Your hatred for speakman is getting boring now We dont need a hard nosed manager, we need someone who develops players and who is tactically sound You sound like you want a manager to just come in and cause divides in the club, thats the last thing we need
One of my best friends is a Polish fella who is football mad was telling me this coach is waiting to see if Poland qualify for the euros as he is interested in the National job. He also said he read that his wife isn't keen on leaving Poland for a job abroad. Shame really as he seems to fit the profile of what we are looking for in a coach.
Pretty sure he missed that job a few months ago? I read it was a bit of a boy's club kind of promotion from within. The new guy isn't doing too badly, 3 wins from 5. Can't imagine why they would bin him. But I would imagine your Polish mate knows more about it than me.
Playing devil's advocate , then surely Beale of Dodds should be sound? All youth and qualified to the hilt? I think its a tough situation for most to do well in. We have a sporting director who things he is God and has simply too much say in all matters. All coaches have appeared to be critical of the approach he has implemented. Experience etc. Then we have the absolute insistent that Dodds and Proctor are on the front bench and have their say. Just those ingredients themselves make the job more difficult. I think Bob was suggesting we need a football man of experience. Takes no ****. Standards. That experience will make up for the variables mentioned above. Probably why the likes of Neil and Mowbray had some success over a period and Dodds and Beale have stunk the place out.
Completely agree with this, and the problem I think is that the person you're describing doesn't join us with Speakman in place. Its not the role of Speakman thats the problem, its the way he performs the role. There needs to be a mutual respect between the Head Coach and the "Techincal Director" and the sense I get is that Speakman positions himself entirely above the Head Coach, rather than as somebody working in partnership with. Of course he is above the Head Coach in terms of org structure, but there's ways of going about the job. And you either work in partnership or you work in control. It's why I am extremely reluctantly in the "Speakman out" camp now. Even if I think the club is in a considerably better place than when he joined. I can't see us progressing further without a change in strategy and I can't see our Head Coach, whoever it is, working whilst they have Speakman controlling things.
Good technical directors are seen and not heard. Some aren't even seen. Without googling, can anyone tell me who Liverpool's technical director is? Arsenal? Brighton?
It’s a hard one with Speakman, he’s got credit in the bank and has done a lot of good but I can’t say I’d be gutted if he moved on, feels like there is going to be a lot of change this summer
Not great examples. Edu talks plenty at arsenal and Liverpool have had the press in a frenzy hiring back their old sporting director as the football chief at their holding company while he brought in Bournemouth's SD, Richard Hughes, mission statements galore. Fair enough with Brighton.
The thing is the role of the "Technical Director" in ensuring that the club can move from Head Coach to Head Coach without major disruption is a really important one. But where it works well, they still "serve" the Head Coach, in terms of making that person's job easier whilst sticking within the parameters set by the overall club strategy. That way the Head Coach still has autonomy, but they can't go completely off piste and spunk money on the wrong kind of player - see Stoke for example. The way we seem to have positioned it though is so rigid that the Head Coach just becomes exactly that - a coach that picks the team. What we need, is for Speakman to take a step backwards. And allow a Head Coach to come in and do what he needs to do, whils staying in the background applying some control to keep things aligned to the overall vision. Maybe that's the plan. I hope it is.
In both Arsenal and Liverpool's cases tho - its very clear that the sporting director serves the Head Coach whilst they're in position. Or at the very least they're in partnership. I never got that sense with us. I got the sense of head coach reports into Speakman.
Don't know the ins and outs of the club so couldn't speak to that, I keep hearing Speakman has too much power but I haven't really seen evidence of that, for all I know he is spending his days in KLD'S office as a human footstool. If they're treating his role as similar to a general manager as occurs very commonly in American sports, the head coach would be much further down theborganisational chart than the sporting director though. I just don't think any of us know much about it at all.
Yeh its all my opinion. The only "evidence" of Speakman having too much influence is the continued presence of Dodds and Proctor. We have an Assistant Head Coach seemingly permanently employed into that position. Now - in the summer when we get our new Head Coach, that might change. But until then this is all just how it "feels"
Was just about to reply to your previous post, but you've beat me to it. Agree about Speakman, hopefully he realises he needs to step back a tad.
Can't argue with that. Think Dodds will be moving on in the summer personally. Shame given he is supposed to be good at his old job, seems he was fast tracked way too early. I get the whole permanent coaching staff with a head coach and a couple of his people coming and going but those permanent guys ought to be best in class. I certainly don't get that impression of proctor, nor dodds in the job he has been rushed into.
Probably not, you're right, but there's been the same grumble from two coaches in a row now about the recruitment strategy. I don't recall whether Beale mentioned it.
This is a really funny post because the only people who know who Speakman is are Sunderland supporters. I absolutely 100% guarantee you that more neutral football fans would be able to name Arsenal's technical director than ours.
Two coaches who almost certainly both signed on for the job knowing full well what the recruitment strategy was... Neither of whom complained when that recruitment strategy was working, instead choosing to whine about it when the team that had been doing well, stopped doing well under their guidance.
Interestingly - the supporter collective minutes have just come out, and Speakman has confirmed that the new Head Coach can bring in "assistants"
