Wally meets... Luther Blissett

By Mike Walters

Published 22:30 02/04/10

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Scorpions lurking around the campfire and his tent every night, Luther Blissett tried not to think of the love bites.

By day, temperatures reached a sweltering 48 degrees Centigrade on the Cape hinterland and it was the hardest labour he could remember since he worked the channels for Watford in Graham Taylor’s heyday.

But after 12 days of extraordinary endurance and teamwork under the burning African sun, the job was done.

From just a grid of shallow trenches, a school building and adjoining toilet block rose from the Veld - and for Blissett, now 52 but still lean as a butcher’s dog, it was one of the most rewarding things he had ever done.

A expectant nation trusts it will not be the only English triumph on South African soil this year, and certainly Fabio Capello’s squad will hope their World Cup training camp will be a shade more luxurious than the basic mod cons of a primary school near Leopoldtville.

But if any WAGs need a cheap and cheerful bolthole, with ensuite scorpions and unidentified wildlife on the prowl at night, Blissett will probably be able to get them a discount after his efforts on behalf of the Bobby Moore Fund for Cancer Research UK.

“I did the full DIY bit - digging, building, roofing, grouting, tiling, plumbing, fixing doors and fitting windows,” said Blissett, who scored a hat-trick on his first start for England against Luxembourg 28 years ago.

“But I love getting my hands dirty - I’d rather do all that hard graft than sit behind a desk all day. In South Africa I was sharing a tent with George Parris (the former West Ham defender), and we got on like a house on fire.

“There was a real air of comradeship sitting round the campfire every night, and by the time everything was in place the sense of achievement was incredible. I’ve run two marathons, and did all right for myself as a footballer, but nothing comes close to this project.”

The only pangs of regret Blissett felt while he was away came when he missed the funeral of his contemporary Keith Alexander, the Macclesfield manager who died suddenly last month at the age of 52.

Alexander’s death was another setback for the cause of black managers, whose under-representation in dugouts throughout the professional game reflects little credit on chairmen and directors who make coaching appointments.

As a player, Blissett suffered hideous racist abuse. The worst, he recalls, was at a midweek reserve game at Peterborough, and he once silenced a sustained chorus of the vile monkey hoot at Millwall by drilling a superb finish into the top corner.

And his treatment in the job market since he retired has been disgraceful. After five years as Taylor’s No.2, he was removed from office at Vicarage Road when Gianluca Vialli swept into office for his short-lived, and unlamented, Watford revolution.

Since then, his only job as a manager has been at non-league Chesham United. And of the countless job applications he has made to League clubs, many did not even afford him the decency of a reply.

“Keith Alexander was right - English football will never have a contingent of black managers which accurately reflects the number of black people within the game until you get more black faces in the boardroom,” said Blissett.

“You look at the game now, and the way it is being run, and on the whole it’s in a shocking state. I’ve gone for a number of jobs at different levels, but I’ve pretty much given up hope that I’ll ever get the chance to prove myself as manager, and that’s a hard thing for me to say out loud because I really wanted to do it.

“I did my first coaching badge when I was 17, so that’s 35 years of planning for the future going to waste.

“I’m glad to see Les Ferdinand is working with Tottenham’s strikers, but it doesn’t raise my expectations greatly that the floodgates are about to open for black managers.

“If any change is going to be made, you have to put people in charge, let them decide on the tactics, the youth policy, transfer signings and run the whole show.

“And you need to give people a chance. If Blackburn were strong enough to appoint Paul Ince as their manager in the first place, they should have been strong enough to back him when things were tough.”

*Luther Blissett took part in the Bobby Moore Fund for Cancer Research UK’s Project South Africa to raise funds for research into bowel cancer. For more information to to www.bobbymoorefund.org

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