Sacking a Manager

Earlier today it was confirmed that Swansea City and Garry Monk are parting ways after a run of poor form which sees the Welsh side drop to 15th place and a single point away from the drop zone. After weeks of speculation they finally put the former Swans captain out of his misery and sacked him and are now ‘reluctantly’ searching for a new boss.

There seems to be a slight disturbance with many Swansea fans admitting it wasn’t a surprise but not agreeing with the decision. This is a results driven game so even if a manager’s team is putting in good performances but losing games he could shortly find himself in the dole queue.

Then again a manager could find his team at one of its highest points and still be given the boot. A notable example of this would be Nigel Adkins being sacked by Southampton when his team looked more than comfortable in the English top flight. Obviously that example did turn out for the better as the Saints are now a force to be reckoned with under Ronald Koeman. So the questions I want to ask are when's the best time to sack your manager? And how do you know it's the right decision?

Now personally I don’t think sacking Monk was the right thing to do for Swansea at this point in time. Frankly, the fact their chairman says he is now looking for a new manager either makes him a fool or a liar. You don’t make a decision like that without having another man waiting in the wings...unless he already had someone lined up and didn’t want it to look like he was forcing Monk out…? I’m probably looking too much into that statement.

Anyway back to what I was saying I think the former Swans boss had a tough run of fixtures which would have come to an end after the Manchester City game this weekend. The Jacks’ next 3 home games (West Ham, West Brom and Sunderland) are the biggest of their season and to sack your manager just before them spells bad news for the team that had their highest Premier League finish last season.

I would have given Monk until the West Brom game personally. if he lost to West Ham and West Brom then there is time to bring in a new manager and let him loose in the January transfer window. But like many others I believed Monk could turn it around and would have picked up full points from both those games and come away with all 3 from Sunderland too.

My other question was how do you know it's the right decision to sack your manager? In some cases you do, I remember a few years ago Sheffield Wednesday sacked Alan Irvine as manager a manager. This was a guy who couldn’t beat a 9 man relegation battling Yeovil side and settled for a 2-2 draw. When your manager is tactically inept and even Piers Morgan could do better, sacking the gaffer is the right idea.

~ I think it was the season after that as well Gary Megson was sacked by The Owls after beating Sheff United 1-0 at home and was replaced by Dave Jones. We went unbeaten for the rest of the season and this was considered the key reason behind it (as well as Ched Evans going down.) Inspired decision by Milan Mandaric ~

Sunderland seem to make a habit of making inspired managerial changes. A friend of mine pointed out that for four years on the spin Sunderland have brought in a new manager right the Tyne-Wear derby and have come out victorious and gone on to avoid relegation (Di Canio, Poyet, Advocaat, Allardyce.) I’m sure most Sunderland fans would want progression and to see their side win more but it’s a difficult road that Sunderland can’t seem to stick to.

Then again sacking your manager doesn’t always mean success. You look at Fulham and Cardiff as an example; Felix Magath and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer both brought in when the sides were struggling and finished 19th and 20th respectively. So in answer to my question, you don’t know if it’s the right thing sacking your manager. It’s your judgement call and you have to take full responsibility if it goes tits up.

Now one thing that a few Swansea fans were saying got me pondering another question. Why is it only managers that get the sack and not players? A manager could have a run of five poor games and get the sack whereas there are players who were shit for years and still found themselves in football (yes I’m talking about you Xisco! You were at Newcastle for 5 years! 9 appearances! You could’ve been kidnapped and no one would’ve known.)

I understand their payouts would be astronomical but surely you can offer written and verbal warnings and then sack them due to an unwillingness to work, possibly bypassing those fees. If I came into my job and wasn’t performing well enough (if I was just sat there writing my blog all day…) then I’d get the sack. Why can’t footballers be the same? Clubs are now big business and in every business there are decisions like this that have to be made.

~ Just saying I don’t have a law degree or anything so there probably is some reason behind it such as a union or a loophole-less contract that stops this... ~

But anyway I’ve bored myself talking about this. I would like to say though, good luck to Garry Monk on his next journey in football and it’s been a pleasure watching you. If you liked this then please do me a favour and comment your favourite manager in the comment section below. you can talk about why you love him or you can just leave his name.

~ Anyone who enjoyed this please follow me on Twitter @ThePenaltyKing1 or like me on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/ThePenaltyKing1 ~

Cheers for reading.