Micky Adams – My life in football

[oldblade]

Not so.

I never slate managers merely for having a poor record. Micky Adams always came across as a decent and honest man who really wanted to achieve things with the club. Unfortunately, by his own admission the job was too big for him. No hard feelings, we move on. On this same thread I've also been quite equivocal about Nigel Adkins of all people.

I dislike Warnock primarily because he was an arsehole and a charlatan. I only mention his record because it isn't exactly consistent with the nauseating hagiography that has been created around him.

No, you just slate a person who actually has one of the better managerial records at United in the last 40 years or so.

To describe us as stumbling over the line in 2006 betrays your bias.

If stumbling to promotion means you do it with 3 games to spare, with the highest number of points we have ever got in the second division, and fully 9 points clear of third place then I'd like to keep stumbling every season please.

Dislike him all you want, but there is no need to misrepresent his record.

 

[Esablade]

Adams got chucked in the deep end with lead boots ( no, that one )
A desperate attempt to appease the fans ( on the cheap)

 

[Tyler Durden]

No, you just slate a person who actually has one of the better managerial records at United in the last 40 years or so.

To describe us as stumbling over the line in 2006 betrays your bias.

If stumbling to promotion means you do it with 3 games to spare, with the highest number of points we have ever got in the second division, and fully 9 points clear of third place then I'd like to keep stumbling every season please.

Dislike him all you want, but there is no need to misrepresent his record.

Finished 16 points behind Reading, who we were leading until his botched attempt to stab us in the back in 2005.
As I said, he started with us in the 2nd tier and left us there having had the luxury of a 6 and a half year run.
Any improvement on the infrastructural side owes more to Kevin McCabe, despite his perceived faults.

 

[oldblade]

Finished 16 points behind Reading, who we were leading until his botched attempt to stab us in the back in 2005.
As I said, he started with us in the 2nd tier and left us there having had the luxury of a 6 and a half year run.
Any improvement on the infrastructural side owes more to Kevin McCabe, despite his perceived faults.

Reading finished with 106 points. I think that might be a record for the second division. They only lost two games all season and one of those was their very first match of the season. They lost only one of their last 45 league games.

Most people would recognise that Reading had a truly exceptional season that no other side in the division was ever likely to match, rather than try and hold their success up as some kind of evidence of failure on Warnock's part.

Warnock actually achieved a club record number of points for this division and contrary to one of your previous posts, our form did not dip during the Portsmouth episode. The dip came long after that and lasted for all of 4 games.

The improvement to the infrastructure could only come about because we had a manager that was able to work within severe financial limitations for most of his time here.

Yes, he started with us in the second division, but we were bottom of the second division with half the season gone, staring relegation in the face and had recently had an attendance of fewer than 9,000 against Port vale. When he left us we had a side that was incomparable to the one he inherited and our attendances were around 25,000. Warnock is the first manager since the early 1970s at either of the Sheffield clubs to have achieved a season's average attendance of over 30,000. The side that he left should easily have achieved promotion and probably would had he stayed. Unfortunately, it is down to the failures of others that it didn't.

To try and say he left us in the same position as he found us stretches the credibility of your argument to an absolutely astounding level.

 

[Tyler Durden]

Yes, he started with us in the second division, but we were bottom of the second division with half the season gone, staring relegation in the face and had recently had an attendance of fewer than 9,000 against Port vale. When he left us we had a side that was incomparable to the one he inherited and our attendances were around 25,000. Warnock is the first manager since the early 1970s at either of the Sheffield clubs to have achieved a season's average attendance of over 30,000. The side that he left should easily have achieved promotion and probably would had he stayed. Unfortunately, it is down to the failures of others that it didn't.

Improvements in attendances are a natural consequence of being promoted. He was given a lot longer to achieve this promotion than many get, and he even did his best to sabotage that one due to being an egotistical bastard.

The fact that he did not stay after relegation is entirely his doing. He'd proven to be utterly out of his depth at the highest level and was an increasingly disruptive figure at the club. Even prattling on about his precious contract on the eve of the Wigan match.

Because after all, this wasn't about Sheffield Uniteds season in the Premier League, it was about Neil Warnocks.

Anyway I've devoted enough time to talking about that specimen. I'm just grateful that we now have a man in charge who has the interests of this club as his main priority, a man who genuinely loves this club.

 

[oldblade]

Improvements in attendances are a natural consequence of being promoted. He was given a lot longer to achieve this promotion than many get, and he even did his best to sabotage that one due to being an egotistical bastard.

The fact that he did not stay after relegation is entirely his doing. He'd proven to be utterly out of his depth at the highest level and was an increasingly disruptive figure at the club. Even prattling on about his precious contract on the eve of the Wigan match.

Because after all, this wasn't about Sheffield Uniteds season in the Premier League, it was about Neil Warnocks.

Anyway I've devoted enough time to talking about that specimen. I'm just grateful that we now have a man in charge who has the interests of this club as his main priority, a man who genuinely loves this club.

In other words, increasing attendances are a natural consequence of on field success. Success that Warnock (as manager of the team) played a significant part in producing.

Our attendances increased substantially in the seasons prior to promotion. We were actually getting more in the second division under Warnock than we were under Bassett got in two of his four premier league seasons. In fact, 5 out of Warnock's 6 full second division seasons have higher average attendances than any of our preceding second division averages until you get as far back as 1970-1.

I wonder why that was. It couldn't possibly be because he was actually doing a pretty good job and people were quite liking what they were seeing, could it?

As for whether or not leaving the club was all his own doing, were you privy to the discussions that took place between him, McCabe and the board? I doubt it. As I remember it, the official line was that it was a mutual decision.

One thing that I can probably agree with you about is Chris Wilder. I am also glad that he is our manager. However, I would not take any of the other managers that we've had from Warnock's departure up until Wilder's arrival. In my view the only people who would prefer any of those managers to Warnock really don't like our club much or have some weird desire to experience excruciating football lows.