Fergie occasionally got things wrong. But he rarely got major things wrong twice.
The Argument for Giggs as our Next Manager
- Thread starter Walrus
- Start date
- Status
The truth is, nobody knows how it would turn out, he could become the next Guardiola, or he could be another David Moyes. However, that's the problem right there. The uncertainty, the risk element and then, there's the question of the alternative, if the alternative is Guardiola [whom I consider the surest thing in football, along with Jose] then why would you appoint Giggs as manager? Honestly, I don't think it's a given as people seem to think. Ed Woodward is no mug, he sent Moyes packing before the end of the season, I think he's very rational, and his decision will be based on logic. So, no, there's no argument for Giggs as our next manager apart from a romantic one. We need to be logical.
Prior to Moyes he endorsed O'Neill and Mclaren as potential successors
Probably the worst post in the thread and that takes some doing given the steaming pile of logical (lol) bs that Raoul and co have come up with.
Which is exactly why Giggs would be a far riskier appointment than Guardiola was for Barcelona. It's a strong argument against Giggs.
Last edited:
In private business you don't get to become CFO just a year or so after completing your CA/CPA just like Phelan wasn't named AM on th flick of a finger - he worked his way up the ladder. Ryan Giggs was made Assistant Manager a couple of days after retiring. There is no meticulous planning involved in how he got to be heir apparent, it's just plain nepotism from day one. Many are rightfully questioning the way he is being fast tracked into the hot seat when it is highly unnecessary because United will not die if Ryan Giggs never gets to manage it.
Giggs is in exactly that place, he's deputy to the man with the top job. So don't try and tell us that what United appear to be doing is any different to any other business. It might not be the usual way of appointing a manager but if they follow through on the idea of LVG effectively training Giggs it will certainly be an innovative one. And one that is used in private business all the time.
Well, everything on here is an argument, is it not? It need not only be two-sided; an argument can have any number of sides as long as the debaters have differing points of view. To my mind your stance is an argument in that it differs from mine as well as others.
See what you have done, you have got me arguing first thing on Sunday morning! Anyhow, using your language, I should have said, `I see the following flaw in your pointo of view...'
But Giggs has not worked his way up now has he? Every coaching opportunity he has had to date has been handed to him on a fecking silver platter and we have no way of knowing if LvG and Moyes actually chose him or he was forced on him and judging by the sustained media campaign to force him on Woodward I'd guess the latter. That is quite different from what Guardiola did, for instance, he chose to manage the youth team when he could have easily gotten a more illustrious job within the first team or what Zidane is attempting to do at Real, both took the risk to expose themselves rather than depending on their father figure benafactor to engage in horse trading whilst hiding under Van Gaal's armpits.
You know why Giggs is in a different situation. We've been over and over this. His situation is different to the other ex-United players because he is still working at the club and is its current assistant manager. Plus he appears to be being groomed for the role. That makes comparisons with players who have left the club to manage smaller clubs irrelevant.
That's the key for me. Those (and others) are or were in positions in which they took responsibilities which they are / were taken accountable for. I wouldn't know which responsibilities Giggs has which he's accountable for, and that would be considered key qualities for the manager position at a club with the ambitions of Manchester United.
Yeah your right. Giggs has just being hanging around at Old Trafford for the last 25 years, what a free-loader. I can't believe the board are potentially appointing this random person.
Again, one last time. Giggs' route to the top job is incomparable with most other situations in football. He's taking a different route by training as a coach at United and effectively serving an apprenticeship under LVG. It's just different to most managerial appointments. That doesn't mean its wrong.
Last edited:
Do you consider Bayern to be a well run club? Because they have 'fast tracked', as you put it, many players into senior positions over the years.
Yes, clearly this is a concern though it is not my primary concern.
My hope is that, by appointing the best manager we can, we can avoid all that by doing well on the pitch.
I'd be very happy with O'Neill, I know this will cause much sneering but I would.
Before McClaren got the England job he was widely tipped to take over at United. Not surprisingly really; McClaren had done exactly what many posters on here are suggesting Giggs does - leave for a mid-table team and 'prove yourself'. So much for that.
