ruthless

The job of England manager is under usual circumstances the partest of part time. When England fail to qualify, it becomes even less onerous because all it involves is long periods of hanging around doing nothing while preparing for friendlies that signify nothing. It is the best of jobs in that the hourly rate is preposterously high. It is the worst of jobs in that there is so little to do yet every little thing you do is microscopically analysed.

The job doesn't even involve much looking busy, merely lots of travelling around and showing your face at Premier League matches so the Match of the Day summariser can say, 'all under the watching gaze of the England manager'.

You employ an assistant manager (eg Tord Grip) not to help with the workload, but to keep you company. For the rest of your week you sit in your office in Soho Square watching Sky Sports News and waiting for Brian Barwick to drop round to share a plate of sandwiches in front of Working Lunch.

The heart of the problem is that the team essentially pick themselves. Steve McClaren's squads were, in the main, indistinguishable from those of Sven-Goran Eriksson. Those whom he omitted to make a point were later recalled in a desperate bid to get points. If everyone is fit, then Jose Mourinho's starting XI would be no more dissimilar from McClaren's than his was from his predecessor's.

Not that we would see a Mourinho starting XI play a proper 90 minutes for nearly a year. His first months in charge would be taken up with providing fodder for teams who have qualified. He will be in charge of a gym full of sparring partners. And when they come out to play he will, if he's sensible, rotate them mercilessly in an effort to convince the success-starved media that the friendly they have to write 2,000 words on really isn't that important. Confuse them by clogging up their copy with a finicky list of substitutions and they will swiftly lose the mental energy to eviscerate you.

Given the job specification (short hours, no rush, battered team needing care and affection), it should be filled by an avuncular figure, a Joe Mercer. Instead, it seems that it may be offered to a manic, head-banging, attention-fixated, ruthless nephew.

The manager to whom Mourinho (one Champions League and two Premiership titles in three years) is most often compared is Brian Clough (one Championship and two European Cups in three years). Clough routinely allowed it to be put about that he was the Greatest Manager England Never Had. He drew less attention to the fact that he persistently slagged off each and every one of those who would interview him - a bold, if not always successful, strategy.

His best chance came when he was interviewed in 1977. 'I was utterly charming, too. I walked in, introduced myself to them individually,' he recalled. 'And I saw [Sir Harold] Thompson look so startled I thought the glasses were going to slide off his nose. At the end, I thanked them all very much and said, "Hey, you're not a bad bunch." I went out of the room, back straight, head up, knowing I'd done all I could.' The FA gave the job to Ron Greenwood.

This time they may give it to the equally grandiose and narcissistic Mourinho. And the bigger surprise is that he might accept it. Mourinho, better than anyone, knows the limitations of the Golden Generation. He bought Florent Malouda and picked him ahead of Joe Cole and Shaun Wright-Phillips, which suggests he isn't too taken with the attacking options. He made only one English signing during summer 2007, Steve Sidwell, and if he's the best one fears for the rest.

Mourinho would have to move from chasing a quadruple to waiting the best part of a year for a qualifying competition to start. He would have to replace day-to-day full-on involvement with a squad he has formed with an occasional jolly with other people's players. He would be bored witless within a week. He would be mad to take the job. And yet wouldn't it be fun for the rest of us if he did?