If anyone is interested in hearing Ashley Brown and Iain McInnes discuss the reasons for letting Guy go the link is here. http://www.expressfm.com/local/podcasts/the-football-hour-933450/
Firstly I am sad for Guy. The team he has assembled was the best that could be done in the time available at the beginning of the season. There was no opportunity for planned team building. A fair go would have , at least allowed him to adjust his squad in the January window. An incoming manager now will want to make an impression before next season ie attack the prospect of getting to the playoffs. This gives him December and perhaps early January to assess the current squad and scout for potential transfer window strengthening. I am not sure if Pompey's current budget allows for any scouting but, even if it does, an incoming manager has to have time to develop confidence in any scouts. A manager who is currently in a 1st or 2nd division environment may have some chance of knowing the available talent pool sufficiently well to contract new players in the window. Someone currently operating at a different level would I am sure struggle with the time frame. If I am right this significantly reduces the potential manager talent pool. Personally I believe Guy should have been given the chance to adjust the squad within the window and should not have been replaced until it became clear the play-offs were out of site. A new manager then would have the end of the season to assess the squad and the close season to recruit in. All the above is from someone that has not had the opportunity to even see Pompey once this season on television. I am very aware that Guy's selections and tactics have been severely questioned having read reports on this forum and the News forum. I think it is easy however , to over blame the coach and under blame the players (if 'blame' is seen as a road to a solution in any case!!). From the reports it appears too many points have been lost due to defensive errors. (fundamentally I suppose all goals come from defensive errors). There are two types of defensive errors. Those the player doesn't know he has made - a coach can help here - and those he knows he has made but has made anyway. The latter type are very hard to reduce by management or coaching. I am trying to point out that recruiting the squad is a major roll of management and Guy has not had a fair chance in that regard. Getting the best out of an existing squad has its limitations. it is unlikely the next manager will be able to make a purse from a sour's ear
Not sure what to make of this:- http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/25170876 Are we really going around clubs asking if politely if their managers might be available? So reading between the lines of what Mark Catlin is saying, we're not sure if we're ready to approach people yet but we want to find out who's available. Just doesn't exactly sound very professional, but suppose that's football (and dare I say it - the last few years at Pompey) down to a tee. Anyway, what do I know. Just sounds a little different from the application approach that was being talked about earlier in the week. Unless Chris Wilder has made an application, we've looked at it and phoned Oxford asking if they'd let him join us. Otherwise, the conversation must have been:- "Hi, it's Mark Catlin here. We're looking for a new team manager. Not sure if the chap you've currently got in charge at the moment is exactly what we're looking for. However, we're drawing up a shortlist and just want to see if we did decide to talk your man, whether he might be available or not. No? OK, must go, I've got another 15 chairmen to phone this morning". The other thing it might suggest is that we have some money available for compensation if we did decide to approach a manager who's currently employed. Although suppose you never know what clauses managers have got written into their contracts. Finally - what a classless prick this Oxford chairman is (although suppose he joins a very long list of them). No need for the "failing" club comment. Although dare say he probably knows a thing or two about that:- Oxford United chairman Ian Lenagan has revealed the League Two club lost £750,000 last year and are expected to lose a further £660,000 in 2013. The U's owner also insists there are no plans to leave their current ground - or abandon attempts to buy it. However, Lenagan revealed he is setting up an advisory panel to identify all the options available. "It's been an awful shock to the system, the amounts of money being lost," he told BBC Radio Oxford. "For three years it was moving forward and got to the point of being better than break even, and I think it can get back to that. "We were aware that loss was going to occur to an extent. But having got through it and paid off those losses and cleared the debts we are in much calmer, cleaner scene going forward and we are moving in the right way. I'm confident I think we can sort it." http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/21380551
We can only speculate at this point. It's possible that some managers have got the nod and the wink to put in an application, in which case if our board want to shortlist and interview them they would need the permission of the current club. I'm sure I read somewhere that only an application would be considered even if some managers were approached to apply. They would have been approached by Darren Simmonds of Football Executives though, they are the ones handling the first stage of the recruitment process.
Cheers for putting the link up matey.....not being local I don't get to hear the station. Having listened to it, it pretty much sums up what any one who has been to any of the games since the Fleetwood home game (for me that's when the wrott started) has been feeling. It sounds like as well as a lack of performance target achievements GW has been failing targets off the field as well. It sounds like from what some of us have been saying, coupled with what I was told from with in the club that this has been on the cards for a while.
Several times McInnes reiterated that they were looking for a 'Manager' and not a Head Coach, it did come over as though Guy hadn't left his coaching role behind enough to take care of other managerial issues. Don't know what these might have been though.
