.
If you compare it to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s situation, people were calling for his head not long ago. That video of Roy Keane and Jamie Carragher going back and forth in the Sky Sports studio a year ago, and Roy saying “give the man time”, was circulating again on social media recently.
United stuck with him and are challenging for the title this season — albeit they suffered defeat to bottom-placed Sheffield United on Wednesday night.
It was interesting what Carlo Ancelotti said too: “At the end, it’s not sad for Frank — another door will open for him. Look at me. I was sacked everywhere.”
You hope that Lampard goes away, clears his head and gets more experience under his belt at another club. We’ll just have to wait and see where he goes from here.
Chelsea didn’t get their ‘new manager bounce’ when Thomas Tuchel took charge for the first time against Wolves the other night, but it could well happen at home to Burnley on Sunday. I’m going to say Chelsea 3-0.
Arsenal v United, 5.30pm Saturday
One of the most intriguing games of the weekend takes place at the Emirates on Saturday evening.
As much as Arsenal are playing well at the moment, you just don’t know with them. A few weeks ago, it was awful and now they look great again.
United had the chance to regain top spot on Wednesday but shocked everyone by losing 2-1 to Sheffield United in what was arguably the biggest upset of the season so far.
The Gunners are in good form but I think United will win out in a close affair — 2-1.
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