For me, sacking the manager is not the right option to choose.
You dont sack a manager unless you are in danger of going down (which i dont believe we are) or are on a run like Bury were prior to yestredays game.
Some points from yesterday and in general to explain why i think we should keep Clotet for now:
1. Bury had just changed manager, how many times do you see what is considered a poor side get a result in this situation? Quite a few, over an extended period of time the change of manager rarely makes much difference but in the first game or two you often see some unexpected results, we were unfortunate to be up against Bury immediately after the change.
2. The first goal conceded yesterday was a result of two things, a poor back pass from Tiendalli (who had been having a decent enough game until this point) which gave meant Eastwood had no option but to give away a throw in, but the main reason was the players inability to defend a set piece again. Yes the manager picks the team, but once they are out there it is down to them to make the correct decisions and be able to defend a set piece, they have enough experience between them to take responsibility for this, the manager cannot play the game for them, it is not FIFA on the playstation. By getting on at the manager all we are doing is allowing the players to hide/pass the blame which means things wont improve.
3. Booing during the game, im sorry but what?!!
We all want the team to do well and it can get frustrating when they appear to be playing in a negative way but surely its better to keep the ball rather than lose it playing an impossible pass. I often feel myself wanting them to get the ball forward a bit earlier, not to go route one but be a little more direct, but if there isnt an option to do this because a striker has come short rather than long for the ball in behind/the corners should we still play that pass just because it means we arent playing "boring" football? of course not.
Im confident that those booing would be the first to moan should give the ball away needlessly.
4. The club has lost, through either long term injury or sale, a large number of players since Clotet came in. (Johnson, Lundstram, Hall, Nelson, Ribeiro, Pekalski etc) all that i have listed there would have a good case to be starting more weeks than not.
I appreciate many will argue that the players brought in havent been good enough, but as we saw in Appletons first season, August and the early part of the season is a difficult time to bring in quality players be that permanent or on loan in comparison to January, jakubiak and morris v roofe and macdonald for example in Appletons first season and Brannagan (on paper) v Van Kessel.
5. I wouldnt take too much notice of the post match interviews with the manager or players, all they are and ever will be at most levels is conversions full of cliches and sound bites, none of it really means anything. You can be certain that the messages given across in these are not the same opinions expressed behind closed doors. There is no benefit to coming out in public and castigating players for basic errors. it will either make no difference or be a negative so in my opinion keeping things within the group is the right thing to do.
Di Canio used to do this on a regular basis and look where it got him, it was fine at Swindon where they were prepared to effectively write off the cost of a player he upset and allow them to leave and go and sign a replacement but this is not a sensible way to run a football club for two reasons, no one can really afford to do this long term but also football is a small world, once a club gets a reputation for being a bad place to go the quality of player you are able to sign drops, if we had adopted this model there is no way that we would have been able to sign Roofe, Ledson, Branngan etc. As soon as he got to a level where this couldnt happen, whether this was because the number of players good enough was smaller or the club couldnt afford to just let people go and replace them his managerial career came crashing down.
6. The whole episode is very very similar to when Eales and Appleton came in, an average (or worse in Appletons case) start to the season after a summer of uncertainty due to takeover talks (one successful, one not), the team playing a passing style which on occasion seems ponderous and ineffective due to some of the players, particularly those in the back 4 (Mousinho and Martin v Hunt and Newey) not being equipped to play that way at pace, a majority of fans calling for the manager to be sacked, an unacceptable and embarressing defeat (5-1 v Cambridge and 7-0 v Wigan).
Of course there are other issues such as the lack of marketing etc which was really good when Eales first came in, that contribute tothe general feeling of discontent but this is not the managers fault.
From a footballing perspective we are pretty much where i expected to be given the summers events, and probably about where we should be given size of club etc
I believe based ont he points made above it is worth persevering with the current managerial team, in the hope that they can make the same strides that Appleton et al did a couple of years ago, if of course they have not improved and we find ourselves struggling to retain our League one place then it may be time to make a change.
