IF YOU were choosing the Manager of the Year this morning, who would it be? It is too easy to give it again to Sir Alex Ferguson. This prestigious award must not always go to the biggest and best. If Manchester United go on to hold off rivals City and retain the Premier League, why does that make Fergie Manager of the Year? The same applies to Roberto Mancini, who has held the big earners and big egos together at City while Kenny Dalglish picked up the first trophy of the season when Liverpool won the Carling Cup. Harry Redknapp has taken Spurs to third place with some exciting football and Alan Pardew has a bigger case than most with the outstanding job he has done at Newcastle. My manager of the moment, however, has won more than a trophy, heâs captured the hearts of football with his principle of how the game should be played. Brendan Rodgers and Swansea were given a standing ovation by Fulham fans on Saturday after their 3-0 win at Craven Cottage. It was a testament of appreciation. Rodgers says he is living in dreamland at being in eighth place in the Premier League, especially with the resources he has to work with. Football should be grateful to Rodgers because he is proving that you donât need to spend fortunes to create something special. Swansea are not going to win anything this season but why do you have to win a trophy to be Manager of the Year? What Rodgersâ team is doing is proving that you can be successful by playing pure football regardless of cost and reputation. Not once has he broken away from what he believes in and promoted Swansea this season have been a refreshing throwback. Keep the ball, pass, move, play it from the back, encourage your players to love the ball, donât give it away, refuse to panic and enjoy yourselves. Not difficult, is it? He began his career as youth team coach at Reading then moved to the same role at Chelsea under Jose Mourinho, was promoted to the Bluesâ reserves in 2006 and in November 2008 got his first managerâs job at Watford. This 39-year-old Irishman then replaced Steve Coppell at Reading before leaving by mutual consent and taking over at Swansea from Paulo Sousa. He has found his spiritual home with players who never thought they would make it. With these bargain buys and those he has handpicked to do the job his way, Swansea have defied all odds. Gylfi Sigurdsson, who Rodgers worked with at Reading, got two of Swanseaâs goals against Fulham on Saturday. Every Swansea player is comfortable on the ball. They are the Premier Leagueâs mini-Barcelona. How far he can take them is another matter and it is clear that Rodgers is destined to move upwards at some stage. Already he has produced one of the quotes of the season when, linked with the Chelsea job, he said he didnât want to ruin his career before it had started. Swansea are playing the kind of football that everyone treasures. This is a victory for the little guy and small club. Had other coaches over the years followed the Rodgers principle then we would not, technically, be so far behind the rest of Europe. How many times have you heard the phrase âwe must never lose what we are good atâ? What exactly does that mean? Ah yes, running, non-stop work rate, closing down and having a physical presence. Had English players been encouraged to play like Swansea 20 years ago then we wouldnât be in such a mess at international level. One of Rodgersâ claims to fame is that he climbed Kilimanjaro. English football is a bigger mountain to conquer. Heâs not even halfway up yet but at least eighth place in the Premier League allows him a platform to shout a message for others to start playing the Swansea way. For that he definitely deserves to be Manager of the Year. - By Brian Woolnough Thank you Brian, very much appreciated, good to see our project is starting to receive the merit it rightfully deserves!...........
Sorry Musty can't agree with that, Pardew would never have achieved on the Swansea budget, he couldn't do it at Charlton!..................
Great read, and Rodgers for me is the man to win, followed by Lambert, they have proved that you don't need to spend hugely to achieve, and a team full of players from league 1 and 2 can cut the mustard at the highest level if the ethics are right, and the manager and coaches are right. Pardew has done good at Newcastle admittedly but he has done so with much bigger resources at a much bigger club, he doesn't come close to it.
considering where we are at the moment, brendan and the boys have done a tremendous job, and deserve all the plaudits.
Great read, thanks for posting that up Phil. While Pardew has done a fantastic job at Newcastle, you mustn't forget that they were already a PL outfit before this season. So, they had a big transfer kitty, higher wage allocation etc etc to us three promoted teams. So, while it looks biased, it has to be Buck. He has worked wonders on a tight budget, with our most expensive player costing 3.5million pounds. Our entire yearly wage bill comes to less than Yaya Toure and.......... (Can't remember) alone. Lambert comes a close second. They have been ahead of us for most of the season, done the double over us, but they havn't had the scalps we have nor a standing ovation at an away ground. People are shouting Swansea from the rooftops and our Buck deserves all the plaudits, Manager of the season by far. One of the favourites for the drop......get real.
