The best managers – even in name aligned with their employer?

It’s Friday, forgive some lite-ness. I remember, probably over a decade ago, when Arsenal had a manager called Arsene Wenger. (They still do? What the…) Well some wags on the radio were suggesting he’d been successful so soon after arriving at Arsenal because his name was so close to that of the club.

Hmm. I know, this isn’t exactly science. They – from Manchester – suggested their struggling team, Manchester City (they’d never amount to anything) would do well to hire someone with similar namesake-ness. Their suggestion was Mani from The Stone Roses. Perfectly logical.

Funny to think that all these years later Man City have done well with a manager called Mancini. C’mon, it’s close enough. Work with me.

And patently, as Chelsea look for their umpteenth top-level manager in just a few years, it would seem Andre Villas-Boas would have been much better suited to the job of Aston Villa boss.

Think this is all about football? About 18 months ago, when Stephen Elop was announced as the first non-Finnish CEO at Nokia, I convinced myself of visits to the mobile giant’s headquarters, by the water just outside Helsinki, at Elop.

Actually, Nokia’s HQ is at Espoo. The damage to my thinking had clearly already been done.