English Football League clubs that voluntarily agreed to interview black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) candidates for managerial jobs "failed to meet that promise in six out of eight opportunities last season," according to Matt Slater of the London INDEPENDENT. The clubs were required to interview a BAME candidate "in instances where they ran a recruitment process." Three such processes took place, "including one where no BAME candidate applied." The EFL, however, "is committed to tackling the under-representation of BAME coaches and managers" and will extend the program to include "all 72 clubs next season." Based on the NFL's "Rooney Rule," 10 clubs signed up to the pilot scheme but only four of those -- Birmingham City (twice), Chesterfield, Coventry (twice) and Wolverhampton Wanderers (three times) -- changed managers during the '16-17 campaign. The PA contacted all four clubs and found the following:
- The "Rooney Rule" was applied twice -- when Wolves appointed Paul Lambert and Russell Slade joined Coventry.
- On five occasions it did not apply -- Gianfranco Zola and Harry Redknapp joining Birmingham, Walter Zenga and Nuno Espírito Santo at Wolves and Mark Robins at Coventry.
- An available BAME candidate did not apply for the Chesterfield job.
Birmingham, which twice failed to interview a BAME candidate, said that it had "abided by the agreement" as the scheme allowed clubs to appoint "specific individuals" without a full recruitment process during the season (
INDEPENDENT, 7/11). The BBC reported football equality organization Kick It Out Chair Herman Ouseley praised the EFL pilot of the "Rooney Rule," but said that representation of BAME people remains "shameful." Ouseley, who founded Kick It Out in '93, said that the new rule has started to move football in the right direction -- although it "has not yet yielded the results many hoped for." He said, "The EFL deserves praise for getting this pilot off the ground. While it has not as yet yielded the results which many hope it would, it nevertheless took us further than before because some black, Asian and minority ethnic qualified coaches got interviews for academy posts, and 11 actually got jobs, which is better than what has gone before" (
BBC, 7/11).
