Glenn Hoddle (born 27 October 1957) is an English former football player and manager. He works as a television pundit and commentator for ITV Sport and TNT Sports.
He played as a midfielder for Tottenham Hotspur, Monaco, Chelsea and Swindon Town and at international level for England. In 2007, he was inducted into the National Football Museum Hall of Fame, which cited him as one of the most gifted and creative English footballers of his generation, exhibiting "sublime balance and close control, unrivalled passing and vision and extraordinary shooting ability, both from open play and set pieces".
He has been manager of Swindon Town (earning promotion to the Premier League), Chelsea (taking them to the FA Cup final), Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur (reaching a League Cup final) and Wolverhampton Wanderers. He managed England to the second round of the 1998 FIFA World Cup, where they lost to Argentina on penalties. He was dismissed from the England job in 1999 following an interview with Matt Dickinson in which he was widely interpreted as saying that people with disabilities and others are affected by karma from past lives.
He began supporting Tottenham Hotspur when he was eight, and his favourite player was Martin Chivers. He first came to the attention of Tottenham when Chivers and Ray Evans went to present prizes at a local school cup final and noticed the potential of an 11-year-old Hoddle. On Chivers's recommendation, he was invited to train with the club at Tottenham's practice ground in Cheshunt. At the age of 15, Hoddle played for Harlow-based Sunday league club Longmans, alongside his father.
Playing career
Tottenham Hotspur
thumb|Hoddle with Tottenham Hotspur in a 1983 match against [[Feyenoord]]
Hoddle joined Tottenham as a junior when he was 12, and signed for the club as an apprentice on 17 April 1974. He successfully overcame knee problems in his early teens and collected eight England Youth caps, the first of these on 18 March 1975 against Spain. He made his Spurs first-team debut as a 17-year-old substitute for Cyril Knowles against Norwich City on 30 August 1975, a game that ended 2–2. Hoddle was forced to wait until 21 February 1976 to start a First Division match and immediately announced his arrival with the winning goal.
He flourished under the management of Keith Burkinshaw and despite the club's relegation to the Second Division in 1976–77 after 27 seasons of First Division football, a Hoddle-inspired Spurs side won promotion to the top flight at the first attempt. As Tottenham's transitional phase continued, Hoddle's international career began on 15 December 1976 in an Under-21 friendly fixture against Wales. He would collect another eleven caps at that level, and play twice for the England 'B' team prior to scoring on his full international debut against Bulgaria on 22 November 1979.
The 1979–80 campaign heralded the emergence of Hoddle as a top-class player; the 22-year-old midfielder scored 19 goals in 41 league appearances and was awarded the PFA Young Player of the Year award at the end of the season. In 1981, he starred as Spurs won the FA Cup for the sixth time, defeating Manchester City after a replay. The following season, Tottenham retained the FA Cup (Hoddle scored in both the final and final replay) against Queen's Park Rangers and finished the League campaign in fourth place, the club's best league position since 1971. Hoddle was part of the Tottenham team which reached the final of the League Cup, losing 3–1 to Liverpool, and the semi-final stage of the European Cup Winners Cup. During the summer of 1982, Hoddle played in two of England's matches in the opening group phase of the FIFA World Cup, starting against Kuwait after a substitute appearance in a 2–0 victory over Czechoslovakia.
Hoddle's involvement in the following three seasons was limited by a number of niggling injury problems (he started only 76 of a possible 126 league matches) but nevertheless, Hoddle proved to be the architect behind the team's 1984 UEFA Cup triumph despite missing the final due to fitness concerns. In October 1983, he helped Spurs win 6–2 on aggregate against a Feyenoord Rotterdam side containing Johan Cruyff. Cruyff was dismissive of Hoddle before their first match, but after Hoddle's performance, Cruyff swapped shirts with Hoddle as a sign of respect.
Spurs came close to further honours in the next three seasons, reaching third place in the First Division and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1984–85 and another FA Cup Final in 1987, losing 3–2 to Coventry City, the only time the North London club has experienced defeat in the final of the famous knock-out competition. The unexpected loss to the Midlands side was Hoddle's last match for Spurs, as newly appointed AS Monaco manager Arsène Wenger brought him to the principality for a fee of £750,000. Between 1975 and 1987, Hoddle scored 110 goals in 490 first-team matches in all competitions; only four players (Steve Perryman, Pat Jennings, Gary Mabbutt and Cyril Knowles) have made more appearances in a Spurs shirt. At international level, Hoddle won 44 caps for England during his Tottenham career.
