Wilkins Fills Clarke Void at Chelsea
"SUPER!"
By dixon9
September 18 2008
Kenyon is often accused of co*king up at Chelsea but I doubt detractors would disagree with the signing of “Butch” Wilkins to replace Steve Clarke as coach and player link for Scolari. Clarke shocked Chelsea fans just days ago when he joined Zola at West Ham but already the void has been filled by yet another member of the Chelsea boot room that are proliferating throughout the leagues nowadays.
.
Apparently, Scolari has already met and sat down with Wilkins and is said to have “deeply impressed” the Brazilian (perhaps stating "the bleeding obvious" as I don´t see the club appointing anyone without the "ok" of Big Phil!).
“Super” Ray, 52, is intelligent, coherent and possesses an excellent knowledge of top-flight domestic and European football. His CV is impressive indeed and he should be a first class asset for Scolari.
Butch started his career at Chelsea after graduating as an apprentice at 17 in 1973 and at 18 years of age was already captaining an exciting young Eddie McCreadie side that I was fortunate to see. Even at that age Butch showed a maturity way way beyond his years although we did used to nickname him “The Crab” due to his penchant for passing sideways!
In those days, although the football at the Bridge was exciting and full of promise for the future, the economic situation at the club compounded by the East Stand debt and recession took its toll – McCreadie was refused a company car and resigned in disgust and eventually our prize asset in Butch was swallowed up by Manchester United after making 179 appearances.
After Manchester United came AC Milan then Rangers and then PSG. Wilkins won 84 caps for England - 24 of those whilst at Chelsea and some of those whilst playing in the 2nd Division!
He eventually began his "out to pasture phase" at QPR where he was player/manager. Afterwards came management at Fulham and then alongside Peter Taylor with England Under-21s.
In more recent years he teamed up with Dennis Wise at Millwall and they guided the then-Championship club to the FA Cup final in 2004.
I can remember when he joined QPR and some pundits said that he wouldn´t have the pace to maintain top-flight performances, Butch replied that he never had any pace at 18 years of age anyway so what difference would that make?!!!
This won’t be the first time that Butch has been involved with the Chelsea coaching staff as he did fill in for Graham Rix ( “…for the period that Graham would be away” as he diplomatically described it) for a couple of years with Gianluca Vialli from 1998.
When you think about it, his replacing Clarke should have been so obvious that it didn’t occur to me – full marks for Kenyon for being on the ball and for recognising the desire and importance of maintaining a Chelsea link in the club management.
To lose one man in Clarke who was Chelsea through and through was a painful blow but I can’t say how happy I am that he has been replaced by another so competent so swiftly.
Maybe Wise will still come in to replace Kenyon once he goes of to the citeh !?
LINK
.
"It is born out of hypocrisy and fundamental insecurity. There have been two kids on the block for the past 12 years. Suddenly, there is a third and that one is threatening to be more successful than the others and they don’t like it." P Kenyon.