“Captains: Do they really matter?”

When Fabio Capello was preparing to name his England skipper last year the nation got itself into a bit of a tizz. But was it all a big fuss over nothing?

Divide and Conquer

There may fewer captains who can single-handedly guide their team to victory in the modern era, but that’s not to say that these types of players don’t exist. At Man United and Arsenal respectively, Cristiano Ronaldo and Cesc Fabregas – neither of whom wear the armband – are the players the team regularly turns to when in need of inspiration. Ditto Fernando Torres at Liverpool, who has eased the burden on captain Steven Gerrard by leading from the front and scoring important goals.

This, insists sports psychologist Andy Barton, is evidence that leadership can come from all over the pitch. “As long as everyone is playing to the same message, it’s not that important who delivers that message,” says Barton, before explaining why leadership, regardless of who it comes from, is so important. “As humans, we’re influenced by the emotions projected by those around us, so if someone is being positive, that spreads throughout the team. By the same token, if a player like Gallas sits in the centre-circle looking defeated, his state of mind affects those around him. The team may then start to look for excuses for why they lost, rather than doing everything they can to win. This can be fatal in sports.”
With so much riding on positive leadership, it’s hardly surprising that there’s less onus on the captain to always be the one to rouse the troops. As a result, there has been a revolution in the dressing room, where autocracy has given way to democracy.

“As a captain you have to try and set an example,” explains the wearer of the armband at Ajax, Klaas-Jan Huntelaar. “But alone it wouldn’t be possible – you need natural leadership in the whole team.”

But, while sharing responsibility eases the burden on one player, this process does have its down sides. The absolute authority of a captain like Roy Keane, who admitted to dishing out verbal assaults to players if they didn’t look up for it before matches, no longer seems to exist. Last year, during Arsenal’s Carling Cup semi-final defeat to Spurs, a rebuke from William Gallas for Nicklas Bendtner led the young Dane to square up to his captain. An emerging player confronting his skipper on the pitch? An inconceivable thought in Tony Adams’s day.

At the same time, the sanctity of captaincy has diminished too. The clearest example of this was during England’s 2-1 friendly win over Serbia & Montenegro in 2003, when the armband was tossed between Michael Owen, Emile Heskey, Phil Neville and Jamie Carragher, leading to widespread condemnation in the press.

So while leadership will always be essential, captaincy has clearly changed. In an age of universal player power and multi-millionaire bench-warmers, everyone now wants a say. A fact confirmed by Aaron Hughes, Northern Ireland’s captain since 2003. He says: “If we come in at half-time and anyone has anything on their mind tactically or otherwise, they’re free to say it and everyone will listen. I think the days of one player shouting at everyone, telling them what to do, are gone.”

But captaincy not that important? Try telling that to Rio Ferdinand.

Hitesh Ratna

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