Don't forget that we had a standing ovation at Anfield as well, it means not a lot on the larger scheme of things, but this is from football fans that don't even support our club.
If I was making the choice it'd go to Brendan but Lambert also deserves great recognition! Pardew comes in third I think.
4 home clean sheets to start the season , a record that promoted teams to the Premier & there manager will have a tough time ever reaching in the future . Applauded off more than 1 away ground . The only 2 teams to have more clean sheets come from Manchester with probably a half billion spent on the teams together . Neutrals are in awe of our accomplishments ..... At the end of the day , it can only be Buck !!!
as i've said before, its between lambert and rodgers for me, but lambert shades it. in his 3 seasons he's had back to back promotions and consolidated this season without spending fortunes. in favour of rodgers is the style of play and league position, but currently norwich are 3 points off swansea, and swansea are 3 points from 14th. one or two results could see the swans tumble down to that sort of positioning.. repeating what i've said before, if you base it purely on this season then its rodgers every day of the week, but lambert because of the incredible level of success he's brought norwich
This season has been a season of two parts. As the lead in another current article: Pre-Spurs and Post-Spurs. Pre-Spurs we had accumulated just 19 points. Post-Spurs we have accumulated 20 points -- Top 3 form, and this includes a couple of dodgy games againt Stoke and Norwich, and two points dropped with almost the last kick against Chelsea. I don't think we're done yet - we could easily jump another two or three places given our current form. Based on this and the quality and style of our performances recently, Rogers has developed, perhaps transformed is a better word, a majority Championship squad into a markedly premiere Prem squad. Do we have the depth that other clubs have - no, this will come, but our top 15 players are capable of holding their own and then some against the top teams in the division - not by the sheer brute force of their individual talent, but by the system and their cohesivness and execution on the field. By comparison within the division, ours is a relatively young and inexperienced squad. This is the hallmark of a very good coach and manager. This deserves to be recognized for its achievement - as it is an achievement in pure footballing terms with meager resources, not purchased or bank-rolled. For this the top candidate has to be Rogers.
Swamp. The award is for manager of the season. This season. I've heard your argument from a mate of mine who is a Norwich fan and it doesn't wash. Whereas Lambert has worked wonders and they may still finish above us, their style of play is (imo at least) predictable, and usually involves lumping it diagonally across the box to the pie-eater that is Grant Holt, or Steve Morison to head home. The stats show this to be true. Effective, but hardly inspiring. Pardew has done well at the Toon but as has been pointed out he already had a very strong squad in place. He's made some decent, astute signings but hardly on a budget. £3.5M for Tiote, £2M for Obertan, £5.3M for Santon and a reported £9M for Cisse. Again, they don't play the free flowing football of 'The Entertainers' of old as they used to. Stack both against Rodgers and he wins by a country mile.
you can add the big wages that newcastle always seem to pay, as well as the £2m signing on fee and £2m agent fee that they paid for demba ba. people like colocini and cabaye are on £60k plus a week, so he is most certainly not on a shoestring, though he deserves credit for continuing the upwards trajectory of newcastle. i remember ryan giggs got sports personality of the year a year or two back.....surely a culmination of a fantastic 15 years or so of football? moyes has got the award 3 times, the highest his team has finished is 4th once, when he wins it arent they taking into account the fact that his team have supposedly overachieved for years? like i said, if you are judging it purely for this season then rodgers every day of the week. however your only 3 points from 14th so say if swansea were 14th with 4 points less would he still get it? possibly but i suspect probably not...
No, I agree. The league position at the end may swing it, but you never know. Forgot about Ba. Bargain!
I think though that there is something being ignored here, which is unique, and that is we are the first to introduce a successful adaptation of Barcelona style of play to the Prem, and that has to be good for the British game, getting the ball down and playing total football from the back out, is something that can only grace the Premiership, and hopefully will catch on, maybe others will look at their hoofball route one, and relegate it to where it belongs, dead and buried. But we have definitely shown up the top teams, and their footballing philosophy as inferior, and it looks to me that our way of playing is definitely superior than most of the Prem teams, who even struggle to match us with top world class players, and that to me says something for our system of play, and I'm sure there is still plenty of mileage in perfecting our system, which Rodgers is brimming with anticipation to complete, but Rodgers must be a first for all this!............... please log in to view this image
