So basically my opinion on this:
Pros
- Decent young football manager. Apparently well respected with modern ideas.
- Did very well at Oldham, despite rebuilding their squad time after time he kept progression going.
- Barnsley fans think he's done well for them.
Cons
- So many managers do very well in the lower leagues, where there are many free agents and so much opportunity to rebuild time after time. You do not get away with this in the Championship, where ultimately money is everything and where his own Dad failed spectacularly (Peter Styvar anyone?). I'm a huge fan of both but GJ was not a Championship Manager. LJ has never been given money to work with, so he is unproven here.
- The club's philosophy is to move forward with wise, young purchases and making use of the youth academy. We're now appointing a manager who's success is measured on his ability to rebuild squads season after season, with short-term contracts and loan players, meaning rebuilds every year. This contradicts entirely with our supposed philosophy. Given that, if LJ had agreed to work within our ideas, we are 100% taking a punt in this aspect, given he has no experience in this.
- Steve Cotterill was sacked due to 'the club's aspiration to ultimately become a Premier League club'. Have we really moved forward from Cotts to LJ?
- Mark Ashton says we've had over 40 applicants and you'd be surprised by the calibre of managers that have applied. Well why have we gone for LJ over all of these presumably 'proven' applicants Mark?