Was reading a couple of articles of the back of that BBC one, and a couple of what I thought to be well-considered comments from last year caught my eye:
If institutional racism can be proven to be a problem in football then I can see a need for the Rooney rule as a way to shake things up, but just because there's few non-white managers, that doesn't mean football is racist. The average age of a Premier League manager is 50, and as most managers are ex-players, they probably reflect the player pool from 15-20 years ago, which I suspect was significantly less ethnically diverse than it is now. Few players from a particular minority means fewer qualifying as managers, and fewer making it to the upper echelons of the sport. If in 20 years time we're still seeing the numbers we are now, then it suggests there's a problem. My other issue with the Rooney rule is the somewhat artificial definition of a minority. It seems to only be targeting ethnic minorities, why doesn't it also consider female, gay, disabled, etc candidates? Should they have to interview someone over 65 to prove there's no ageism?
I agree DH football is a results business and if a player is good enough he will be signed no matter what Suarez for example is blatantly a horrible human being but will always be in demand for his talent regardless of race or colour. There are very few Asian players or managers so maybe they should be included in the Rooney rule?, simply giving black people a chance doesn't help other minority groups and simplifying race as just black or white seems worse to me. We appointed Hughton because of his past record and fired him because he wasn't good enough that had nothing to do with his colour or his Irish heritage. Ince is the one moaning all the time but if he was succesful in his role he would probably be managing a good side now.
