da bwin：
da roleta： During the first half of the Premier League season there have been a lot of surprises for fans of the most watched league in the world. Manchester United put eight past Arsenal then contrived to lose 6-1 at Old Trafford against City, Swansea City have marked their first season in the division by being having the tightest home defence in the league and Newcastle United have ignored their turbulent summer and spent the first four months of the campaign fighting for European places with the big guns. Robin van Persie has been on fire, Michel Vorm and Demba Ba have been superb signings and none of the promoted sides are in the bottom three.
However, the biggest shock of the season so far is that only one man, Steve Bruce, has lost his job.
The sacking of a boss is not something that we want to see on a regular basis but it has become an inevitable aspect of the beautiful game. Success is what they are all judged upon so there is no boardroom that is prepared to let the team fall below expectations which often leads to those in charge facing the axe for failing to achieve their targets.
But this season, chairmen appear to have found their sensitive side and instead of opening the trap door at the first opportunity they are giving their men the chance to turn it around. Even Steve Kean, who has become a figure of hate for fans, has been backed by Blackburn Rovers Indian owners despite the club sitting bottom of the league and seemingly on a one-way trip to the Championship.
It is an intriguing conundrum in a game where points make prizes. By New Year’s Day last season two managers had gone and seven had left their clubs by the same time during the 2007-08 campaign.
The 19 managers still in their jobs will say that it is because they are doing a good job and the owners believe in what they are doing. Some will say that their league position is good enough while Kean and Owen Coyle believe that they are being backed because they can turn things around. And while in some mixed up way that could very well be the case, it is pretty unbelievable that Venky’s and Phil Gartside are happy to see their teams propping up the league as it heads into 2012.
A much more believable reason for them being able to keep their jobs, along with several other bosses, lies off the pitch. Like all other industries, football is suffering from financial difficulties and so clubs are reluctant to spend millions taking a risk on a new manager. Steve Kean has been under pressure at Ewood Park for virtually his whole tenure having won just 11 times in all competitions, but with Rovers posting losses of over £18 million recently it is unlikely that they would want to put aside another couple of million to pay off the rest of his contract and then stump up more funds to attract somebody else. Belts are even being tightened towards the top of the table. At Stamford Bridge the sacking of Carlo Ancelotti was expensive, as was the £13.2 million compensation package sent to Porto for Andre Villas-Boas. Add that to his wages and he will have cost Chelsea over £15 million already and when results were poor and rumours of the sack were emerging, it was speculated that it would take another £20 million to get rid of him so even Roman Abramovich has taken the unusual step of delaying execution.
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Another problem facing the 20 top-flight club owners is the apparent lack of choice for them if they do bring their bosses reign to an end. Until his move to Sunderland, Martin O’Neill was the best manager without a club but past him the choice is sparse and unappealing. Mark Hughes is now the manager with the best Premier League record after doing a good job at Blackburn and Manchester City before he was unceremoniously sacked. But the clubs that could currently justify bringing in a new manager wouldn’t give a second glance to the Welshman. Having been at Blackburn before and the situation they now find themselves in it is unlikely that he would choice to return their, while his history at Ewood Park would mean that the Trotters faithful would never warm to him if Bolton Wanderers ditched fans favourite Coyle for Sparky. Other clubs that could consider a managerial change include Fulham, where a strained player-manager relationship is on show, but after an average season their last term, the unpleasant remarks between him and Mohamed Al-Fayed since his departure and his decision to leave in a bid to join Aston Villa, he wouldn’t be welcome back at Craven Cottage. As for the Villains, the fact that they overlooked the Welshman in favour of a man with a Birmingham City background says it all.
While all these posts would be crying out for a man with his credentials he is unsuitable for all of them. Another man out of work who could fill a gap is Alan Curbishley, who hasn’t been seen in the dugout since leaving West Ham United, but he is still receiving compensation from the Hammers following his departure so a return to management isn’t on the cards.
While clubs may look outside their goldfish bowl and see a lack of candidates for their post potential bosses are unwilling to apply for these jobs. With half of the season behind them there is no time for a new manager to settle in because every game from now on could make or break a season. For anybody taking over at a club in the bottom three they will inherit a squad that is struggling for points, performance, luck and morale so the chances of turning it around are slim. But that new man knows that if they fail to steer the club to safety then they will be removed in the summer and will struggle to get another job. A prime example is Alan Shearer, who was given the chance to save his beloved Newcastle United from the drop but he couldn’t, since then he has never returned to the hotseat despite being linked to several jobs. For those more likely to survive this season, managers won’t necessarily want to take the job either. After a decade in the job, the stress of seeing your best players sold and having less money than Greece, Everton boss David Moyes is beginning to show the strains of the job. But if the Scotsman was to leave tomorrow it is unlikely that anybody who could benefit the club would want to take a job somewhere those extreme issues need resolving. In the upper echelons of the league, if Abramovich’s tolerance of Villas-Boas was to snap then who would want to come in under an owner that is prepared to discard his multi-million pound manager? As for replacing the 70-year-old that has sat pretty on his Old Trafford perch for 25 years, if he was to walk away in 2012, would anybody dare to take the reins?
It would be a happy end to 2011 if we could say that the time of trigger-happy chairmen is coming to an end. But that would be a naive way to look at the situation. Clubs can no longer maintain the managerial merry-go-round we have become accustomed to and while that is good for those already in the hotseats, disgruntled fans may have to bide their time for change. More money brings more choice and a wealthy 2012 will see the sackings continue.
Are clubs put off by the cost of the sack? Comment below or tell me on Twitter @jrobbins1991.
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