‘If there’s a battle… you fucking battle!’
Ron Atkinson had a successful career as a professional footballer then manager and then broadcaster. He was on the way to becoming an avuncular national treasure when he was sacked from his job at ITV in 2004 after making a pretty awful racist comment about then Chelsea centre half, Marcel Desailly. Less than two years later, Big Ron was back on our screens in the supposedly rehabilitative docuseries, Big Ron Manager. And, obviously, it’s absolutely batshit…
Styled as a ‘trouble-shooter’, Ron is sent to Peterborough United at the bottom of the English Football League following their appointment of rookie manager Steve ‘Bleo’ Bleasdale. The inclusion of the Posh means that we don’t just get one larger-than-life football legend in Big Ron, we also get another in the form of Barry Fry. While this makes for undoubtedly great television, it also drives home just how amateur lower league football was, even as recently as the mid-2000s. ‘Bleo’ is clearly out of his depth, despite his undeniable passion (too much passion, it could be argued), and the players are openly in revolt for much of the documentary (the decision to take them to a factory to see what a ‘real’ job is like predictably backfires). The central conflict between Bleo, Big Ron and Barry Fry is impossible to resist, however. It’s clear from the start that this dynamic was never going to work, and it is this narrative that drives this docuseries, turning it from a curio into arguably essential viewing for any football fans who grew up in the ’90s. It helps that Jeff Stelling’s narration is perfect and the soundtrack, full of indie bangers of the era, is genuinely wonderful.
Big Ron Manager is far from hard-hitting television, his racist tirade is never really reckoned with (apparently Terry Venables told him to stop apologising, which Ron seems to think is as good a redemption arc as any), but it does provide a snapshot of the charming ineptitude of lower league football at the start of the 21st century.