What Makes a Great Football Manager in the 2020s?

There was a time when judging a football manager was wonderfully simple. Win trophies, avoid relegation, beat your biggest rivals and keep the dressing room together. In the early 1990s, those measures still carried enormous weight. Three decades later, however, the definition of a great manager has become considerably more complicated.

That does not mean trophies have lost their importance. Quite the opposite. Sir Alex Ferguson's 13

Premier League titles remain the clearest evidence of sustained managerial excellence in English football.

Yet modern football asks a manager to deliver much more than silverware. He must have a recognisable tactical identity, develop players, manage data, communicate with supporters and executives, adapt to different opponents and, increasingly, help shape the entire culture of a club.

The changing expectations can be seen by comparing Ferguson with Pep Guardiola. When Ferguson began his Manchester United reign in 1986, tactical sophistication certainly existed, but the modern obsession with positional structures, pressing triggers, expected goals and detailed opposition analysis was nowhere near today's level. Ferguson's genius was partly his ability to repeatedly rebuild successful teams. His United sides changed considerably from the Cantona-led team of the early 1990s to the Treble winners and later the Rooney-Ronaldo generation.

Guardiola, meanwhile, has helped turn tactical detail into almost a second language of elite football. His Manchester City teams have used possession, positional rotations, inverted full-backs, high pressing and

different interpretations of space. His influence has extended beyond trophies.

That raises an important question, is style of play now as important as winning? The answer depends heavily on the club. A manager at Manchester City or Real Madrid will be judged differently from one at a newly promoted side fighting to survive. Arne Slot captured the distinction neatly when he said that success could mean winning a league for one club and staying up for another, while also arguing that a visible playing style and player development are important components of success.

Arsène Wenger provides perhaps the clearest bridge between the two eras. In the 1990s, his success was measured in trophies, but his influence went beyond them. He changed attitudes towards nutrition, training and preparation in England, while his Arsenal teams introduced a more technical and aesthetically ambitious style. The 2003-04 “Invincibles”, who completed the Premier League season unbeaten, remain the ultimate example of a manager combining results with a distinctive footballing philosophy.

Would today's successful manager have succeeded in the 1990s? Guardiola's tactical ideas would almost certainly have been revolutionary, but his methods would have required adaptation to a less data-driven environment. Conversely, a manager such as Ferguson could plausibly thrive today because his greatest strengths were not tied to one tactical system: leadership, recruitment, adaptation, squad management and

the ability to reinvent a team.

Perhaps that is the real definition of greatness. Trophies provide the evidence; style provides the identity;

adaptability provides longevity. The greatest managers of the 2020s are therefore unlikely to be remembered simply for what they won, but for how they made their teams better, and how they changed the game around them.

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