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swjf50

Is Phelan a big loss?

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Personally I think the board should have known what his ambitions were when we signed him up. If he had said he was really keen on managing the club eventually or taking over from Adams, if it didn''t work out, we''d have known what his intentions were. As it is, I think he may have got the hump when Neil was appointed and although Phelan took over managerial duties against Bournmouth, Neil obviously didn''t have the confidence in Phelan''s ability to get the win once Howson was sent off and joined him in the dugout to take over.

I think Phelan has credibility and experience. I think he may have attracted some Man U players at least and would have given Neil some help on the touch line and training ground.

Time will tell whether it was a mistake to allow him to go.

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I think the club''s arm was twisted by Alex Neil in allowing him to bring in his assistant from Hamilton. If that was the case then instead of putting their foot down and refusing, the club caved in to Neil''s demands which effectively resulted in Phelan being squeezed out.The club''s long term plans for footballing stability whereby an external manager comes and works with an existing backroom seem to have been abandoned after only a few months when Adams was sacked. As I said on another thread, we''ve seen four first team coaches leave within less than a year and their replacements are all considerably less experienced.Yes, time will tell whether Phelan leaving hurts us. But the overall state of the backroom is a cause for concern and we face massive upheaval if the present manager gets sacked ie we''d be left with only one senior coach in Gary Holt.

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[quote user="swjf50"]Personally I think the board should have known what his ambitions were when we signed him up. If he had said he was really keen on managing the club eventually or taking over from Adams, if it didn''t work out, we''d have known what his intentions were. As it is, I think he may have got the hump when Neil was appointed and although Phelan took over managerial duties against Bournmouth, Neil obviously didn''t have the confidence in Phelan''s ability to get the win once Howson was sent off and joined him in the dugout to take over.

I think Phelan has credibility and experience. I think he may have attracted some Man U players at least and would have given Neil some help on the touch line and training ground.

Time will tell whether it was a mistake to allow him to go.[/quote]Based on the fact that Phelan has never got a

managerial job and now, instead of trying, has moved to another position

as assistant/coach it is not at all clear that he actually wants to be a

manager. Or that - IF he does - he has understood how to go

about it. Which is to apply for a manager''s job down in League One or

League Two. If Phelan thinks the way to become a manager is to become an

assistant/coach high up the leagues and hope to get promoted (with no managerial experience) when the

incumbent is sacked then he is being very naive.In general, as

second-in-command he is likely to be tarred with the failure of the

manager. As as far as Norwich city was concerned there were two

particular illogicalities in Phelan assuming (again IF he did) that he

would replace Adams. Or in anyone else assuming that.If Adams did badly then, as above, Phelan

would be seen as part of that failure, especially because he was meant

to be the wise adviser. So much for his supposed wisdom. And if Adams

did well on the back of Phelan''s wisdom then he would keep the job and

Phelan would be stuck in a job he thought was only a

stepping stone.Added to whch, if Phelan had studied the history

of Smith and Jones'' managerial appointments he would have known that the

two unquestioned failures were the two times (Grant and Gunn) they

chose someone who had never been a manager. If Adams was then the third

such failure the chances of S&J deciding to gamble a fourth time on a

non-manager were pretty thin.Especially since it was highly likely that McNally either already had a list of possible alternatives from the search in the summer or had compiled one immediately thereafter, in case Adams went belly up. And as it transpired he did have a list containing at least one name in Neil, whom we watched at work every game this season.

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