I filed this to Cif this morning:
People respond to all that Harry Redknapp stuff: the way he prospers in the modern football world while personifying an old-fashioned craftiness and reverence for tradition like he's delivering some Cockney cameo for an Ealing comedy. Redknapp's persona hits big nostalgic buttons of affection for a World Cup-era London that was both straitened and swinging, completing its transition from ration book era to reconstruction boom. Harry with his West Ham pedigree, his market-trader face, his street alchemist's popular touch, his professions of fondness for the south coast – as a London football type he's just ideal.
There's more here.
