Was Pep our worst ever manager?

[malcolmsmoustache]

I used to think it was Kemp, but am now not so sure....in his six months, Pep...
1. Squandered a top ten budget on a collection of players at best Conference standard (Xemi), players who look amazed to be still playing professional football (Tiendalli), players who just look useless (Gino, Mehmeti).
2. Showed a total inability to organise a team to defend, pass, attack. Or do anything really.
3. Appeared to demoralise even our best players (Ledson, Eastwood) .
4. Gave pompous and nonsensical post match interviews .
5 Produced the most disgraceful performance I have ever seen from an OUFC team (Wigan).
And yes, I know he had to sell two players, but when you see Shrewsbury top three with a bunch of frees, you realise just how bad Pep was.
And I also know we were tenth when he was fired but we were heading for the drop.
Early days but KR at least appears to be able to call it how it is without lapsing into Pep management gobbledygook.
On balance, Kemp is probably just about our worst ever. But it's a close call...

 

[Ian]

Kemp had to deal with Kassam. Pep wasn't properly prepared for the job when he took it - hence certain deficiencies in the squad - and the excess of centre backs.

 

[McXal]

Like most others, I thought it rational to give Clotet time to bed in his ideas...but he lost me (again, like most others) after the Wigan game.

Starting Xemi and Ruffels together in a powder puff, can-only-pass-5-yards-sideways midfield duo whilst Lego and Rothwell sat on the bench, presiding passively over us getting utterly mauled...then his bewildering post-match interview where he claimed we’d played well.

He wasn’t as odious, toad-like and unpleasant as Kemp - who came across as braindead and nasty all at once. And Pep definitely struck me as a hard worker...but the decline of our team under his watch, despite a decent budget certainly implies he was pretty ill-suited to a #1 (to put it mildly)

 

[Marked Ox]

I used to think it was Kemp, but am now not so sure....in his six months, Pep...
1. Squandered a top ten budget on a collection of players at best Conference standard (Xemi), players who look amazed to be still playing professional football (Tiendalli), players who just look useless (Gino, Mehmeti).
2. Showed a total inability to organise a team to defend, pass, attack. Or do anything really.
3. Appeared to demoralise even our best players (Ledson, Eastwood) .
4. Gave pompous and nonsensical post match interviews .
5 Produced the most disgraceful performance I have ever seen from an OUFC team (Wigan).
And yes, I know he had to sell two players, but when you see Shrewsbury top three with a bunch of frees, you realise just how bad Pep was.
And I also know we were tenth when he was fired but we were heading for the drop.
Early days but KR at least appears to be able to call it how it is without lapsing into Pep management gobbledygook.
On balance, Kemp is probably just about our worst ever. But it's a close call...

Fair points and a good argument. One small point, Shrewsbury spent over £500k with Stefan Payne accounting for about £350k of that iirc.

 

[Berliner]

Pep shuffles in at spot 5 in my list, pop pickers.

1. Kemp
2. Talbot
3. Patto
4. Wright
5. Pep

I'm sure there are candidates from before my era as well...

 

[greatunclekip]

Rixy surely. Solid team destined for minimum playoffs, to miss out completely.

Terry Parker, Woozley, Pitt.

Worst ever.

 

[Foley]

Pep shuffles in at spot 5 in my list, pop pickers.

1. Kemp
2. Talbot
3. Patto
4. Wright
5. Pep

I'm sure there are candidates from before my era as well...

Agree with a lot of that. Bill Asprey comes into the top 5 for me.

Kemp (with big Joe) may have had to have dealt with Uncle Firoz, but did spend a lot of money on Quinn and Scott from Brentford. Waste of money ...

 

[Gary Baldi]

Rix. Talbot. Waddock. To name 3 without really thinking.

 

[Marked Ox]

Have to take issue with that, Andy Scott was a good buy.
I've seen them all from Arthur Turner on and I believe Rix was the worst, followed by Mickey Lewis and Pep.
The best was Maurice Evans, followed by Arthur Turner, Mick Brown and, dare I say it, Chris Wilder.

You seem to have missed Jim Smith (mk 1) off your best list? He'd have to be no.1 for those 2 Championship winning teams.

 

[McXal]

I’d largely forgotten about Patto and the ‘Honest Lads’ era. So glad this thread could bring it all screaming back to me

Harsh to include Waddock on the list though. He was poor - but he had to work with a completely spent group of players, was only brought in as a firefighter because Lewis’ position had become untenable, and was pretty much left to keep the lights on as the mostly absent chairman formulated his escape plan...

 

[Gary Baldi]

Definitely not Waddock - he signed Danny Hylton!

And did little else! I cannot recall any of his home games because they were all so utterly bereft of anything.

 

[McXal]

All I really remember of Waddock’s reign was the vacant, embattled expression he had when he came to applaud the fans after we’d been taken to the cleaners at Southend for his first match.

He knew what he’d walked into and probably also knew he didn’t have the tools to do anything about it. Compare that post-match performance to Robinson’s after another 3-0 away televised loss

 

[unification]

Rixy surely. Solid team destined for minimum playoffs, to miss out completely.

Terry Parker, Woozley, Pitt.

Worst ever.

