Sharpey on the telly | Page 2 | Vital Football

Sharpey on the telly

I disagree King, single worst decision this club has ever made and it was the catalyst for everything that followed. At that time making the right appointment was crucial and it was incomprehensible on all levels. A revolution wasn't required, just a steadying of the ship that any competent manager of note could have overseen.
 
I disagree King, single worst decision this club has ever made and it was the catalyst for everything that followed. At that time making the right appointment was crucial and it was incomprehensible on all levels. A revolution wasn't required, just a steadying of the ship that any competent manager of note could have overseen.

It was a bad decision but the point was he left we were in mid table in November of that season, the play offs were still well within reach, we had possibly the best squad in the whole division and 3 years of parachute payments to burn through. If we got the follow up appointment right there was no reason why things couldn't have been put right and challenging for promotion over those next 3 and a half years.

You should blame Coyle for failing to have us where we should have been and what he did wrong but you can't blame him what came after, there was more than enough time, money and quality in the squad to have absolutely no excuse to get us relegated. It's like last time we were at this level Caldwell struggled and left us in a difficult position and it was going to be hard for whoever came in but only Joyce is responsible for his signings, his tactics, his motivating, etc. If you want to say Coyle is largely to blame for what came after him, is Martinez not to blame for Coyle? I'd say no - each manager is only responsible for what they do. Coyle was at fault for the first 6 months only, Rosler for the next 12, then Malky for his 6 or so months. Coyle was one of many mistakes, so the blame should be spread accordingly.
 
I'm not saying Coyle is to blame for what came after him, I'm saying his appointment defied logic and from then on poor decision after poor decision was made by the leadership group. Did we have the best squad in the league? Probably. Was leaving us in middle table at the time of termination under achievement? Absolutely. However the issues his appointment brought ran deep and I don't think I ever heard or read any justification for his appointment. The only person who did, that has any interest, connection or knowledge of the club was Whelan. Without doubt the Coyle appointment set the tone for a turbulent period at the club. If it wasn't made I very much doubt the subsequent disasters would have happened.
 
Fair enough, personally i wouldn't say it set the tone as the tone could easily have been changed if we got the following appointment right, but it was the first of many mistakes.

I wanted Poyet at the time but like i said i said i don't think it was as unthinkable as you say. I think Whelan looked at his cv - he did great at his 2 clubs in Scotland, worked wonders at Burnely taking them to the Prem on a shoe string playing attacking football and then had them holding their own before jumping to Bolton who were in deep relegation trouble and he kept them up in his first season. At that point Coyle was understandably regarded a good manager. After that his next 18 months at Bolton were very poor but he had a legitimate injury nightmare that he blamed for his downfall - his reputation was damaged but it was his first set back on an otherwise good cv. Whelan obviously felt it was a blip and the injury crisis is what did him in and he'd bounce back with us. It was a bit like Jewell he had a good spell at Bradford before a terrible spell at Sheff Wed in that instance Whealn wasn't put off by his time at Hillsborough and was right. I think he thought he'd do the same this time but he misjudged it this time.
 
I agree with him being the wrong appointment and it being an easy job that he badly messed up, but you're putting way too much at his door to say we are only clearing up the damage he caused. The damage was done by a combination of Coyle, Rosler and MacKay over a 2 year spell and you could even say Caldwell, Joyce and Barrow deserve blame too for the set back of relegating us to L1 for a second time.

When Coyle left after six months we'd massively under performed but we still had a good team, had some good new signings along with the duds (Perch, Powell, McClean, McCann and initially Barnett) and 3 and a half years of parachute payments it wasn't a crisis at that point. So he can't be blamed for what happened after he left, he was just the first in the line of failures. Rosler probaly did more damage than Coyle due to blowing so much more money and signing all duds and dragging us into a relegation battle and destroying our confidence leaving us in a mess that the hopless MacKay had no clue how to clear up.

I don't like having to defend Coyle as i was as against his appointment and for his sacking as anyone but i understood why Whelan wanted him even if if i disagreed myself it wasnt completly crazy or totally void of logic. Also i don't think we can throw excessive blame Coyle for the disasterous 4 years or so spell with 2 relegations when he was only in change for few months. He may have set the ball rolling but others had more than enough of a chance to stop it and ended up pushing it down the hill even further and faster.

You could even make a case Martinez set the ball rolling on our decline by relegating us in the first place. I'm just glad we've finally back on the right track with Cook.
The damage was done when The board underfunded Martinez and he relegated us from the top flight and then walked and the board then sold off our best assetts.
Coyle started from scratch with a disbanded squad and a League and European campaign. The squad he recruited finished in the play-offs and in the FA Cup semis. I had no love for him but he did deserve some credit and was a totally different kettle of fish than McKay and Yootha.
 
