winchester_royal The main issue with the Adkins tenure wasn't necessarily the results, though they were poor, but more the atmosphere that was building around the club. While we haven't been pulling up trees this season I don't think our current position demanded change, but the decreasing crowds and lack of atmsphere from those who turned up made it inevitable.
It wasn't working, we weren't progressing, the fans had long given up on him - we would have survived this season with I'm sure, but at what cost? It would have taken a long time for Adkins to turn it around, whereas a new manager could bring that shock to the system freshness that will speed up that process of turning it around.
Agree with the majority of your post, but is the highlighted part not almost exactly what many thought would happen when we sacked McD and replaced him with Adkins? I know no one was really expecting him to save us from relegation, but it was mainly for the future and rebuilding process that was needed, and it looked like a positive move. We were in a bad place and who knows what would have happened if McD had stayed. Would we have been fighting for promotion the following season? I think not...would we have even missed out on the play offs and come 7th like we eventually did? It just wouldnt have been the same, just like it wouldnt have been if we had brought him back in instead of Clarke this week.
Many believed McD was showing he was inept at that level and that his tactics and one dimensional style was what was limiting us, although it was also down to the fact our squad just wasnt strong enough. I don't think McD bought particularly well with the money he did get in the PL either, but I know a lot of that wasn't down to him.
Man Friday Woodcote Royal You are living proof that there is just no limit to the amount of utter sh*te people are prepared to post on these pages
Saddled with the near impossible task of keeping a team that should never got within touching distance of it, in the Premiership, simply because he'd achieved the near impossible task of getting them there in the first place, McDermott was sacked a month after achieving the near miracle of winning Premiership Manager of The Month with his motley crew of (mostly) Championship players.
If this constituted
"loosing his way" in the top flight, we've just spent 20 months in the wilderness with Moses
Quite right. Also, they weren't "50-50" decisions he was moaning about. As a small club we had 3 to 4 key refereeing decisions go against us that cost us 6-7 points (including the Chelsea game at the beginning and the Villa game at the end). He had every right to stick up for his club in an attempt to minimise the chance of such outrages happening in the future. All futile of course as it is for every small or non-fashionable club in the PL. And no, it doesn't balance out - the only time I can recall us benefitting from poor refereeing was against Everton when we had a very soft penalty awarded to us (and I think they had a good pen shout turned down).
@Woodcote I take your "impossible task" point but no matter what anyone says, McD's team selections and tactics let him down that season (not quite to the extent of our owners/board etc but that's not the point). Refused to drop his favourite out of form players and had no plan B at all, which was a shame because we actually converted a fairly high percentage of the few chances we created that season (much like the season before), a change or two in more ways than one could have really helped. It seems strange to say but we didnt really deserve to win that many of the games we did win in those two seasons.
@Man Friday, think your being too biased. I agree bigger teams get favoured by refs over small teams and it doesnt always even itself out, but on more than one occasion it seemed like McD was using refereeing desisions (and honestly a lot of them were 50/50s) as an excuse and/or to divert attention from our poor performances, and I just don't think it was necessary half the time.
Of course it was never going to be easy to keep us that season. I think a really good manager could have done it, but your average one couldnt have, and thats what McDermott is. Having said that, I don't we could have acquired a manager good enough for the task at hand that season, so in a way I agree that his sacking was a bit unfair but still, he didnt help himself.
Also, they've gone pretty quiet now, but there were enough people on here saying it was time for him to go during the season (the final straw was the home defeats against Wigan and Villa), and for the record I dont even think I was one of those people (particularly). Like I said, I was quite surprised when he got sacked. But there are some selective memories about to say the least.