I'm convinced @Rory 7 is Gary Neville in disguise
Having many former players in senior positions is the ideal way to go but appointing one as head coach for the sack of it is a step too far. Bayern have had three world class managers in the past five years after their own Moyes moment. Do you see the difference? They have former players in key positions but they are outsourcing the most important one. There must be a reason for that but you are too dogged on Giggs taking over that you are completely ignoring and downplaying all the risks.
I'm downplaying the risks? Classic. I've fully acknowledged the risks. Posters like you see appointing Pep as the only way of mitigating the risks! Despite the fact that the appointment of any new manager brings risks. Dogged on Giggs Oh like what he's done in the last twenty five years will matter one jot if he sucks at the job. The intangibles you are trying to upgrade to merits will only come into play if he's good enough at the actual management thing and right now all we have are just Fergie, Neville and Beckham's word not actual proof nor a track record to look into and guage his strengths - that's like an upstart company trying to win a major tender on a mission statement. We should demand more because we don't owe him a job.
To me it is a lot harder to be the manager of the team than be one of the senior member of the board, manager or head coaches is a very solitary and difficult job.
Don't forget LVG, the man he currently reports into.
It is I agree. But my point to the other poster was its hardly unique to see other clubs 'fast-tracking' players internally.
There was a time when Quieroz looked like a serious option for manager. He even landed the Real Madrid job on the strength of being SAF's assistant, experience that seemed particularly valuable because SAF was seen as a hands off coach. It was only when we saw him in charge of teams that the idea got dropped.
Going from a different angle, Paul Clements after various coaching jobs worked with Hiddinck at Chelsea and then became Ancelotti's assistant. He's got a PL title on his CV, a Ligue with PSG, a CL and a Copa with Real Madrid. This has earned him a manager job with Derby County.
Giggs may be special (he was as a player) but even a trophy collection acquired as assistant, and experience across multiple countries like Quieroz and Clement have, didn't get them in the running for the United job when it was vacant.
Giggs will be treated as a special case. We all know that. United may even end up taking that gamble - especially if the Giggs/LvG team win something. As long as we don't get hung up on the great, but he needs time, but he needs his own players, SAF needed years, type debate. If he comes in as the continuity candidate it's because it's believed he can hit the ground running. To me, he looks more likely to be gone in 20 weeks than our manager for 20 years - but that's a guess, I'll assume the people involved in the decision know him better than I do. Mind you I made that assumption about Moyes as well.
Going from a different angle, Paul Clements after various coaching jobs worked with Hiddinck at Chelsea and then became Ancelotti's assistant. He's got a PL title on his CV, a Ligue with PSG, a CL and a Copa with Real Madrid. This has earned him a manager job with Derby County.
Giggs may be special (he was as a player) but even a trophy collection acquired as assistant, and experience across multiple countries like Quieroz and Clement have, didn't get them in the running for the United job when it was vacant.
Giggs will be treated as a special case. We all know that. United may even end up taking that gamble - especially if the Giggs/LvG team win something. As long as we don't get hung up on the great, but he needs time, but he needs his own players, SAF needed years, type debate. If he comes in as the continuity candidate it's because it's believed he can hit the ground running. To me, he looks more likely to be gone in 20 weeks than our manager for 20 years - but that's a guess, I'll assume the people involved in the decision know him better than I do. Mind you I made that assumption about Moyes as well.
We don't owe Ryan Giggs the manager's post nor will we collapse like a deck of cards if he never gets to manage us so the onus is upon him to prove how good he is not on us to take a risk on him on the back of a sustained campaign that the gun lobby will be proud of. Steve McClaren, Martin O'Nearl and Roy Keane were routed in years gone by but failed at the audition stage. So you knowing that the chance of Giggs failing is high want us to just skip past it and hand him the job, are you really concerned with the future health of this club? If he can't prove himself then he goes into the dustbin that's currently housing O'NEARL, Keane, McClaren and O'Leary. It's that simple.
