Mick McCarthy is never a man to mince his words and, you might not be surprised to hear, that has landed him in hot water on a number of occasions as a manager and a player. One of the more memorable times was during his stint as Ipswich manager when he ordered everyone present as a post-match press conference to ‘f**k off’ before promptly f**king off himself.
The Republic of Ireland great sat down with the lads on the From The Horse’s Mouth podcast to take a look back at his impressive career on both sides of the white line and what might be next for him. And, in a wide-ranging chat, his relationship with the media came up and, of course, Mick had a barnburner of a story to share.
Some people will see it as two points dropped. Some people can f**k off!
“It literally is the greatest comeback ever at a press conference. You must have been pissing yourself inside were you when you were saying that” Paddy asks Mick, teeing the big man up with an open goal.
“No, well I don’t know about peeing myself.” Mick explains, “I might have been completely peed off with everybody. I got it all the time, you know?
“You get a [2-2] draw [with Leeds in 2014] and everybody thinks you should win and, do you know what? We had the 20th biggest budget in that league at Ipswich and we finished 6th, 7th, 9th, 12th. We were batting above our average, shall we say, using a cricket term.
“I just got a bit peeved with it – not spending any money, not having a budget and probably going away and getting – which I thought was a good point.”
We’ve all seen the Mick memes, but the lads wanted to know if the former Ireland manager felt home grown bosses got a harder time than their foreign counterparts from the fans and the press in the social media era.
“I used to go into the press conferences and I don’t have to read social media or newspapers to know that I’m getting it [abuse]. I can tell by the questions that they’re asking me what they’re thinking of me and what are they writing.
“[Nowadays] I’ve got a pretty good relationship with most of them [the press], I have. When I did the [Ireland] job the first time round I had a bit of a growl sometimes because I didn’t get on with everybody.
“When I went to the World Cup in South Africa, working for the BBC, I went into the press room and they were all there. I thought… ‘well, I might as well go and shake hands with them all and say hello and get on with it.’ So I did.
“I did squeeze one or two hands a little bit harder than some! But, in the main, I’ve got a good relationship with them.
“Sometimes you just don’t think it’s fair and we don’t like it but you’ve just got to get on with it. I’ve been doing it a long, long time. I’ve done 980-odd games as a manager/coach, so it’s been going on for a long time you know.”
But was Mick up for a third stint with The Boys In Green? “Yes of course I would,” He admitted, “But I don’t think lightning strikes three times, does it?
“I mean it’s struck twice already and there might be gasps of horror if – I don’t know why actually. We’ve always done alright to be fair.”
You can hear the chat with Mick in full by subscribing to From The Horse’s Mouth wherever you get your podcasts from.
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