By Martyn Ziegler, PA Chief Sports Reporter
Last updated May 5 2006
England players can expect an unusual mixture of caution and adventure when Steve McClaren becomes their new manager.
They will already have experienced his coaching techniques while he was worked as assistant to Sven-Goran Eriksson, but - for those worried that McClaren is merely a carbon copy of the Swede - he is his own man with his own ideas.
After a moderate playing career, McClaren has learnt his trade at the feet of men acknowledged to be among the best in the business, and has assimilated what he has taken on board to such an extent that he has arrived on the biggest stage of all with the necessary credentials and experience safely tucked away in his armoury. He is a man, however, who firmly believes football education is an evolving entity and his thirst for knowledge will not be quenched when he walks through the door at Soho Square.
He will also be acutely aware that, in his new role, his performance will be dissected by the hour, his shortcomings magnified and his achievements remembered only until the next crisis comes along. That is the nature of the job he has accepted, and one for which he is fully prepared after a carefully-planned and eventful apprenticeship.
York-born McClaren took his first step on the coaching ladder after a modest playing career at Oxford when he was put in charge of the youth team, although it was under Jim Smith at Derby that he got his big chance.
It was there as assistant to the hugely-experienced Smith that he started the process of gleaning all he could as the Rams won promotion to the Premiership and cemented themselves in the top division.
But it was after his move to Old Trafford in 1999 as Brian Kidd's departure gave him a chance to work under Sir Alex Ferguson that McClaren's meteoric rise began in earnest. | 