Oh I haven't just left him out purposefully because he is just doing it to keep Ryan and his influential constituency sweet. If he allowed a rift to grow between him and Ryan, with the way Ryan's ex team mates are always sniping at him at the best of times, he wouldn't last till christmas.
It's not unique and it's a good thing. I'm going on a tangent but I understand what you and others see in the appointment of Giggs, he represents the history of the club, he represents a sort of continuity, the club have changed a lot and you see him as a reassuring figure but to me it's the wrong way of achieving it.
To me the club needs to change his organization, with a DOF(maybe Neville) and the legends like SAF or SBC should be in the executive board.
Wow.Again, in my view, comparing the Giggs situation to pretty much all the ones you've mentioned is pointless. Giggs is an internal appointment but you are fixated on managers who 'prove themselves' at other clubs. O'Leary
wtf?All that aside, based on your 'the manager needs to prove himself' demand, who would qualify?. Remember now, you can't include Kloop. So outside of the usual list (Pep, Jose and Ancellotti) who has 'proved themselves' worthy in your eyes? This should be fun...
That's fair enough, I don't disagree with your second point. I guess where we differ is I am prepared to back Giggs if the club are (as they appear to be).
We are not different then because I will back him if the club does. But from the outside I don't understand how he could.
Giggs camp is very insistent.
I really don't see any relation between a manager of a football club and a CEO of a big company. In one you need to be good at tactics, motivation, transfer market and you have to deal with 20 'emplyees', in the other you have far more responsibilities, most likely you need to be far more intelligent, and you have to deal with tens of thousands of emplyees. Ed's job with CEO of big companies, is more related, though not exactly the same.
Obviously, the reason why you (and others) need to go into other sports to find examples and then in CEO jobs at Apple and Microsoft, is that in modern football (which is what it matters if we are discussing appointments in modern football) we have a single example of a club legend who was relatively inexperienced, getting the manager job at a big club and then doing well. If Pep Guardiola didn't exist, no-one would have entertained the idea of Giggs (who is not near as intelligent, knowledgable and charismatic as Pep) to become our manager.
Anyway, if we want to go at CEO analogy, we need to go deep into details. There are generally three ways of becoming a CEO of a big company:
- Founding the company and then making it a big company. Similar to Jobs, Gates or Page.
- Being experienced in some other company and then getting the CEO job at an another company who want some fresh air. A typical example is Marissa Mayer of yahoo.
- Getting promoted from within (which I think is related to Giggs). Obviously, in order to achieve that, the candidate generally has a few decades (or at least a decade) in executive branches of a company. He would have spend a quality time on performing CEO duties in branches of the company, has leaded hundreds or thousands of employees and his job could easily be quantified. Sundar Pichai is probably the best example. He got his job as CEO of google (which considering all things will be more a CEO of a department of alphabet, rather than CEO of google) not because he was a legendary programmer who spent some time assisting Larry Page, but because he showed fantastic results in making products of google like Google Chrome, Google Maps, Google OS etc. He had to make tough decisions in those parts, not just advice Page/Brinn and then let them make their decisions. If his decisions were bad, he would have been throwed out of the google. If Giggs' advises (see, it is advises, not decisions) are bad, we'll blame Van Gaal. Cause after all, Giggs advises, Van Gaal executes. Being good at advising other people, and being good at non-executive stuff (in Giggs case, football) has really no correlation on being good as a manager, or football manager.
But, I guess that this is something we know. So, now I am waiting for the new analogy of how inexperienced princes became great kings, and so we should give the job to unexperienced Giggs.
Last edited:
How is this 49 pages long? Surely the only answer is that he's been with the club for a long time. No other arguments.
I know what I'd do as a hiring manager.
I know what I'd do as a hiring manager.
We should confine ourselves to that list of the usual suspects, move mountains to get Carlo in even if it means getting rid of LVG prematurely. Outside of that list we'd have to look at Simeone before we start to think of taking punts.
