I think regardless of break clause, if results don't pick up we'll be changing manager. I think there's a good a chance we change anyway tbh. Seems like the perfect time to have another 'fresh start', particularly with a new DoF type at the helm.
No, but I do think they would want an upturn in results. Whilst I think the performances have been better we still haven’t got a point under him, if that continues until the end of the season (even if we get say 7/8 more points) then I think he will be replaced. If he gets us to 20+ points I think they may keep him. Whoever the new DoF is may have other ideas though. SR seem to have coveted Juric previously as they allegedly wanted him before Jones. The big question I have is that was again to come in and manage a team who were one of the worst teams in a league, Juric has had success doing that in his career. He hasn’t managed a team expected to be one of/the best team like we would be next season in the Championship. The closest he’s gotten was Roma and that was a big red flag on his record. I don’t think he’s the guy for us next season stylistically at all, so I’m hoping that the reason SR coveted him so much was because of the situation we were in and next season we go a different route
Upshot is Solak and SR aren't going anywhere so let's give him a chance to right the many wrongs that have been made.
Well this was obvious to everyone as soon as Wilcox left, the question is why it’s taken this long to do it? As I’ve said before they (whoever it is identifying) clearly can spot a good DoF as the two SR have appointed have both been poached very quickly to go and work at much bigger clubs. When Shields left we didn’t appoint a new one and look where it got us, when Wilcox left we didn’t appoint a new one and look where it got us. It could be we are setting the bar too high on who we want and can’t get someone in who matches those standards, but I’m sure even a sligjtly competent DoF would’ve done better than what we’ve seen this season. My suspicion is that they let Martin have a lot of control over transfers in the summer as he was aligned to Wilcox and now he’s gone the search for a proper DoF has only recently started.
Did actually get to listen in the end and I agree. I'm not filled with an enormous amount of confidence. That said, I guess even if they are planning to say, go back in for Rohl in the summer, he's hardly likely to say that 'on air'. It's gonna be and interesting 6 months ahead.
And it sounds like to change things back to a pressing hard working team, they may need to do what I’ve been hoping for a while, which is a total reset. Almost any player should be up for sale, because hardly any of them will be suitable for the football Juric wants to play, and it sounds like Solak will stick with him and help get the players in to play his way. And not many of them are premiership quality if / should we come back up. I’d even go as far to say that a couple of seasons in the championship may be more beneficial for squad building. We have quite a few players out of contract over the next couple of seasons, of which none are worthy of a new contract except maybe SAA for the future. Our wage bill is much more manageable than when last relegated as Ramsdale will jump ship straight away, and I would move on from Bednarek, and they are our only two real big wage earners. Build the team around Edward’s, Wood, THB, Fernandes (hopefully), Charles,etc, and bring in young hungry players and add a bit of experience with the loan market. We will get decent money for Ramsdale, Dibling maybe even Sulemana now he’s showing glimpses of what he can do.
From what Alfie House has said previously on TSP that is essentially what happened. We decided in our infinite wisdom that Wilcox had done the initial work that needed doing in hiring Martin, deciding that our ethos was possession based football and hiring the new head of recruitment etc. So when he left they didn't think they needed to replace him, and his remaining responsibilities could then just be shared out among Martin and Bitcon, whose job role slightly changed to adjust for Wilcox leaving. So I don't think it was that they couldn't find a new DoF that they wanted, and was more that they didn't think they needed one and restructured in a way to run without one (which clearly was a great idea and worked so well).
Agreed. I don't get the 'let's get rid of the owners' theory anyway. As they own the club, it is not like changing manger etc, they have to want to sell and someone has to want to buy. We are relatively financially stable with them and there is no sign of financial trouble ahead if we are sensible. It is not as if they are asset stripping etc. We have to accept though that from our view, some really bad decisions have been made to lead us to where we are, but I know we are all quite anonymous on here, but I am pretty sure that no one on here has run a multi million pound business before, so these decisions are tough and not so black and white. With the narrative that they try to do it all on the cheap, let's get real. We aren't going to complete with Man U or Liverpool etc financially. Yes, Bournemouth maybe, but they have an owner as wealthy as ours (I think a lot more wealthy) and have had the rub of the green (and what I mean is good judgement and a bit of luck) with manager appointments and a few players. Sadly for them, this may only last 2-3 years as the big clubs will come swarming and players and managers will leave.It has happened to us time and time again and will happen to Bournemouth, Brighton et al in the future. With SR, it is IMO better the devil you know. And, be careful what you wish for IMO.
So (again) SRs biggest failure has been on the management side. Trusting Martin too much with the footballing side of the club basically in his hands is what has well and truly ****ed us this year. Football fans are fickle and reactive, so I don’t blame all the fans loving Martin after promotion and Wembley etc. But the people in charge need to be a lot more level headed and try and see what will happen early on if they want to be successful. A new DoF should’ve been brought in as a minimum to at least have someone else telling Martin he was an arrogant idiot when he was talking about how he wanted to go about the upcoming PL season. They also could have told him that his genius idea of recruiting all the players who did well last season but never played in the PL despite all of them being at PL clubs for lengthy periods (can let THB off due to age/being at City) was ****ing stupid. Maybe they could’ve thrown in his plan of signing mainly British players to keep squad harmony super good was short sighted as any good British player costs **** loads and there aren’t that many of them around. The ones who would come to us probably aren’t going to be PL standard and we would have a much higher chance of success shopping abroad. But yeah absolute stupidity to let Martin have control over the club, was obvious from about 5 games into last season that he would be a disaster for us at PL level, so to double down on him with recruitment as well was as bad a mistake as SR have made
I think this is the key. Some questions in these interviews should basically be ignored because they have to be answered in certain ways. He can't say he accepts we're relegated even if that's what he thinks. He can't say he's planning to sack our manager in the summer even if that's exactly the plan.
Because he’s a good manager who has come in at an impossible time? I don’t think he’s the right fit for next season from a style point of view (what we’ve seen so far anyway) but he’s comfortably the best manager we’ve had pedigree wise since Ralph and arguably at least on par with him
Exactly. Give him at least til the end of the season. Blows my mind how impatient people can be. If Lincoln was in charge we would go through half a dozen managers a season.
