Not exactly a favoured choice but I said eight games or so into the season that Erik will go because his position will become untenable. If you assess this seasons weakness it's that Erik is one dimensional tactically and the team is too open so if a manager comes in and structures the midfield and defence positionally it could go a long way to improving results.
Graham Potter | turns down Ajax job
- Thread starter horsechoker
- Start date
It makes sense. Bring him in as the manager ASAP, give him the season to feck around, wait until a very good manager comes available, sack Potter and say results and performances didn't improve, that's if he can't do anything with this team and the players that come in under INEOS.
That's literally no different from hiring an 'interim' just without the title. People need to stop marrying every manager we appoint and seeing them as the last great hope for the football club.
That's literally no different from hiring an 'interim' just without the title. People need to stop marrying every manager we appoint and seeing them as the last great hope for the football club.
No doubt....it is a mammoth job and it is not a cheque book fix.
But here's the thing, Jim's new structure will not be setup instantly. Will take at least a year if not more.
Can't see the fans warming to Chris Hughton personally.
Why will it take at least a year? What is going to happen over the space of that time that needs setting up? He's going to hire a bunch of people that are familiar with the job roles they do, they already have connections, and they're already effective. If it takes them at least a year to do anything meaningful they're absolute amateurs and we might as well keep the current shit show.
Don't know, always felt he was underrated for the jobs he did.
That might be the whole point - assuming they decided ETH is not the man (for example he has lost the dressing room), but Potter is also a "temporary" solution before they work out who can join long term.
Does it make sense to bring De Zerbi in current team structure and personnel problems? Not even sure he would like to join this mess.
It would be a massively unpopular move with United fans. Has echoes of his ill-fated spell at Chelsea already, getting rid of an underperforming manager from overseas who won a trophy in his first season with the club but was starting to struggle. Replacing him with Potter, because he talks a good game and is British. It's not hard to see why Brexit appealed to Ratcliffe if true.
He's not a bad manager. More a very average one that failed miserably at Chelsea.
NO.
Good lord why do we do this to ourselves. Just keep Erik if Potter's the only choice.
Good lord why do we do this to ourselves. Just keep Erik if Potter's the only choice.
We need a manger that knows the league, we can't wait 12 months for another manager to get to grips with the level of competition. Potter would provide something immediate but not long term, and that's good enough right now when we're in free fall.
Why would you do that? Potter would improve us in the short term.
He is vastly overrated, I don't think a lot of fans realise how well de zerbi has done with Brighton because too many fans/pundits have rose tinted glasses for the job potter did there.
He would be worse than moyes but of course if did take over and inevitably flop our fans would of course blame the players again.
How is conte not getting a mention, the guy actually has a pedigree compared to some of the uninspiring managerial links we have had
I don't think Potter would be any good at a short term job. He's the type that needs to build something.
As an interim solution why not. Can't do any worse than EtH
For a start we'd be less open. We might still struggle to finish, as that was always Potters weakness, but we'd be better drilled and play better football. He got Chelsea playing the way he wanted pretty quickly, but ultimately the wheels came off when they signed 50 players. I'm not saying he's our saviour, I'm saying the current guy has to go, Potter has a point to prove, get him in, give him 6 months, if we finish the season worse then sack him and do a proper recruitment.
I liked him when he was at Brighton even though he couldn't score goals but after seeing him struggle to score goals at Chelsea as well and then De Zerbi going to Brighton and scoring bucket loads of goals straight away I have gone right off him.
I think most people are way too harsh on Potter for his Chelsea stint, especially since they've been worse under Poch.
I'm not sure he has the mentality for a big club, but I'm not writing him off for his Chelsea time where he had the added pressure of trying to integrate hundreds of millions of square pegs into round holes, without a decent goalscorer amongst them. Albeit he would be in a similar situation here
Now I'm talking myself out of it. Just to be clear he's far from my first choice, but don't think he's anything like as bad as some are making out.
I'm not sure he has the mentality for a big club, but I'm not writing him off for his Chelsea time where he had the added pressure of trying to integrate hundreds of millions of square pegs into round holes, without a decent goalscorer amongst them. Albeit he would be in a similar situation here
Now I'm talking myself out of it. Just to be clear he's far from my first choice, but don't think he's anything like as bad as some are making out.
It'll just be like Rangnick v2. In hindsight, we should have just given Ole till the end of the season. If we learnt lessons from that, I would give ETH till the end of the season and then look to replace him before the transfer window opens.
