July 2nd - 12th, 2017
The ten days between the first training session and the flight to Singapore were a strange, bifurcated existence. My days were spent at St. George's Park, immersed in the dry, academic world of coaching theory, surrounded by men who had lived the game I had only ever studied.
My evenings were spent on the phone, a remote-control manager, a ghost in the machine of the club I was trying to build.
The team was training under the watchful eyes of my staff, the intensity ramping up with each passing day, the new players slowly, awkwardly, finding their feet. But the real work, the work that would define our season, was happening in the quiet, unseen moments, in the hushed phone calls and the secret negotiations that were running in the background.
