The scale of Hecky's achievement

Doug O'Kane did another highly readable review of the season so far in yesterday's Chron. Doug says that we have just one point less than at the same stage last season. So despite the late recruitment, the limited experience of the players and the limited time the staff have had to work with them, this squad has come within a point of a settled squad which still included Winnall, Hourihane, Roberts, Scowen and Watkins.

That is quite amazing. Is this the best manager/head coach we've ever had?

 

He is the best, having to compete in this era with the financial support some other teams have and still keep producing team after team amazing. I hope the fans going to Norwich and then at our homes coming up really let him know. Being one of our own also is a big thing to me, it makes it that bit more special.

 

Not yet but he could be

Wilson’s team was incredible on very limited resources

 

Best in my time, going back to Johnny Steele. Shades Wilson for me because hes built 2 teams. That for me is the mark of a potential great.

 

We tend to look at previous sussessful managers through rose tinted glasses and remember the good times but not the dross. For me, the good periods under Clarke 1, Hunter and Wilson 1 stand out, but Clarke and Wilson on their return were not half the manager they had been, whereas hunter lost his best players and it all fizzled out. So in effect, all three were able to do it with a good group of players, but weren't able to do it with a different group.
If hecky gets this latest group, up and challenging for the play offs, this or next season, he's got to be up there.

 

Wilson's team was absolutely sublime. And consistently sublime as well. But he did not have to contend with players wanting to jump ship as soon as they got noticed for being good. Neil Refearn had already been with us for nearly four seasons I think before 96/97. That just doesn't happen these days.

 

No one who wasn’t there can understand the impact Clarke had on and off the pitch and Wilson did what Hecky is doing on a much smaller budget and took us further. Hunter’s team played the best football I’ve ever seen at Oakwell.

Paul would certainly be well below any of those. I’d put him around the level of Mel Machine at the moment who kept us in this league on a shoestring budget whilst developing players and selling them for profit. Anything else is hyperbole because he is ‘one of our own’.

None of that is to say things won’t eventually change but as it stands he has led us to promotion via the play offs like say Andy Ritchie and had one lower mid table finish below the level where we sacked Bobby Collins. Perspective is important.

 

Ita a fantastic achievement but hes,spent quite a lot in terms of what we spend normally

 

In absolute terms, yes. In relative terms in an overheated transfer market, possibly not. If we take wages into account in comparison with what our rivals are paying now, I reckon he's probably on a smaller relative budget than Wilson was.

 

You can't really speak about Paul in the same breath as Mel Machin until he successfully converts Hammil and Isgrove into full backs, then converts Bradshaw and Hedges into central defenders, before fielding them all in one match at the same time, along with Jackson, McDonald, Lindsay and Pinnock. The match must be away to Port Vale on a Tuesday night. Only then could Hecky be compared with the mad genius that was Mel Machin.

 

I see your point JC but the difference in the finances of the game today make it impossible to compare what Hecky is doing with the likes of Wilson, Hunter and Clarke. We didn't have much money but neither did many clubs at the same level and even those that did weren't so financially richer that we didn't have a prayer of competing. Not only does this affect recruitment but retention also.

 

He would also need to bring Brendan back out of retirement to play the lone striker role to be fully equivalent to Mel and sign john Pearson to led us out of the division.

 

I can see that as an argument and movement of players is certainly something that has changed at the same time I’d say we are pretty much where we have always been in football’s hierarchy bottom end of the Championship top end of L1 in relative terms nothing has changed.

 

Let's just factor in here that the Championship has changed out of all recognition since we were last in it in 2014. The much-used term 'mini Premier League' is a fair description. That is the backdrop against which Hecky is doing what he is doing.

 

Factoring that in lower mid table followed by a season in and around the bottom 6 is good it’s achieving is not overachieving. Burton managed to stay up last season with an equal budget and inferior players.

 

I think Wilson has to rank above him and regardless of any modern day context, if we never get back to the Premiership then Wilson will go down as the best of all time.

I was going to post a positive comment about John Dennis but folk on here would see it as a dig.

 

John Dennis is the best owner we have ever had.

 

They'll be on to you Jim.

(I agree)

 

Converting John Pearson into a centre half would have been a very logical move, considering his effectiveness as a striker. I'm genuinely surprised Mel never tried it, especially as he once put Andy Saville, a very decent striker, in goal. Mel Machin, the king of post-modernist avant garde football formations.