Again, in my view, comparing the Giggs situation to pretty much all the ones you've mentioned is pointless. Giggs is an internal appointment but you are fixated on managers who 'prove themselves' at other clubs. O'Leary
All that aside, based on your 'the manager needs to prove himself', who would qualify. Remember now, you can't include Kloop. So outside of the usual list (Pep, Jose and Ancellotti) who has 'proved themselves' worthy in your eyes? This should be fun...
Those managers are relevant in that at one time or the other over the years they were name dropped by Fergie himself after showing initial promise early on but went on to flop horribly when the heat was on. Right now all we got is Fergie's word and guess what those guys had much more going for them then than Giggs has, who didn't even earn his No. 2 spot. So here we are with another Ferguson candidate after half a dozen that he name dropped and one he personally picked have all flopped horribly. Forgive me if I'm not taking his word as law after that.
Appointing Giggs after Van Gaal would be a disaster. I'd be very surprised if he's as good a manager as Moyes, and even if he was he'd be a disaster. Anyone who wants Giggs as our next manager is just blinded by romanticism.
And that's where you and I differ. You want to recruit from the usual suspects and I want us to be brave and think outside the box.
Thank you. Great to have a prophet in our midst.
His list of managers for whom he had good words and whom he advocated to get jobs include Alex McLeish, Steve Bruce, Steve McLaren, Martin O'Neal, Sam Allardyce and David Moyes, with Moyes even getting the United job. He doesn't seem to be the best judge of managers.
He also got tactics terribly wrong in both finals vs Barca, but that has nothing to do with the discussion we're doing. Similarily, how Fergie not making usually the same mistake twice doesn't have much to do with Giggs appointment.
Not when the status of our club is precariously placed as it is right now. The chances of failure are high and cost of repairing the damage very excessive. We have to nip this transition induced rut in the bud before it becomes a sustained decline. I want Giggs to manage us one day and my heart says the sooner the better but if ee rush it we could ruin everything because Giggs will get much longer than Moyes got due to the influential figures he has rooting for him and his status as our most decorated player. If he is inept then that length of time could be enough to really dig us into a giant hole. The implications of his failure would bring about institutional lessons that will ensure that he will be the last ex player given such a chance like Moyes did to British managers.
We all want one of ours to get the top job but he has to prove that he is the right one not just the one.
I'm not sure I get who you're talking about? We haven't 'fast-tracked' a former player internally into an important position since Lerby became our coach in 1991 and that was one of the biggest disasters in the history of the club. I can't think of anything comparable to Giggs becoming the next United manager. Maybe Nerlinger becoming our DoF in 2008? He went to university and got a business degree after his playing career though and he wasn't really a success and soon enough replaced by Sammer, who had more than a decade of experience in football management after his playing career, first as the manager at Dortmund and Stuttgart and then as a DoF in the youth set-up for the German FA.
We often give ex-players the chance to become youth coaches or scouts, but that's it. You really have to work your way up into a key position at the club.
Which can be formulated to: I want us to get a top proven manager, while you want to gamble with the post and give it to Giggs who is relatively unexperienced?
Something that I mentioned to the Giggs-camp yesterday but unsurprisingly no-one replied: if you are forced to bet your yearly wages (the number is not important, what is important is that assuming that you lose, you will struggle to provide food and other stuff for you and your family) on Giggs or Pep/Mourinho/Ancelotti on being a success at United (and assuming that after the bet you can see the results, going a bit all sci-fi here), which one would you have chosen?
I think this question will be asked at United board? A terrible appointment would feck the club, especially if Van Gaal doesn't win the league/UCL this or next season. 4 years without important trophies, the next appointment would be very important. I would guess that the position of board members, including Ed would be dependent on it.
O'Neill at United? Seriously? Regarding mclaren there is a say in my area which describe that situation. Its called dodging a bullet. Hence why so many aren't happy of us handling such role out of pure nepotism
And how does he do that? By bringing Subderland mid-table and winning the league cup? By winning things abroad? None of that proves a damn thing. His situation at unique now is unique. Either we embrace what the club appear to be planning or we spend the next few years crying for one of the usual suspects.
- Status