The media would have you believe that managing England is the job no-one wants. Don't you believe it. Managing Oxford United is the job no-one wants, apart possibly from the current caretaker Mike Ford, writes Jon Murray.

Cheltenham boss Steve Cotterill turned the club down this week, and in the process managed to get himself a nice little pay rise at Whaddon Road where he has now signed a two-year extension to his contract.

But former managers are not exactly queueing at the door to be taken on by Oxford.

Managerless third division strugglers Plymouth Argyle are in a similar position, yet they seem to have had more interest, despite being out on a limb geographi- cally. The Devon club say they have had about 50 applications for their vacant manager's position, of which ten have been treated seriously, and they expect to interview half a dozen.

Ironically, Denis Smith, pushed aside at the Manor and now advising chairman Firoz Kassam, might be one of those.

He and Malcolm Crosby, who is unhappy at not being involved as much as he wanted at first-team level at Swindon Town under boss Colin Todd, are being talked of as a possible double act at Argyle.

And Smith often goes down to Plymouth because his sister lives in Polperro in east Cornwall.

The fans' choice at Plymouth is Alan Buckley, who recently parted company with Grimsby, and who followed Smith to West Brom.

United too have spoken to Buckley. Smith said: "I know Alan well and I've spoken to him about this (job), but I don't think he'll be coming."

Smith was unable to say whether any managers had shown an interest in coming to the Manor Ground. "I've had professional people write in and the chairman has had professional people write in to him.

"It's all a matter of opinion and it's up to what the chairman thinks. I can only advise and he might not take my advice. In the end, the chairman will be deciding what he thinks is right."

It appears that, despite showing an initial keenness, Mark Wright is not convinced about giving up what he has started at Southport, a part-time club whom he has taken into the top six in the Conference, to come back to Oxford.

It seems people in the game know what a poisoned chalice it is, and how little money there is available at Oxford.

But how much longer can it go on without a proper, permanent manager at the Manor? "I wouldn't like to see it going on too much longer," said Smith when I put it to him that we could still have him and Mike Ford running the ship in a month's time.

"We are talking to people and all I can do is put names to the chairman."

And what about England? Some fans nicknamed him DNEMSO (Denis Next England Manager Smith Out) after he referred to the time when, ten years ago as Sunderland manager, he was being talked of as a potential England boss.

Terry Venables is the only obvious candidate that Smith can see.

"He would have to be English . . . we invented the game, for God's sake," he stated. "We've got enough good coaches in England to do the job."

"I do believe that both Venables and Glenn Hoddle were the best two English candidates at the time they were appointed. Hoddle was technically and tactically very good and Venables had the respect of the players and the supporters.

"But it's a problem of who wants the job? Our goalkeeper Hubert Busby has played in Canada, Holland and Portugal and he says he can't believe the way managers are treated by fans in this country.

"If it's not something you need and most of our top managers are pretty rich and don't want their families and private lives to be attacked why would anyone want to put up with it?"