EPL Manager Mess

With all the management changes affecting the top teams next season’s English Premier League promises to be the most interesting in many years. Manchester United’s Alex Ferguson has announced his retirement for a second time, this time though he appears to mean it. For 26 years he has monopolized the silverware, winning 25 trophies for the Red Devils – almost half of the honors they have achieved in over 100 years of football.
His replacement, David Moyes seems to be cut from the same cloth at least in temperament, however in his 10 years managing Everton he has not yet won any trophies, unlike Ferguson who had much success in Scotland before arriving at United. Although a good manager Moyes has some of the largest boots in football to fill. He now has access to a lot more money and far superior players but the expectations are also higher and his challenge will be to attract the top players and keep them motivated. In his defense he knows the English game very well and being friends with Ferguson will give him invaluable insights, but I still feel they will struggle to win the league next year.
The noisy neighbors Manchester City will also have new blood for next season. Mancini has finally been sacked after a disappointing year. After the spectacular last minute title grab of the previous season it was a surprise not to see them dominate this year. The team is still strong but the style of play is too unhurried for the premiership. You can’t wait for things to happen, you have to make them happen, Ferguson proved this time and time again, grabbing victory from the jaws of defeat so many times. Manuel Pellegrini is to replace him, unlike Moyes however he is new to English football so he will need some time to adapt, this may limit City’s success over the short term.
Chelsea will also change managers at the end of the season, Benitez’ caretaker role has almost ended and if the rumors are to be believed Jose Mourinho will be coming back to the club. If this proves true, Chelsea will be a serious threat, they are still one of the strongest teams in the league and Mourinho is respected around the world, as long as Abramovich stays away from the dressing room and allows Mourinho to manage I think they will be the champions next year.
As for the other teams I think it will be business as usual. Arsenal will play well but fall short as Wenger’s refusal to buy great players will cause them to lack the final punch when they need it most. Spurs had a great season under their new manager, we’ll now find out if he can maintain it. Brendan Rodgers is improving at Liverpool but there is much rebuilding to do there. I expect them to improve but not to mount a realistic challenge any time soon.
Next season can’t come soon enough!

Swansea Go From Strength To Strength

Sunday’s 5-0 win against second division team Bradford in the League cup final deservedly brought major silverware back to Liberty Stadium for the first time in over 100 years. Whilst the result was expected against a team 72 places below them, Bradford had already beaten 3 premier league teams to get there (Wigan, Arsenal, and Aston Villa) so complacency could not be an option. Swansea’s path to victory was arguably better, defeating last year’s winner, Liverpool and Champions League winner’s, Chelsea.

The victory is a reward for the way the club has been managed for the last 10 years which has seen them rise from the third division to the premiership. The Chairman Huw Jenkins has spent extremely wisely, eschewing the fashion for getting into debt to win success. A small team like Swansea will always struggle to retain talent as teams with much deeper pockets will always swoop in to get the best players and managers. Their success is in stark contrast to fellow promotion team QPR, a team that has spent big yet languishes at the bottom of the EPL. Swansea’s rise has been punctuated by an ever changing manager – Martinez, Sousa, Rodgers and currently Laudrup. Each time a manager has left the team has improved by the next canny appointment. Can this carry on? Who knows but whatever happens in the future the ride has been worth it.

 

(c) featuresports

Benitez true to form at Chelsea

Since Rafa Benitez has returned to the EPL he has shown the same sort of form he showed at Liverpool. After much success in his first few years at Liverpool failings began to show. Ever the tinkerer he would switch players from the team with predictable regularity, changing the way the team played and removing much of the consistency. Impressive wins were followed by shocking defeats.

Substitutions were another sore point. When chasing victories he would fail to strengthen the attack, either by bringing players on too late to affect the game, or making senseless changes such as replacing a defender with another defender instead of bolstering the attack.

His form at Chelsea indicates he has learned little since his time away and Chelsea are poised to make the same mistakes as Liverpool under Benitez’ reign. He is supposed to remain until the end of the season and has done just enough so far to avoid the sack so far (he showed this flair at Liverpool as well). He may also be helped by the poisoned chalice of Abramovich – managers have been fired so regularly at Chelsea since the chairman took over that they are running out of top managers that would want to handle the expectations. Either way it seems unlikely Benitez will hold on to the post next season.

(c) featuresports