Difficult to sum up my feelings on this, but I’ll go with good riddance, but best of luck. Maybe he’s a better manager than coach, as he did win the u-18 title.
Kieran McKenna / Ipswich manager
- Thread starter RonaldoVII
- Start date
It's very hard to get manager job, especially for coaches like McKenna who are not very popular. He isn't ex-player, so he doesn't have that extra credit too. So for McKenna it might be very good opportunity which he might not get again. So its better to take the risk now.
Even it goes bad, he can always join as a coach at many clubs.
Could Ralf now try and bring in Marsch
When a manager leaves its normal for his minions to leave with him.
we will have too many chefs
Weird appointment from Ipswich but I guess they're desperate.
McKenna has apparently been criticised for not being good with the older players but great with the younger ones. Based on that alone, he’s going to struggle with management and the day to day dealings of being the person in charge. Feels like they’ve appointed him based on his connections more than anything else.
Anyway, good luck to him, hope he does well. Just hope he isn’t going to be using the Ole approach to management otherwise he better not get too comfortable in Ipswich.
McKenna has apparently been criticised for not being good with the older players but great with the younger ones. Based on that alone, he’s going to struggle with management and the day to day dealings of being the person in charge. Feels like they’ve appointed him based on his connections more than anything else.
Anyway, good luck to him, hope he does well. Just hope he isn’t going to be using the Ole approach to management otherwise he better not get too comfortable in Ipswich.
Well Armas has replaced Carrick so presume someone will come in to replace McKenna too. I don't count Lense as he's a Sports Psychologist.
Expecting another coach who’s worked with Rangnick before to come in now. It’s hard to get your system drilled if you don’t have enough coaches who know the system. Especially as it also looks like Phelan is semi retired at this point
Happy for him and I hope this goes well. He's young and has a load of promise. We pursued him for ages as a coach and he did very well with our youth setup. This will be a good opportunity for him to show what he brings to the table without battling the spotlight that being at United brings. His youth gives me hope that he's only going to improve with time. Time for him to step up and prove that what we saw with United's first team was more about Ole as a manager than him as a coach.
Just to feed my inner muppet; I know he’ll take some share of the collective blame for the Solskjaer tenure. How much he should take, clearly none of us know. But what did he actually do to get to be a senior coach? Man Utd don’t just hand out coaching positions all willy nilly (unless you are a former player of course), so at some point he must have done something that caught the eye.
Probably the only set of fans in the world that think an assistant manager is a big part of the club failure, I don't understand how people think like this. You see other big clubs and you'd struggle to even name the assistant manager/coaches, yet somehow at Manchester United he's one of the big reason we've failed since SAF
Solskjaer admitted that he wasn’t involved in coaching the players. Mike Phelan apparently wasn’t either and it was Carrick/McKenna who headed up the coaching during his tenure. See “we are and awfully coached team” thread.
It is a bit weird how some fans get so worked up about stuff like that.
He has attention to detail and has been great with the youngsters, he’s not a bad coach but being promoted beyond your experience too fast ultimately ends in disaster for young, promising individuals.
McKenna was promoted to Assistant Coach because Solskjaer wanted to instil “United DNA” within the team, he also insisted he, Carrick, Phelan etc were part of a world class coaching setup. So if you believe Solskjaer’s word, you’re on to a winner.
However, the criticisms directed at McKenna was that he didn’t have the authority or experience to coach the likes of Ronaldo and therefore the first team were uninspired by his coaching sessions.
Personally, I think this is another step too soon for McKenna, although I hope he does well. Get used to seeing him pull out a flip chart on the touch line…
Wasn't he already assistant coach under Mourinho?
Saw a coaches voice interview with him and he came across as particularly dull which is not really a good ingredient if you want to be the leading man of a managerial set up. Hope he does well though.
Good luck to him, thrown in deep end here with little experience, and was so lucky to be given the opportunity. Right time to move. Ralf can now bring in more coaches.
Can't remember now to be honest, I know Carrick was, not sure about McKenna. Was he made assistant after Rui left?
I love that people think that managing Ipswich isn't a step up from being a bit part coach under a new manager at Man Utd for a young, ambitious coach. Completely delusional some of our fans 
Yes, when Rui Faria left, both Carrick and McKenna were made first team coaches and acted as JM assistant manager
Can you go too? Pleaseeeeee
Lots of these guys have clauses that they can leave for manager roles... According to FM anyway ! But it makes sense that clubs would allow a young coach to go take an opportunity like that
40 years have passed but I still remember most of that team. Mick Mills, Frans Thijssen, Arnold Muhren, Paul Mariner, John Wark, Kevin Beattie, Terry Buthcher Brian Talbot, George Burley. Great time to be a football suppoerter.
Mental isn't it? Some of our fan base clearly have never watched a Championship/L1 or L2 match ever.I love that people think that managing Ipswich isn't a step up from being a bit part coach under a new manager at Man Utd for a young, ambitious coach. Completely delusional some of our fans
I was looking at their managerial history yesterday, there's plenty of well known names on there. He would've been mad to turn down an opportunity like this.
Different times. For the love of the game!
And sadly half the names mentioned are no longer with us
But even if the manager does not do the coaching, the ideas of how we are going to play should come from him. Can we really say that United looked like a team that had the right idea but just wasn't coached well enough to do it?
He's just turned 35 and has massive experience working with youngsters, aswell as seeing how things work at a big club like Manchester United.
I don't think dealing with veterans would necessarilly be a problem. He can always mix it up by promoting from the academy.
It's impossible to tell if he's going to be a sucess or a failure, but given his age, he has an enormous amount of time to learn on the job.
I don't think dealing with veterans would necessarilly be a problem. He can always mix it up by promoting from the academy.
It's impossible to tell if he's going to be a sucess or a failure, but given his age, he has an enormous amount of time to learn on the job.
No. He shall stay.
Been doing that the last 3 years
So if he go there and flop you'd shut up about how great he was?
Best of luck to him. Phelan next .
Glad he’s gone - hope he does well and so on. He’s the face of tactical cluelessness on the sidelines together with Solskjær, with his stupid iPad and toddler haircut. Time to bring in some professional individuals to cater this once great football club.
He was a highly rated youth coach at Tottenham and we brought him in to coach the under-18s. He won a league title with that group and was promoted based on performances in the youth set up.
I'm pretty sure that being a staff member is more of a decorative position.
Now all the spotlight is going to be on him, not on Solskjaer.
I bet he’s going to be really good and will work his way back to the top. All this “too British” training talk is just the players throwing yet another person under the bus. I can totally understand him wanting to give this a lash after all those unflattering leaks. It’s a great opportunity for him to develop. I’m sure he’ll be getting a lot of positive attention again soon.
Or.... he'll prove to be rubbish and we won't hear his name again.
Good for him,
IF RR fails, at least he won't be in the cross fire again or will he anyway?
IF RR fails, at least he won't be in the cross fire again or will he anyway?
From what I heard from sources I trust, McKenna was easily the finest coach Ole had at his disposal. The rest were mostly there because they were Ole's mates or because of their links with the club. The guy knew his football and had an eye to detail. However at age 35 he wasn't in a position to coach the first team mostly by himself. FFS he was younger then Ronaldo and a year older then Cavani.
Yeah. I don't think that it's fair to have a go at him. We are talking about a very young coach that was rated at Tottenham and then within United youth setup.