I think most people are way too harsh on Potter for his Chelsea stint, especially since they've been worse under Poch.
I'm not sure he has the mentality for a big club, but I'm not writing him off for his Chelsea time where he had the added pressure of trying to integrate hundreds of millions of square pegs into round holes, without a decent goalscorer amongst them. Albeit he would be in a similar situation here
Now I'm talking myself out of it. Just to be clear he's far from my first choice, but don't think he's anything like as bad as some are making out.
EXACTLY
Only thing you can say really is Chelsea are in a mess with their approach to things which didn't help.
So what makes you think he could handle the United shitshow then?
No it won't. How is hiring a bloke that did a fairly good job in the PL already, the same as bringing in a guy that hadn't managed in years and never set foot in England?
Just appoint a new manager who desperately wants to succeed and is also under the impression this is an opportunity for them instead of knowing they're being booted out in 5 months. Don't call him an interim so the players are under the impression he's the new boss and then just sack him if it goes to shit again. Absolutely no one can complain about that situation.
He doesn't have to, he just has to make it slightly less of a shit show for a while.
Ole had already lost it, what would end of season achieved? Sure Ralf didnt work out but nor was Ole. ETH has already failed, he isnt turning this around. Not least because his signings have made us worse. He has nowhere to go with this team
I thought he was starting to get things right at Chelsea and am fairly confident that they’d be in a much better position now had they stuck with him.
That said, he now needs a successful spell at a slightly smaller club for me before he could be considered for another top tier team, especially United.
That said, he now needs a successful spell at a slightly smaller club for me before he could be considered for another top tier team, especially United.
Hiring Potter would just signal that the new regime are simply picking up where the old one left off. Learnt nothing and continue to make the same mistakes. Now I think Potter isn’t solely to blame for how badly his Chelsea stint went as anyone would struggle under the Boehly shitshow but I certainly don’t want us taking the risk on him.
Conte is a terrible choice. I would take anyone over him. This lot would down tools within a week after he called them all cnuts.
Schooled ETH twice last season but let’s not let bias get involved.
He did a good job at Brighton yes, but so did Erik at Ajax. I see them as a similar type of manager. Potter struggled with Chelsea as their new owner had no clue what direction to take the club in, over here the shitshow is equally bad. There's nothing about Potter that suggests he can be the band-aid.
If we want to change for the sake of change for 6 months, there are surely other managers with a better profile of handling difficult big clubs. I'd love it to be Zidane, but he will never come to England. I think Conte is worth a punt too, I think he'll sort the defence out at the very least even if not much else.
At the end of the day though, I think keeping ETH till the end of the season is the best choice but we have to start considering his replacement now.
Explain how this mirrors the current regime.
Your right Boehly’s ownership is terrible. We all know this and long may it continue.
Definitely not Conte. If we are going to change, please can we just get in a manager who wants to play good football and will stick with an attacking system, giving them time to get it right. It really shouldn’t be too hard for a club of our size to find a manager who can do that.
I just don’t see the point when Ten Hag is a superior manager to potter. Why not just try and fix the structure around ten hag? Get the sale through, drive some positivity and let him try and coach the team for 6months with 1 game a week and no distractions. If he can’t manage to improve performances by the summer than evaluate again.
I don’t see things picking up under ETH. We are in outright free fall in terms of performances. If we get Potter in, we see how it goes. If it goes well, then we continue. If he doesn’t do well, we sack him. It’s not like we’re giving up on something good to give him a try, we’re hardly going anywhere positive right now.
Once the club doesn’t give him carte blanche to blow his load on whatever player he wants (which I can’t see Jim and Blanc doing) then we’ll be fine whether he works out or not. It’s no different to any other club.
For 6 months, he's just here to lay the foundations of a working defence. It can be done, Dyche and Allardyce do it all the time and Conte is better than them.
After that, he effs off. He's not a long term manager.
Did you see him at Chelsea??
It’s another poor appointment imo. Taking a punt on a manager that failed the last time he made the step up to a bigger club. Jobs for the boys vibes, hiring him cause he’s pals with Ratcliffe/Brailsford. I could easily see us being in the exact same position of needing to replace him 18 months down the line after he’s spent £300m. The same old vicious cycle of the last 10 years repeating itself again.
We thought that when Ole first came in after Jose left. We won't know until we try, so let's try because it can't get any worse.
Would be briefly funny though. They might then appreciate any manager after much more, could be a genius move.