I agree with him being the wrong appointment and it being an easy job that he badly messed up, but you're putting way too much at his door to say we are only clearing up the damage he caused. The damage was done by a combination of Coyle, Rosler and MacKay over a 2 year spell and you could even say Caldwell, Joyce and Barrow deserve blame too for the set back of relegating us to L1 for a second time.

When Coyle left after six months we'd massively under performed but we still had a good team, had some good new signings along with the duds (Perch, Powell, McClean, McCann and initially Barnett) and 3 and a half years of parachute payments it wasn't a crisis at that point. So he can't be blamed for what happened after he left, he was just the first in the line of failures. Rosler probaly did more damage than Coyle due to blowing so much more money and signing all duds and dragging us into a relegation battle and destroying our confidence leaving us in a mess that the hopless MacKay had no clue how to clear up.

I don't like having to defend Coyle as i was as against his appointment and for his sacking as anyone but i understood why Whelan wanted him even if if i disagreed myself it wasnt completly crazy or totally void of logic. Also i don't think we can throw excessive blame Coyle for the disasterous 4 years or so spell with 2 relegations when he was only in change for few months. He may have set the ball rolling but others had more than enough of a chance to stop it and ended up pushing it down the hill even further and faster.

You could even make a case Martinez set the ball rolling on our decline by relegating us in the first place. I'm just glad we've finally back on the right track with Cook.
He is partly to blame for the first relegation to the league one because it was under his reign and with the players he brought in when the atmosphere in the dressing room began to sour and some players began to become bad influences in the dressing room. This sour dressing room then crept back into the club at the end of Roslers first season and then carried on into his second. I remember before we played qpr in the play off final and 3 of our players was slating rosler on twitter. Even with Roslers dreadful signings, we had more than enough good players to stay up comfortably that season and should of done. But player attitudes had become a problem and that was the main reason for our relegation. An that was in part due to Coyle and the way he had treated players during his reign. An we have only just started to truly recover from Coyles, because we have only just started to get ourselves back to where we was before he came into the club. Which was a good championship team. Which I think we are again this season.

When Martinez left our next manager was the most important appointment we ever had to make, if we had of got that right not only would we have been promoted again. We would of probably had a couple more years in the prem and managed to establish ourselves as a club that would bounce between the championship and prem. But Whelan got it dead wrong and he hired someone who went against everything the previous manager had built up.
 
The problems we've had all stem from the managerial appointments. Each has been different from the last.
Coyle was different to Martinez. Rosler different to Coyle. Malky different from Rosler and so on.
Each had a contract and brought in their own players but didn't last long so the next manager was stuck with unhappy players who possibly didn't suit the new mans style.
I think Sharpe tried to rectify things by having a player clear out and recreating Martinez's playing philosophy in appointing Caldwell. We'll never know if Gary could have kept us up but Sharpe had a Coyle moment and appointed Joyce which totally screwed us up that season.
Hopefully lessons have been learnt and Cook can give us at least mid table security this season and something to build on next season.
 
To Griggs goals: We don't know exactly what happened behind the scenes but when Coyle left we didn't appear to have any major dressing room issues, they only seemed to start under Rosler. Uwe managed to have issues with Powell, McClean and Holt, and didn't he also supposedly fall out with a few others like Fortune, Espinosa, Maloney and one of the coaches too (Black)? I can't quite remember but it seemed like Rosler was rubbing everyone up the wrong way more and more the longer he was here.

Rosler also had issues with falling out with players at other clubs he's been at - i get the impression given enough time Rosler could fall out with an empty room. So i don't think it's at all fair to say that it's Coyles fault for Roslers inability to man manage the players and end up with them turning on him. The first job of any good manager is to manage their dressing room.

I am more than happy to say Coyle failed - he inherited a strong base and spent about 6m on fees and had a 25m wage budget (3rd biggest in league) and while he failed miserably to utilise it, he left the next manager with the best squad in the division in mid table after 6 months. But at that point not one of us would've said we are on a downward spiral and relegation was inevitable - we had under performed but there wasnt a lot wrong other than having a hopless manager. While automatic promotion that season was asking a bit much for whoever came in at that point, the play offs were very realistic and a further 3 and a half years of parachute money to work with meant Coyle successor had a fantastic opportunity to build us up and Coyles time should've been a blip that we put right in the subsequent seasons even if he squandered our best chance at an immediate bounce back.