But it plays a big role in keeping them here when it's obvious they're quite obviously not up to much. See Mourinho.
Fear of changing the manager
- Thread starter Andycoleno9
- Start date
Plays 0 role.
The first bit depends on whether they 'had it' in the first place I suppose. It's always heavily linked to the quality of players at disposal either way.
I don't think I've ever said Ole's getting better.
Dortmund didn't sack Klopp. Also his final season was largely as a result of 'bad luck' rather than poor underlying performance. As the article at the bottom discusses.
There will be a perfect manager out there for us somewhere. Picking him out of the crowd is a different story, especially for Woodward and Co. We haven't got to the point where it's worth the gamble yet.
It is always worth the gamble to get a new manager if the current one is not performing.
I want United to stick ruthlessly to Solskjaer for 5 seasons at least. Speaking for myself as a fan, i'm just bored of changing manager. Then nothing actually changes.
Speaking with my business head.. I think if Jurgen Klopp was on the market, or a younger Sir Alex, then there would be very little argument or fear. But look at who we hire.. Van Gaal, Moyes, Mourinho... Christ. I'd genuinely rather keep Solskjaer for life than let this club attempt to hire another has-been or never-was manager.
No point changing unless we can hire someone we're certain we'll stick with for 5 years no matter what and who is very capable of delivering titles and building another great United team.
Speaking with my business head.. I think if Jurgen Klopp was on the market, or a younger Sir Alex, then there would be very little argument or fear. But look at who we hire.. Van Gaal, Moyes, Mourinho... Christ. I'd genuinely rather keep Solskjaer for life than let this club attempt to hire another has-been or never-was manager.
No point changing unless we can hire someone we're certain we'll stick with for 5 years no matter what and who is very capable of delivering titles and building another great United team.
Not saying it’s right or wrong but Barca/Madrid you’d get sacked after losing 6-1 to Spurs.
Klopp was given time at Liverpool as an example.
Personally I see it as far more of a gamble to persist with a manager of Ole's ability rather than getting in a better one. People will go and cite LvG and Mourinho as examples of "better managers who failed" and that's fine, but we all know in retrospect both were well past their best when they came here.
As it stands, since SAF left, we have yet to hire a really good manager who was still at their best, or improving as a manager - that's the cold hard truth. All four of our managerial appointments since SAF left have either not been good enough in the first place (Ole, Moyes) or no longer the manager they used to be (LvG, Mourinho). We simply have no idea what will actually happen if we do hire a really good manager at their peak, because it's hasn't actually happened! So why not try and make it happen?
And yes, the club may make the wrong decision again but persisting with a manager who isn't good enough because the club could (not necessarily will) botch the next appointment seems senseless to me.
Myth 5:
Changing managers is a magic wand which will solve all problems
No. Changing managers has to be a well oiled process. You can't go from LVG to Jose to Ole to Poch to Allegri. All have completely different style of play. Randomly changing managers because someone "arguably" better will just backfire as fans will demand certain style of play and manager will struggle to change his well trained style.
Changing managers is a magic wand which will solve all problems
No. Changing managers has to be a well oiled process. You can't go from LVG to Jose to Ole to Poch to Allegri. All have completely different style of play. Randomly changing managers because someone "arguably" better will just backfire as fans will demand certain style of play and manager will struggle to change his well trained style.
yeah. It wasn’t like we demolished PSG with brilliant football. It was very much sit back and counter and we got a huge slice of luck.
Not fear, some are just attached to the Fergie model and think giving the manager 5 seasons will make him a legend, beside being a likeable ex legend makes it hard for some to admit that United can do better, so they lowered expectations to rock bottom so that anything we will do now will be great results.
It's not ad hominem as far as I'm concerned. I've just questioned what appears to be the very basis of the thread. To me there's a clear subtext here.
Unless of course you think we should have fired LVG and Mourinho sooner. If not, then there's no pattern at all and I don't get the point of the OP as I said earlier.
I was asking a genuine question, as from what I can see we are firing managers quite frequently, which is why I tagged you. I'm not going to include Moyes as we all know he deserved more time.
So if it's a problem going back to 2013, when do you think LVG and Mourinho should have gone?
Wait and hire best manager in the world or stop wasting everybody's time with these miracle workers every year or two who always end up in Europa League. Huge part of supporters who wants the sacking, are not even entirely sure who to appoint next.
This is not Fergie's model fault. The board is responsible for all choices at the top. If United were a sacking club like many people want, United wouldn't give Fergie much needed time in the first place.
This is not Fergie's model fault. The board is responsible for all choices at the top. If United were a sacking club like many people want, United wouldn't give Fergie much needed time in the first place.
