Bob Bradley must face a few questions when passing through customs. Most travellers only have to concern themselves with ridding their baggage of any liquids or gels, but the 57-year-old has to find a way to explain passport stamps from Egypt and Norway, and now France. It’s sometimes said that American soccer coaches don’t travel well – but Bradley is picking up the slack.  After spells as the Egyptian national team coach, and boss of Stabaek in Norway, the New Jersey native has taken the helm at French second division club Le Havre. For most managers such a move would seem somewhat obscure, but for Bradley it’s just another step on the way to becoming soccer’s most compelling coach.  “I felt like coming to a big football country,” he explains, shedding light on how the club’s millionaire American backer Vincent Volpe lured him to northern France.  “There’s history, there’s a lot of good things going on here. If you look at even the French league – the makeup of teams – it’s interesting. So I felt good about that. I certainly have a great appreciation of French football.”  Indeed he does. Bradley has been to France before, visiting the country for its hosting of the European Championships in 1984. Then coach of the Princeton Tigers, he recalls the sparkle of Michel Platini, Jean Tigana and the likes as les Bleus swept their way to continental glory. Bradley has always held an affinity for the French game, going some way to explain why he was willing to take a job with a team in the country’s second tier. “With the MetroStars I had the chance to coach Youri Djorkaeff,” he says. “I was always asking him about France.”  Although his Francophilia might have been cast aside had a Premier League job come his way – and there was certainly no shortage of speculation linking Bradley with them. Most recently, both Aston Villa and Sunderland were said to have the American on their managerial radar, and yet he never came close to landing either roles.  “From the time that I was finished with the US team, my name was linked, 10 or 12 times, with jobs in England, and only once did I have direct contact with the club,” he says, perhaps with a slight hint of vexation. “Had I had opportunities in the Premier League, in the Bundesliga, in La Liga, I think I would have been ready to jump on any of them, but those type of opportunities never materialised.”  Bradley has spoken previously about his frustration at being overlooked for some of European soccer’s biggest and best jobs, expressing his view that “in many cases, decision-makers play it safe. There’s certainly a network.” It’s something that quite clearly grates, reiterating his belief that in soccer “there are some very good managers but also some others that aren’t very good but still manage to get jobs and opportunities.”  Could it be that European clubs are wary of appointing American coaches? The US game is now regarded with genuine credibility on the other side of the Atlantic, but is there still a stigma attached to the country’s managerial products? Not in Bradley’s view, although he does counter that Americans can find themselves in a catch-22 scenario.  “In England, they value top-flight experience. To that, I would simply say that I think I have done a lot of things that add up – look at the work with the US team, the situation in Egypt, going to a small club in Norway, the work in MLS … but no, I don’t have Premier League experience. I think, as Americans, we don’t have that experience, but I don’t think it’s a direct hit on Americans per se.”  More than five years have passed since Bradley was fired as head coach of the US men’s national team, but he remains extremely guarded about the true circumstances around his dismissal. To many it seemed a harsh decision, and to the man himself that still sentiment still seems to ring true. “I don’t think that our teams, and the work of our staff, always got the respect that we deserved,” he points out. As he sees it, the USA were only short of “a break or two” in making it to the last eight of the World Cup for the first time in 2010.  “I think we got greater respect from Europe than we got from within the United States. I disagree with that. I don’t think the high level of our work was recognised and so when the time came, I just said fine. There were people who really knew what was happening. On the public side, I think there are a lot of people who stand on the outside and think they have a lot of answers, but have no idea what’s happening on the inside. So when some of that enters into decisions, then you can’t fight that. The people who were there, they know.”  Bradley is careful not to wade too deep into the debate over criticism Jurgen Klinsmann’s has recently faced as his successor, explaining his conscious decision to keep a distance from US soccer matters. But despite his diplomacy, the 57-year-old is inherently spirited about the development of the US game. When asked about Klinsmann’s remarks about his American players being “uneducated” he can’t help but provide a viewpoint.  “As national team manager, you’re always trying to raise the level – so I get that,” he comments. |You’re trying to challenge them, whether you speak about it or not. But just because you sometimes throw some things out in the media, that doesn’t mean that you’re doing any real work.” He might not have addressed Klinsmann’s comments directly, but Bradley’s retort leaves itself open to rather intriguing interpretation.  Looking forward, though, Bradley is now charged with leading Le Havre – France’s oldest club – back to Ligue 1 for the first time since the 2008/09 season. The project, led by Volpe and his significant backing, enthuses the American, as does the chance to oversee one of Europe’s most productive youth academies. Paul Pogba got his start at Le Havre, and now Bradley is the one guiding such homegrown talent through the system. And yet Stateside, he remains a reference point for any discussion over the development of his own native game.  Regardless of whether US soccer was right to dismiss him or not, Bradley has only bolstered his standing and repute in the years that have followed – even if they still ask him a few questions when arriving back home.
The former USA manager is that rare beast – an American soccer coach who travels well. He speaks to Graham Ruthven about his latest stop-off in northern France