While Luke Wilkshire's FC Twente have qualified for the Champions League next season they'll need a new manager to usher them through the tournament with current boss Fred Rutten heading to Schalke.
Steve McClaren has been mooted as the possible replacement.
Wilkshire has already served under McClaren's stewardship at Middlesbrough (as have Mark Schwarzer, Mark Viduka and Tony Vidmar, of course). I don't know if he'd be thrilled about a reunification with his old gaffer. For one, McClaren was happy to sell Wilkshire to Bristol City in 2003 having given him only a couple of dozen matches in all senior competitions to prove himself. (He's now played about the same number of matches for Australia, including a few in the World Cup.)
Wilkshire's career was probably stifled a bit in the lower English divisions. I wonder if his sometimes over zealous lunges (against Holland and Giovanni van Bronckhorst in particular in the warm-up match for the 2006 World Cup, for instance) emerged as a result of too much action in League One. (It could be more a case of 'big game' syndrome, though. Of his two red cards in English football, one came against Arsenal in a league match while playing for Middlesbrough. Wilkshire received two yellows, the second for a challenge on Robert Pires. The victim of the first? None other than van Bronckhorst.)
20 May 2008
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2 comments:
Yes James, i read about this yday, and I gotta say, I was pretty guttered for Luke when I heard it.
The poor kid, I thought, his career has been going so damn well over the past 2 seasons, climaxing with a spot in the UCL...on an absolute high...and now this.
I'm hoping it doesnt happen and they get someone in who can continue the methods of the past 2 seasons.
I agree - he appears a much calmer and mentally 'switched-on' player these days (talk about a great move!).
Whatever transpires, good luck to Luke Wilkshire, I hope his career continues to flourish.
I agree with the round ball - poor old FC Twenty (what are their owners on?).
Twenty have some sought of tie up with the Roar and Robbie Kruse is talking of going there. Maybe not now.
Maybe the Socceroos will go off the Dutch style?
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