What is modern day football's fascination with a foreign name?
And what I mean is, well, let's take Roberto Martinez as an example.
The Spaniard recently relegated Wigan from the Premier League. A feat no other Wigan manager has reached, heck, not even close. Yet Martinez did, and that's after flirting with the drop year upon year. Yes, he's put the FA Cup trophy on the table of 'Uncle Dave' Whelan but at the huge expense of Wigan and their Premier League status. Which in turn, has cost the club around £70m in new TV money. The sort of figure that could make or break a small club like Wigan.
Yet, because Martinez has the Latin charisma, the exotic name and swaggers about the touchline in a nice suit, he's heralded as a great manager.
'Performed miracles at Wigan', 'One of the top managers in Europe'. Part of the Top 5 in fact, according to the annoying, loose lipped Dave Whelan.
We constantly get told of Roberto's philosophy of great football and his ability to unearth gems. All of which proved futile and somewhat false. The fact is he took Wigan down. End of.
And then jumped ship to blind admirers Everton.
So why then, did it take Scottish manager Owen Coyle so long to get another job? The man who 4 out of 5 seasons finished above Martinez. The cynic in me can't help but think it's because he was born in Paisley, Scotland and not Balaguer in Spain.
Tracksuit clad Owen Coyle, has always had his teams playing the right way, and had it been for similar FA Cup luck as Wigan, could well have had Bolton's name on the trophy at the end of the 2010/11 season.
As it turned it, Bolton eventually suffered the drop and not long after Coyle recieved his marching orders. A real contrast to Martinez who was rewarded with a Top Premier League job.
After a while out of the game, Owen Coyle has recently been named, coincidentally, as the new Wigan Athletic manager, following Martinez's distasteful leap to Goodison.
Now, don't get me wrong, such bias and favouritism towards the foreigner isn't exclusive to the English football family, journalists, pundits and whatnot, it's an unfortunate trait that has trickled down to the heartbeat of football - the fans.
Players too, can often find themselves victims of such sketchy views.
A quick look at my own club, Aston Villa, last summer, Ashley Westwood and Matthew Lowton were brought into the club, to very little fanfare. Disgruntled noises on message boards became a theme during the summer. Fast forward 12 months and the same fans are getting giddy as the likes of Leandro Bacuna and Antonio Luna join the Villa ranks.
The effects of such a modern dismissive nature runs deeper in football, but to be honest, I don't care enough about the FA's around the UK and their national sides at the moment to delve any deeper, so for now at least, on the surface I'll scratch.
And on that surface, take Harry Forrester and Dale Jennings. Two names that are not well known. (To the average Premier League fan at least).
After Forrester's contract ended with Aston Villa not too long ago, he was offered a deal with Ajax after impressing in the Hong Kong 7's tournament.
Subsequently, the exciting Forrester turned down Ajax's offer (as he was reportedly apprehensive of a move abroad) and ended up moving to Brentford. No offense to Brentford, but how was it no bigger team on these shores could claim his signature? Probably because teams like Fulham were too busy stockpiling Johnny Foreigners into their squads, that's why. Now, as it turns out, Forrester has just had a breakout season with Brentford and is now linked with a move to the Premier League.
Dale Jennings' situation was a little different. Jennings was rightly placed in the 'exciting prospect' category at Tranmere a couple of seasons ago. But when push came to shove, no club in England obviously thought he was exciting enough. Their loss, Jennings signed for Bayern Munich. This summer however, a homesick Dale Jennings headed back to England. Highly rated by the staff at the current European champions, Jennings must surely have had many suitors vying for his signature? Aston Villa? Arsenal? Liverpool? No, no and no.
After being linked with Huddersfield, Jennings moved to Barnsley for a very modest fee, signing a 3-year deal.
Rankles a bit when you see that Premier League cannon fodder Sunderland have just brought in three 'Johnnys' and look likely to sign more. Even Aston Villa's Paul Lambert has succumb to the horrible trend and done all his shopping abroad so far.
Unfortunately, it's British players like Harry Forrester and Dale Jennings, and British managers like Owen Coyle who are being pushed aside for mediocrity, just because that mediocrity is from overseas.