Think it's recognised across the board that he got about 8 months too much, certainly not too little.
What?
Well I don't see that we're at the point of gambling our current stability yet. Just 3 months ago there was very few calls to change manager, even the 'Ole out' thread went quiet.
It's easy to look after the event and say LVG and Mourinho were past it. Most including myself were reasonably happy at the time of appointment, particularly with Mourinho.
This month's next big thing is next year's forgotten man. We'd have had the likes of Eddie Howe in the job if many here had their way in the past.
That's what he saysWhat?
I don't think now is the time to sack Ole, I think we should never have given him the full time job, and then last season after our calamitous run pre-lockdown he should've been sacked, but he did good post-lockdown and has subsequently earnt the right to be given more than three awful performances.
if we are still playing like this after 10-15 games though.. he should probably go, and I think sooner or later, he will be gone, because we will probably continue this boom-bust cycle under him until it just becomes bust and that'll be that. I can understand why some just want him gone at the earliest opportunity because it's quite clear we won't achieve anything under him, which leading back to the main point of this thread, is why it's silly to have such a fear to change managers when it is entirely obvious they are not up to the job.
Yeah there's an odd idea here that somehow the Glazers are swayed by fan power. I suppose its gives fans a misplaced sense of belief - if it is known that nothing we do has an impact on what goes on in the club, then all of these discussions would be for naught. The owners listen to sponsors, investors, financial analysts, the market ... the fans, unless organized in a way akin to shareholders, are pretty much background noise.
The manager should just be treated the same as all other staff until they've earned otherwise. Responsibility usually works upwards from the players with accountability working downwards. At the moment some fans have decided the manager has the least responsibility (what can he do?) and the also least accountability (it's the boards fault!).
I think it goes both ways - the best managers would not want this job given the poor institutional structure we have. They would want a board and footballing hierarchy that is willing to put operational excellence as top priority. They would want to work with footballing experts too, with the marketing and finance folks focused on their respectice areas of expertise. Instead we have bankers and marketers running operations here. It takes a lot of moving parts for a team to be successful and managers are only one of these parts. Even City, with its strong (purchase) institutional set-up and world class manager, find it tough at times. We do have a powerful history and tradition, ala Bayern and Real, here. But that has been replaced by bankers and ad men. We have the worst of both worlds - folks without operational experience in permanent power yet without the stability that comes with long term hierarchial dominance.
There are companies in other industries that have been run to the ground by finance people who kicked out operations executives. Look at Boeing, GE ... great companies that got taken over by finance types who put quarterly targets over innovation and operational excellence that made these companies great in the first place. This is a cultural problem endemic in the American corporate world that has unfortunately infected Manchester United. When bankers and marketeers start running companies, things usually do not go well.
I don't fear it I just don't think it's as easy a solution as many think. People only see the bright side of any new appointment. Get Poch in and we could easily be here in a year's time saying "yeah, we should have probably seen the signs from how it ended at Spurs, it was never going to work here".
But yes if the current performances continue well after the break we have to look at our options.
I think if there was a manager available that has worked with an incompetent board and still managed to build a team that won a few trophies then there wouldn't be any fear
5 days until the next match. I hate the international breaks.
While this looks good on paper, if your team want a top winger and your board is capable of negotiating only average wingers in the market, due to no money or low quality of negotiation skills, the manager can't really be expected to turn him into a world class winger only through training. Not all players are of the same caliber and cannot have same impact on the team.
Bankers no matter how cynical towards football they can be, they're still making us sign exciting prospects for the future and definitely could be keen on paying good wages to absolutely top manager. You have a good point on the structure... it's close to non-existant and there's no defense or excuse for such failed model of hierarchy, but then again why do we still trying to blame majority problems on the manager, even if the the owners & CEO are the culprit in most cases.
Fear of changing manager is pretty much justified in current enviroment and people who feared Jose Mourinho is not a proper match for United had their share of common sense display in the end.
It's a vicious cycle and Woodward already gave Solskjaer his backing twice in 2019 and in first half of current year. Might aswell wait for best manager in the world to take over in time, rather than pay obnoxious sacking pay-outs to every manager out there we want hire for 1-2 years.
definitely
Sackyphobia
Of course it's not an easy solution, certainly not with this board. It is a solution though, but you have to keep trying. The whole point of this thread is that we are far too slow to sack underachieving managers meaning we are going to be far slower to find the right manager. We're not the first club who have made loads of terrible appointments before getting the right manager in but we are one of the slowest at getting the right manager because we persist with failing managers far longer than most.
I'm only for sacking Ole if we're in a bad spot come January and one of Nagelsmann, Rose or at a stretch Bosz is available.
