One of the things that does instantly come to mind when you see a old club favourite being given the top job is what happened last time when Gunny took the regins. The reality of this situation is however that little is that the only similarity is that they both have a passion for the club which, if well translated to the players will only be an advantage.
Firstly Gunn was not part of our coaching set up at the time, he had spent time as our goalkeeping coach but was now a scout. Gunn had never been responsible for a team, setting tactics and communicating that to the players he was learning on the job. Adams has had the chance to run teams and define footballing philosophies that he's instilled into the players. In this sense Adams is a far better candidate for the job than Gunn ever was. Gunn was an appeal to the fans to bring follow, Adams is a sensible appointment with the fans backing as an added advantage.
The second point I'd raise is that goalkeepers very rarely manage to be successful managers and my theory is because whilst the rest of the teams role rely on most other players the goalkeepers role is regularly solo or at least part of a smaller team of himself and the back four. There is not attacking style of play that the team could have that will change the role of the goalkeeper and as such they are far less involed in the overall training session, regularly being pulled off to work with the other keepers and that coach. This is not to say that it isn't possible Nigel Adkins of course being an exception to this rule.
Adams however was an attacking player, he knows attacking, he knows creating chances and he knows scoring goals he will be far better tactically and will know how to drill the players for this in a way that Gunn couldn't.
The fact here is that whilst this is a role of the dice the more I think about it it probably isn't as bigger risk as some feel it to be. As it was so eloquently put in the guardian, it would be hard to do worse with the squad and he might do better.
This leads me onto my last point of comparison, Gunn was given a squad with was quite frankly terrible, there were far too many loans and not nearly enough quality, this is obvious if you ever look to see what happened to the majority of the players who took us down, the best of them Clingan failed to find a club at the start of this season and now pals in Scotland. The squad of players we have now is easily the most talented that I have ever seen play for us (my following started a few years after we were delegated from the PL the first time) and there is clearly enough talent to stay up. Hopefully with Adams passion and the freedom to play some attacking football we'll still be in the PL next season.
Firstly Gunn was not part of our coaching set up at the time, he had spent time as our goalkeeping coach but was now a scout. Gunn had never been responsible for a team, setting tactics and communicating that to the players he was learning on the job. Adams has had the chance to run teams and define footballing philosophies that he's instilled into the players. In this sense Adams is a far better candidate for the job than Gunn ever was. Gunn was an appeal to the fans to bring follow, Adams is a sensible appointment with the fans backing as an added advantage.
The second point I'd raise is that goalkeepers very rarely manage to be successful managers and my theory is because whilst the rest of the teams role rely on most other players the goalkeepers role is regularly solo or at least part of a smaller team of himself and the back four. There is not attacking style of play that the team could have that will change the role of the goalkeeper and as such they are far less involed in the overall training session, regularly being pulled off to work with the other keepers and that coach. This is not to say that it isn't possible Nigel Adkins of course being an exception to this rule.
Adams however was an attacking player, he knows attacking, he knows creating chances and he knows scoring goals he will be far better tactically and will know how to drill the players for this in a way that Gunn couldn't.
The fact here is that whilst this is a role of the dice the more I think about it it probably isn't as bigger risk as some feel it to be. As it was so eloquently put in the guardian, it would be hard to do worse with the squad and he might do better.
This leads me onto my last point of comparison, Gunn was given a squad with was quite frankly terrible, there were far too many loans and not nearly enough quality, this is obvious if you ever look to see what happened to the majority of the players who took us down, the best of them Clingan failed to find a club at the start of this season and now pals in Scotland. The squad of players we have now is easily the most talented that I have ever seen play for us (my following started a few years after we were delegated from the PL the first time) and there is clearly enough talent to stay up. Hopefully with Adams passion and the freedom to play some attacking football we'll still be in the PL next season.