AS Monaco
Hoddle announced in 1987 that he would be leaving Tottenham at the end of the season to pursue a career overseas. He joined AS Monaco alongside George Weah and fellow Englishman Mark Hateley and immediately inspired the club to the 1988 Ligue 1 championship, its first league title in six seasons. Hoddle was voted the Best Foreign Player in French football and helped to guide the team to the quarter-finals of the European Cup in the 1988–89 campaign; however, a severe knee injury curtailed Hoddle's career at the highest level, and in November 1990, the 33-year-old left the club by mutual consent, having helped to improve the standing of English footballers in foreign countries.
During his three-and-a-half-year spell in France, Hoddle won a further nine England caps, making his international farewell against the Soviet Union in June 1988. He returned to England and signed for Chelsea on a non-contract basis to regain his fitness, leaving Stamford Bridge in March 1991, without playing a senior match, to become player-manager of Swindon Town in the Second Division.
England international career
Hoddle made his debut alongside Kevin Reeves in England's Euro 1980 qualifying tie against Bulgaria on 22 November 1979, scoring in a 2–0 win at Wembley. He scored in his third appearance against Australia on 31 May 1980 in a friendly in Sydney. His third goal came in his fifth appearance on 25 March 1981 in a game against Spain at Wembley, which England lost 2–1. He received his tenth cap on 27 April 1982 in the British Home Championship clash with Wales in Cardiff, which England won 1–0. By this stage of his international career, he had scored four goals.
He was included in the 1982 and 1986 FIFA World Cup squads, and England reached the quarter-finals against Argentina in the latter.
Hoddle also featured prominently in the European Championship squads of 1980 and 1988, making his 53rd and final international appearance in the final group game of UEFA Euro 1988, a 3–1 defeat to the Soviet Union in West Germany. He scored eight goals for the England senior side in a career stretching nine years, the last of his international goals coming on 23 April 1986 in a 2–1 friendly win over Scotland at Wembley.
By the time he guided Swindon to promotion, Hoddle was already being linked with managerial vacancies at bigger clubs. Just days after guiding Swindon to promotion, he accepted the offer to manage Chelsea and was succeeded at Swindon by his assistant John Gorman, who had been widely expected to follow him to Stamford Bridge.
Chelsea
In June 1993, Hoddle became player-manager of Chelsea. His assistant at Chelsea was the former Tottenham manager Peter Shreeves, and they reached the FA Cup final in Hoddle's first season, losing 4–0 to Manchester United. But Manchester United had won the double, and consolation for their failure to win the trophy came in the form of a European Cup Winners' Cup place, Chelsea's first European campaign for more than 20 years. Chelsea finished 14th in the league that season.
Chelsea reached the semi-finals of the European Cup Winners' competition in 1994–95 and lost by a single goal to Real Zaragoza, who went on to beat Arsenal in the final. Hoddle guided Chelsea to the FA Cup semi-finals in 1995–96, but was unable to take them beyond 11th place in the Premiership; they had occupied this final position three times in four years. He did establish them as a force in cup competitions and made them capable of attracting top-class players—such as Ruud Gullit—to the club. Other notable signings were Mark Hughes, Dan Petrescu, Gavin Peacock, David Rocastle and Mark Stein.
England
Hoddle's three-year reign at Chelsea came to an end in the summer of 1996, after he had accepted the offer to manage the England, replacing Terry Venables after England's Euro 96 campaign, in which they finished as semi-finalists as the host nation. He guided England to qualification for the 1998 World Cup, securing the team's automatic qualification with a goalless draw in Rome against Italy. He later caused controversy by omitting Paul Gascoigne from the squad and installing supposed faith healer Eileen Drewery as part of the England coaching staff, which led to the team being dubbed "The Hod Squad". They reached the second round of the 1998 tournament, losing on penalties to Argentina.
Hoddle's 60% win rate during his spell as manager is only bettered by Alf Ramsey, Fabio Capello, Sam Allardyce (who only managed one game) and Gareth Southgate.