It's widely accepted players take something different from every manager they play under but it seems like some managers have a better success rate when it comes to their former players being successful managers than others.
If we look at some of our great managers as an example, we can see the varying success they've had. Several players of Shankly's great 60s & 70s teams went into management but very few made a success of it - certainly on British soil. Gordon Milne and John Toshack had some success abroad and Kevin Keegan, while not winning anything, did land the England job and a good tilt at the League with Newcastle. Jimmy Melia had that one good Cup run with Brighton, St John tried his hand at it but didn't do much in the game as did Emlyn Hughes.
A lot though made good careers as coaches for clubs - Steve Heighway, Ronnie Moran and Roy Evans who all success in those roles at our club (Heighway with the youngsters) and Ray Clemence who was the best goalkeeping coach in the country for most of his career.
Move onto Bob Paisley and the story is pretty similar with the exceptions of Dalglish and Souness, who both had great success during their managerial careers. The likes of Phil Neal, Steve Nicol, Ronnie Whelan and Jimmy Case didn't have much to write home about but again in the case of Sammy Lee and Terry McDermott in particular they were regarded as great coaches.
Players who played under Kenny like Lawrenson, Molby, McMahon, Barnes and Aldridge all dipped their toes into the management game and again, very little success came for any of them.
I'll skip over the players from the 90s who went into management because a) very few did and b) one of those who did was Robbie Fowler and I can't bring myself to say he didn't have success with anything.
I think a few from the Houllier era have gone into management but again with little success. I know Sami Hyypia had a poor spell at Brighton, Stephane Henchoz hasn't done much, Abel Xavier wand Rigobert Song were international managers at one point and I think Gregory Vignal is coaching somewhere in Scotland at the minute. Harry Kewell has had a few clubs and not done much from what I remember.
And, of course, Steven Gerrard won a League title with Rangers but has struggled everywhere else he's managed.
Those that I know who played under Rafa and have gone onto forge their own managerial careers are Xabi Alonso (won the League in Germany), Robbie Keane (won the League in Israel), Albert Riera (won the League in Slovenia) and Dirk Kuyt (won a second division in Belgium). I'm sure there's plenty of others but this is coming off the top of me head. So Rafa looks like he's doing ok in the regard of managering future successful managers.
Kolo Toure made a right cock up of his time at Wigan and Charlie Adam went down with Fleetwood this season, though he was only there for half the season in his defence.
And now some of Jürgen's players will be starting to look at that next step in their football lives. A lot of us assumed James Milner would certainly going into coaching in some sort of capacity. I wouldn't be surprised to see Thiago become a manager because he does have a footballing brain. And I suspect a lot of our players over the last decade would be in the frame for a job if they wanted it based on their playing profile alone.
But as we've seen historically, great managers don't necessarily coach players into great managers. It's always said that great players don't make great managers but maybe there's something to be said about great managers not making the next great manager either. And it's not just at Liverpool, if you look at the players Ferguson managed at United then look at their time in the dugout it's not exactly glittering managerial careers. Same with Wenger at Arsenal, Mourinho at Chelsea and now some of Guardiola's City players.
So how much influence does a manager have on their own players managerial careers?
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