People call him dull and boring but Alex Miller gets excited just by turning up for work at Liverpool
By Gordon Waddell
HARRY KEWELL gives a wave and a shout through the open door of the treatment room. Assistant boss Paco Herrera stops for a warm chat and a laugh. Everyone else in the corridors offers at least a nod and a grin.
Wherever he wanders inside Melwood, Liverpool's magnificent training ground, Alex Miller is afforded respect.
Which incredibly is a damn sight more than he gets in his homeland.
Then again why should he care he's become a forgotten man in Scotland?
His next five games in the dugout include two in the Champions League against Bayer Leverkusen, the League Cup final against Chelsea at the Millennium Stadium, an always-thrilling clash at Newcastle and a season-defining derby with Everton at Anfield.
All within four weeks.
Yet ask any Scottish football fan to define him in one word and you'll get answers ranging from 'dull' to, er, 'boring'.
But six years after taking the plunge down south as Gerard Houllier's chief scout, life is anything but for the former Rangers idol and St Mirren, Hibs and Aberdeen boss.
Having gradually switched from being Houllier's superspy back into coaching, he's now Rafael Benitez's first-team coach, on the training ground with Anfield's cream of the crop - and loving every minute of it.
Miller said: 'It's fantastic. You look at that run of games and of course you get a buzz.
'Like everyone else here I was in limbo last summer after Gerard left. But when Rafa came in he needed someone who knew the place, who spoke English.
'I didn't know him. I'd only seen his team play a few times when I was scouting Valencia before we played them in the Champions League a couple of years ago and I knew he was organised. But I'd been back coaching the reserves last season as well as doing the reports on our opposition and we were just pipped for the title by Aston Villa.
'So now I'm on the training ground every day with the first team and as you'd expect, the sessions are fantastic.
'When you're doing possession or patterns of play, maybe working a wide area, overlapping, crossing and finishing, the quality is so high. Same with passing.
'But that's what you get with quality players. The guys who have come in, like Xabi Alonso, I knew a lot about. Fernando Morientes is such a clever striker as well.
'But the one I've seen really blossom since I've been here is Steven Gerrard.
'He's awesome now when he puts his mind to it. He's got absolutely everything.
'He just needs a bit more experience and maturity. Ask any player who plays against him - he can run, tackle, jump, pass, score - and he loves the game.'
Which is a description you could ALWAYS apply to Miller. Despite 37 years in the game his obsession with football never seems to dim.
Not the most ebullient character in the world, his face rarely breaks out of an almost perma-frown - which is probably one of the reasons he's earned that dour reputation. But as soon as he starts talking about the nuts and bolts of the game, Miller's passion bubbles over. Giving the guided tour of Melwood, you can tell how much he loves being there.
And no wonder. The facilities are breathtaking. The gym, the pool, the hyperbaric chamber to simulate altitude and speed up recovery - and the first-team dressing room is a palace.
He said proudly: 'Look up the back there. Two FULL-TIME masseurs. Every player MUST have four massages a week. Compulsory, not when they feel like it.
'And check our boot room. Look at this place. When we played you had four pairs of boots tops - match leathers and rubbers, training leathers and rubbers. Now?'
He opens the door on row upon row of studs, blades, mouldies. Some pegs have at least 15 pairs lined up. But it's out on the pitches where he's most at home.
He said: 'I've learned an awful lot since I left Scotland, especially tactically.
'I'd only met Gerard twice when he offered me the job down here and I had to think long and hard about stepping away from coaching but I'm glad I did.
'My first role was to study opposition teams, analyse strengths and weaknesses, then the day before the game I would speak to the players. On our run to the UEFA Cup, I did every single game.
'That showed a lot of trust on Gerard's part but to give you an idea of the depth they looked for, I trailed Roma for SEVEN weeks in a row before we played them.
'I got into Fabio Capello's psyche, knew what he was going to do next and we beat them so it was worth it.
'But we won six cups in 12 calendar months, so it obviously worked well.'
That was really the first measure we had of Miller's growing stock at Anfield.
Seeing him receiving bearhugs from Michael Owen and Gary McAllister as they paraded the UEFA Cup after their win over Alaves showed he was more than just a bit-part man.
Miller said: 'I was always on the park at the end. The boys knew I could coach.
'Gerard told me I had licence to speak to them if I could help them in any way.
'I'd ask a player how he thought he was doing, go through a checklist with him, get him back on the rails if he'd fallen off.
'Then I was coaching the reserves every day as well as doing all the travelling. I was flying back from all over Europe to be at Melwood for training at 10.30.
'It's hard but I keep fit. I had a medical last week and my blood pressure was 128 over 80 and my fat content 11.5 per cent. I run between 15 and 20 miles a week now, all different speeds.'
And it shows. At 55, there's not a pick on him. He barely looks any different from his days as a one-club Rangers man. And he certainly doesn't wear the haunted look that epitomised his miserable 13-month stint in charge of Aberdeen.
Not that Miller worries about his reputation north of the border any more.
He knows what people think about him but is confident enough to shrug it off.
He said: 'I know what people think but I'm not interested in changing their perceptions of me now.
'I'll go back some day, though, maybe to take a smaller team and try to build them up again.
'I know my make-up isn't conducive to courting friendship. I'm quite guarded. I don't drink, never have done.
'Maybe that works against me because I'll not go out for a pint. I'm just a family guy - when my work's done I go home.
'People said I was boring tactically but I've never agreed with them. My CV stands up to scrutiny - I took St Mirren into Europe and the semi-finals of the Scottish Cup where we lost to Celtic.
'I sold Frank McDougall to Aberdeen and he became their first £100,000 signing. It was funny, Fergie refused to pay six figures, said he would only give me 99,000 - and I refused to sell!'
And to prove how much he loved the game, even when he went in to full-time management Miller still took on some extra-curricular work with kids.
He said: 'When I was St Mirren boss I took my local school team in Bearsden for three years and we won the title three years in a row.
'I could see the pitch from my house and took the team twice a week, and even arranged games if it was my day off!'
It was a long way from kids' football to working with Craig Brown at Euro 96 and France 98 and Miller loved his time as Scotland assistant boss.
But our national team's performance has dipped alarmingly since he left - and he feels the pain of the Tartan Army.
He said: 'I've been to nearly every Scotland game since I came down here.
'I drive up, then back down afterwards. I'm a supporter first and foremost.
'It's not been the best period but it just looked like we didn't do our homework in some games.
'When we're changing after 10 or 15 minutes because of the opposition, that's not right. You do your homework, you must know what they're going to do.
'In any side, everyone must know their role and stick to it. If I know Walter, that's exactly what'll be happening.'
Home