I love the myths, the opinions and the facts in this thread. Blend them together 
There's no fear in changing managers....unless there's greater fear and greater distrust in the men above the manager's position who oversee the football side of the club. And with that, comes concern versus fear of sacking managers left and right.
We cannot just wait to appoint a manager then think they are the savior. Any manager will still seek players who will fit their ideas and tactics.
Klopp and Pep and their respective clubs moved a lot of players in and a lot of players out. United have brought a lot of players in, but not too many out, especially when they should have been flogged off many years before.
To that, Woodward tried to "sell" United to Klopp as an adult Disneyland, remember that. So these football managers who are all football crazy, get approached in that manner...who is speaking to them about football visions and what needs to be done on the pitch and in the club to the specific details of the "sporting project"....if that's Woodward, no fecking wonder we're in the malaise we're at.
No fear in sacking a manager....greater fear in knowing that Woodward is the supreme decison maker in football related decisions.
We cannot just wait to appoint a manager then think they are the savior. Any manager will still seek players who will fit their ideas and tactics.
Klopp and Pep and their respective clubs moved a lot of players in and a lot of players out. United have brought a lot of players in, but not too many out, especially when they should have been flogged off many years before.
To that, Woodward tried to "sell" United to Klopp as an adult Disneyland, remember that. So these football managers who are all football crazy, get approached in that manner...who is speaking to them about football visions and what needs to be done on the pitch and in the club to the specific details of the "sporting project"....if that's Woodward, no fecking wonder we're in the malaise we're at.
No fear in sacking a manager....greater fear in knowing that Woodward is the supreme decison maker in football related decisions.
The financiers in charge are really leveraging the goodwill we built up under the SAF years - when United went from a powerful club to a global brand known for flair, dramatic wins, and iconic players. Since SAF retired, there has been nothing done to improve that goodwill with fans and players alike. We could still offer a handsome compensation package to players and we still have a massive global marketing platform, but the foundations upon which those are built are not getting any better within the club. Now with Covid and the rise of state-backed rivals, the external foundations are weaker too. On the footballing ("product") side, the manager is very important as you rightly pointed out. But the prospects of working with Woodward's team as the top dogs of the corporate hierarchy is a tricky one. Say you are a brilliant designer or engineer and you are interviewing with a large company - formerly one of the best of its kind but which has been purchased by a private equity firm more concerned with drawing cash from the company than innovating - with a history of design and engineering excellence that has now given way to marketing and ill-advised acquisitions to "purchase" innovation thanks to its large coffers. The CEO wants you to bring the company back to its former glory but at the same time, admits that you will be reporting to the CFO and Chief Marketing Officers who have the final say over your R&D spend and product direction. You hope that everyone is on the same page but it seems that the CFO and CMO are really ignorant of the company's products despite their best efforts, aiming for splashy launches and headlines and further skimming the company's brand for marketing dollars. They have spent generously on odd acquisitions that turned out to be poor cultural and product fits for the company, adding to overhead and the company's reputation for burning out bright minds.
Last edited:
There is no point changing a manager of you're not gonna back them up in the transfer market in an efficient manner.
Needs have to identified quickly and acted upon swiftly by football people in consultation with the manager and that's how a proper club is run.
We have a scatter gun approach that is not going to give any results, no matter whom you appoint
Needs have to identified quickly and acted upon swiftly by football people in consultation with the manager and that's how a proper club is run.
We have a scatter gun approach that is not going to give any results, no matter whom you appoint
Yeah its weird really. Every team changes managers every few years. Keeps ideas fresh and unlikely you'll have a super manager like Klopp/Pep/Sir Alex so you might as well. Become less dependent on 1 manager, more on your overall team quality.
Indeed. Even with the complete power and stability that they enjoy, Woodward's team has failed to built a proper footballing operation. They have consistently hired poorly, failed to invest from a position of strength, built a reputation as being ripe for the taking, and spent an enormous amount of money just to struggle to stay in Top 4. It is a damning record for all stakeholders, including the owners.
Fear or common sense?
Madrid weren’t just in Barcelonas shadow, before their CL form under Zidane they won it just once in 12 years between 2002 and 2014, 6 consecutive years of which where they couldn’t get past the round of 16.
Chelsea have won 6 league titles in the last two decades, three of which were won by the same guy.
The fact that Leicester have been successful might be more down to the fact of how well thay’ve been managed from top to pitch, especially in recruitment where we’ve been generally abysmal for long before SAF stepped down.
You’re right, it’s just another rant from an OleOUTer who fears he will combust unless he vents his hate for our manager every single day. Forum is now full of them.
It used to be contained to a few threads but they are now determined to take over the entire forum with their moaning.
That’s exactly what we’re currently doing though isn’t it?