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It doesn’t matter who we have as manager, Cox, Hill, Pep or Klopp. None of them would keep us up. This squad would struggle in the national League.
Interesting comments from hill pre match about how he speaks to other players about the characters of potential new signings. Can’t imagine the swann and cygnet have such good contacts based on the players they signed for Cox.1 user thanked author for this post.
It’s all ifs and buts though Ferrite TBF, we may have been 15 points adrift under Cox, who knows? Best not to beat yourself up too much about it mate, what’s done is done and Swann is and has always been since Alexander was sacked, the man to blame.
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It’s all ifs and buts though Ferrite TBF, we may have been 15 points adrift under Cox, who knows? Best not to beat yourself up too much about it mate, what’s done is done and Swann is and has always been since Alexander was sacked, the man to blame.
But this is basically my point – pretty much all of us thought getting rid of Cox would improve us and it clearly hasn’t. We know that the problem lies above the manager, so we should recognise that maybe Cox wasn’t doing a bad job given his record is notably better than Hill’s.
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Just because both Hill and Cox struggled at the club with the current owner, doesn’t mean Cox wasn’t doing a bad job. One may also speculate how bad things were before Hill came in after Cox in charge for a considerable length of time, perhaps leaving Hill with an impossible task under pressing circumstances. That’s not to say Hill isn’t doing a bad job either.
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Just because both Hill and Cox struggled at the club with the current owner, doesn’t mean Cox wasn’t doing a bad job. One may also speculate how bad things were before Hill came in after Cox in charge for a considerable length of time, perhaps leaving Hill with an impossible task under pressing circumstances.
Yes agree .. leaving Cox at the helm so long was a huge mistake .. Hill came in and hasnt changed results but should be given a bit of leeway due to what he inherited and lets not forget hes working with a huge nail in his boot in Swan .. at least it appears he isnt a yes man same as Cox ..
saying all above ..Hill may walk who knows especially if the club ownership changes.
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No we do not. Just as culpable as all the others.
Some things beggar belief, trust me.
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One thing both managers said ‘the players just aren’t good enough’. We all know what stinks in the club we all know how to fix it but it won’t get fixed. We could have Ancelotti at the club but with Swann thinking he knows football and can pick a player we will keep sinking. This era will be known by historians as the Kelsey Mooney era. A chairman who knows nothing about the business employing an equally lost at sea son who knows nothing about the department he heads up. btw Kelsey Mooney now at Leamington FC but don’t know if he gets a game
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My main problem with Cox was that none of the players looked fit enough to last 90 minutes (2-0 up away at Carlisle being a case in point!)
Strange formations and tactics however were not unique to him.
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Oh to be 2-0 up under Hill with his supposed January reinforcements…hasn’t happened yet!
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Give it a rest with the Cox apologia. I don’t think many thought he was the only problem, nor the primary problem, but he was clueless. He was just as uncertain over the first 11 as Hill.
One thing Hill has over Cox is a proven track record. Which is why many were happy at the time to have him. It hasn’t worked out, Hill has made some confusing choices, but that doesn’t make Cox’s tenure any better.
The situation is complex, Cox helped lumber us with such a poor squad (Simon Elliott alleges Cox personally chose KDT, for example). It’s easy to say Hill hasn’t brought anyone in to replace, but it’s hard to when you’re bottom of the league and in January, where desperation reeked around the club.
This isn’t me trying to apologise for Hill, he has definitely got question marks over his head, but I reiterate that I don’t see how this exonerates Cox’s half-fit squad of no hopers. What seems to be common for all managers for the previous few years is mismanagement, from contract clangers to no organised transfer strategy, from board level.
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That is the point I am getting at. I don’t think Hill has done well, like I say I am not finding excuses for Hill. Mitigating factors aside, he will have to take some blame for the transfers and their inadequacies.
However, what I find frustrating is that when Cox was here people, including yourself, were asking what good would sacking a manager do, no-one else can do any better under the conditions of the board. Now Hill is not given the same benefit of the doubt.
By the time Cox left there was no real defence for him besides this. We were going nowhere under him. It’s easy to say we haven’t done as well with Hill in hindsight, but we didn’t have that at the time. What we did know was that Hill had a proven track record at this level. Cox had nothing, bar letting them have it and a half-fit squad.
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clear out last summer 17 players leave
Clear out this summer – most likely 20+ players leave
Clear out in January 5+ players leftThis is the problem – even if we find somebody worth keeping (rare) they are on very short term contracts. The 2 yr deals for KDT Hallam Perry etc – all duds and have no future in the club – KH may rebuild the club but whi is going to come in on a 1 yr deal being paid £700/wk – we will get dreggs again and guess what clear out next Jan/summer.
Until we change the structure off the pitch nothing will change
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Cox’s recruitment at the beginning of this season was awful, anybody who knows anything about football will tell you that if you don’t score goals, at any level you will struggle our so called forwards, a joke if cox thought that was good enough it is totally beyond me ,from the very first friendlys of the season you could see that at times we were playing not to bad but we hardly ever looked like having a shot never mind scoring, yes we had a pretty poor budget but on this site on more than one occasion fans said we need strength down the spine of the team,in other words good players in vital positions and one of them at least was a proven scorer at this level,it didn’t happen,and that’s why we are where we are ,I believe hill came in and thought this is the worst bunch of players he’d ever seen,he did what he could in January, but unfortunately its not working,let’s give him a chance with is recruitment in the summer before we start calling for him to go. UTI.
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However, what I find frustrating is that when Cox was here people, including yourself, were asking what good would sacking a manager do, no-one else can do any better under the conditions of the board. Now Hill is not given the same benefit of the doubt.
You’re right that sacking Cox was one of the few levers available to us at the time. But I think we should definitely question the manager appointment process: when was the last time that the club interviewed for the manager’s position? How do we know we’re doing all we can to get the best person for the job? What criteria are being applied in deciding who the next manager will be?
Your point about “Hill not being given the same benefit of the doubt” is a fair one, you’re right about that. However, 13 points from 23 is an even worse return than we saw under Cox and he’s had half a season now, so it’s a fair sample size, so I think it’s right that questions are asked, as you said yourself.
Anyway, it’s all a bit of a case of rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic given our current situation and the way the club has been run over the best part of a decade.
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To be fair, there weren’t many better candidates than Hill in October from memory. Adkins was a pipe dream and I don’t want his name sullied by the current mess.
I am not sure if fans should have every detail about the managerial process, but you’re right in that we don’t seem to have approached it by course of interview for quite some time.
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I think if we had the Man City or Liverpool players available we would still struggle, we are utterly jinxed, and whoever manages our current squad I don’t think we would get a massive change in results.
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It speaks volumes that there are no players that arrived during Neil’s time appearing on anyone’s keep list.
Recruitment of Watson, O’Malley, Pugh and Rowe had nothing to do with him and in fact he pretty much only played them if he had no option. I’m told he was a nice man but he was bottom of the list of the many Swann managerial appointments in terms of capability.
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