Agreed. It takes a special lack of talent to take a side in third to out of the playoffs in a matter of months and to leave a side with Tommy Mooney and Lee Bradbury in 20th place in League 2. 6-1 against Yeovil anyone?

What most fans seem to conveniently forget about Kemp is that he inherited a load of crap from Denis Smith. Sure, his mismanagement of them didn’t help but when left with McGuckin, Jarman and Anthrobus, he didn’t have a lot to work with in the first place.

Surprisingly, Mark Wright rarely gets mentioned. Pitiful win rate, wasteful with funds (rare that FK gave him any) and a racist to boot too.

Talbot wasn’t bad per se - he was honest and worked under trying circumstances with FK giving him nothing to work with - but he did struggle here.

As for Pep, well - I can’t say he leaves many fond memories.

 

[Jon-ioualways]

Have to take issue with that, Andy Scott was a good buy.
I've seen them all from Arthur Turner on and I believe Rix was the worst, followed by Mickey Lewis and Pep.
The best was Maurice Evans, followed by Arthur Turner, Mick Brown and, dare I say it, Chris Wilder.

I date from your era (and loved Colin Harrington as a kid--my hero!), and surely Arthur Turner has to be ahead of Maurice Evans. Turner got us into the league for the first time and took us up the leagues. Evans inherited us in a great position (of course, he did pretty well for us immediately thereafter).

 

[OxfordBoy]

And did little else! I cannot recall any of his home games because they were all so utterly bereft of anything.

I think in fairness to Waddock he had a similar run to Faz, took over a team who were out of form and completely devoid of confidence, obviously his short time here was dire but I think he'd have needed longer than 8 games at the end of a season to be deserving of a title like worst manager ever

 

[PottersRightBoot]

You must be joking - we have had a number of bosses worse than Pep.

For starters David - ‘It’s not my team’ Kemp, Brian Talbot - sure he was ‘honest’ but I’ve seen more brains in a tin of paint - and Mark Wright - who seemingly presided during a reign of terror.

Some supporters have no perception of our history and have attention spans of gnats. ?

 

[holdsteady]

Mark Wright for me, you don’t do what he did to a player/employee, miracle we didn’t go down that season as I wouldn’t of played for the bloke if I was a teammate of that player.

 

[sonofivan]

Mark Wright for me, you don’t do what he did to a player/employee, miracle we didn’t go down that season as I wouldn’t of played for the bloke if I was a teammate of that player.

Can you jog my memory with the details please?

 

[holdsteady]

Wayne Hatswell won’t be sending him an xmas card, put it that way.

 

[gingerox]

Think it's easy to forget the football we played at the start of this season; we looked like genuine play off contenders. Until that sh*tshow at Blackpool, we'd won 3, drawn 3 and lost 1, and at that point if you'd have told me we were going to be fighting relegation come end of the season I'd have laughed at you.

 

[gingerox]

Think it's easy to forget the football we played at the start of this season; we looked like genuine play off contenders. Until that sh*tshow at Blackpool, we'd won 3, drawn 3 and lost 1, and at that point if you'd have told me we were going to be fighting relegation come end of the season I'd have laughed at you.

http://yellowsforum.proboards.com/thread/26512/result-matter-anymore

 

[Peterdev]

Darren Patterson was pretty poor. Had the resources and struggled at Conference level.
Waddock only had nine games but lost eight. Think he was out of his depth. Expected more from Talbot but for me probably the worst manager in history.
I don’t think anyone will ever match Jim Smiths first reign, but for Maurice Evans to actually keep us up despite losing great players could put him top. I remember Reading sacked him whilst top of the old division four. A really nice guy who sent me a two page hand written letter when I wrote to him whilst we were still in the top league.
Denis Smith had us playing wonderful football and made some great signings for us. Always a shame when they get moved on, but that’s the nature of the club we support

 

[Oslernorth]

I would say that Pep was the wrong appointment for our club, rather than a man lacking in managerial potential. It'll be interesting to see how his career pans out.
But for all Peps faults at Oxford, I'm glad he hit the ground running at the start of the season, otherwise we might now be in serious trouble

 

[Discoland]

DE at fans forum saying we had a Top 4 budget. Doesn't really help Pep's case.

 

[windmill]

Can you jog my memory with the details please?

Are you all brain dead. Graham Rix.

 

[TailsWeWin]

Shotton?

 

[Banbury2018]

I really think for whatever reason Pep didn’t work and I think there are many reasons possibly.? I do however think our new head coach will do the business. He reminds me in a lot of ways of Mapp but we need to remember Rome wasn’t built in a day.

 

[windmill]

I really think for whatever reason Pep didn’t work and I think there are many reasons possibly.? I do however think our new head coach will do the business. He reminds me in a lot of ways of Mapp but we need to remember Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Well, it better get built pretty soon because I'm in my seventies.

 

[Banbury2018]

Yo

Well, it better get built pretty soon because I'm in my seventies.

u old git?. I was hoping for the new head coach to have us up and running by next season with a good pre season and up at the top end of league 1.

 

[m]

Pep shuffles in at spot 5 in my list, pop pickers.

1. Kemp
2. Talbot
3. Patto
4. Wright
5. Pep

I'm sure there are candidates from before my era as well...

You forget Rix too.