The former Premier League defender hoping to prove TV pundits can succeed in management

France’s answer to Gary Neville has just been handed one of the top jobs in Ligue 1 – but will a television pundit ever make a successful leap to management?

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Gary Neville and Thierry Henry are two of the most respected pundits on UK television, yet both failed when they stepped into management.

Neville had a notoriously difficult four-month stint at Valencia during the 2015/16 season, while Henry toiled similarly at Monaco before a couple of years in MLS with Montreal Impact.

Neville was a stalwart throughout Sir Alex Ferguson’s golden age at Manchester United while Henry is Arsenal’s record goalscorer and one of France’s greatest ever players. Both had history working as coaches in the international game, yet even this top-level experience, working under some of the best managers of all time, did not prepare them for the realities of a top role.

Former Newcastle defender Habib Beye is the latest TV pundit to take a major job and is hoping to succeed where his colleagues from the media have failed.

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Habib Beye gets his chance at Marseille

The 48-year-old Beye has been handed the head coach role at Marseille, a club where he played more than 170 matches, having once been regarded as one of France’s leading pundits.

A former Senegal international, he was a prominent specialist with Canal+, L’Equipe 21 and RMC, regularly featuring as an expert on Premier League football until he suspended his consulting activities to focus on coaching in 2025.

Beye, a former right-back with Newcastle and Aston Villa, does hold one significant advantage over Neville and Henry, though. He has built up managerial experience over several seasons. He spent three comparatively successful seasons in charge of Red Star in French football’s third tier, then had a year with Rennes in Ligue 1 before that spell officially ended earlier this week.

Will this approach allow him to succeed where Neville and Henry failed?

Why do pundits fail as managers?

While there have not been enough truly high-profile players who have gone from punditry to management – it tends to happen the other way around – to draw firm conclusions, there is one thread that is common to Neville and Henry: both underestimated the task at hand.

It’s one thing sounding like an elite tactician to the television cameras, but quite another to get that message across to young players.

Neville’s honest Valencia admission

The Man Utd legend is frank as to why his spell at Valencia failed.

For all the claims that it was the pressure, language barrier and just bad luck, he admitted to TalkSport in 2024: “I didn’t put the work in. All the things I believe in my life, the obsession about work ethic, being dedicated to something, I needed to fail to give myself a big slap around the face to say: ‘Get back down there.’”

Previously, he had admitted on the Blank Podcast: “I should never really have pursued the coaching and you have to really immerse yourself in that every second of every day.”

But beyond this, he admits that he was not ruthless enough to take control of the dressing room.

“Not then changing the squad slightly just to gain a bit of authority and control,” he said.

“There were a couple of players there I should have moved out of the club, which would have established a bit of authority to them. ‘Hang on he has got some power to do something here. He’s in for five months but if we don’t play ball he can damage us’.

“What I tried to do was pick up a rocky ship and just drift into shore rather than really grab the reins, have a strong leadership with me and also make sure that I got rid of what would be people who were making it choppy.”

Henry’s disastrous Monaco spell

Henry’s man management, though, went too far in the opposite direction.

He lost control of the dressing room, sending numerous first-team players to the reserves, claiming that certain players were “just thinking about their own futures”.

An anonymous Monaco player told GFFN: “A few matches ago, he screamed: ‘He is supposed to be worth €10m?’ All of the substitutes heard. The message he sent to the players was very negative.”

There was also an infamous incident with young backup goalkeeper Loic Badiashile, who was chastised by Henry in front of the media for not tucking his chair in properly after a joint press conference.

By the time Henry departed 103 days after taking charge, his side were 19th in Ligue 1 and in serious danger of being relegated – a fate they ultimately avoided.

“It’s like everything: it’s either you win or you learn. And I have always learned a lot more with difficulty than with ease. It’s when you’re tough that you know what you’re made of,” he later admitted to So Foot.

“As a coach, you can have ideas, but you also and above all have to adapt to the players you have, but also to the team you face.”

Why Beye can succeed where Neville and Henry failed

The story of Neville and Henry, then, is one of two elite pundits being lifted out of their comfort zone and placed in hostile surroundings to which they were not accustomed.

Neither had served an apprenticeship as a head coach at a lesser club before being thrust into an unforgiving spotlight.

Beye, on the other hand, has accumulated years of experience with Red Star Paris and Rennes before making the big jump to Marseille this week. If a television pundit is ever to make the transition successfully, his route may be the blueprint.