Great Decision To Sack Collins

If they wanted to remove him prior to next season then that's fine.

"Now then Neil, you scraped into the playoffs and we got battered by Bolton. When we spoke at the start of the season, the aim was promotion. You have failed in this, so we are letting you go. Good luck in the future".

But to sack him with one game left is one of the weirder decisions I've seen in football.

 

Of course it's pointless speculation. But it was based on frustration and annoyance at a pathetic performance against a side we've matched up well with twice this season and could have beaten twice.

I was angry at what I'd just seen, and needed to vent somewhere.

 

The biggest outcome for me is that this decision has effectively thrown Devaney under the bus. A loyal and good assistant coach now has attracted negative attention as a head coach of a team he inherited at last minute.

i reckon we weren't good enough or in form to go up so Collins at the helm or not wouldnt make much difference at this stage. Now we have destabilised much more.

 

It was a good decision to sack clueless Collins it was just 8 games too late imo he should have gone after the Bolton game

 

Big issue is same as it has been all season & that’s giving away cheap goals because the defence is the weakest part of our side. You can’t expect to go up giving away two goals like that. That doesn’t happen with Thomas, Mads & Kitching at the back.

Because we give away too many cheap goals we have to out score sides but since Cole went off the boil we’ve not been able to do that.

As for Collins going. The reason I didn’t understand it was that he was picking the best side in the only system they were suited to play. It was telling that Devaney’s come in & he’s just picking Collins preferred side. Just seems a stupid waste of money sacking Collins at this stage of the season when we can’t bring any players in & there’s no players been left out who could improve us.

I think they did sack him based on fans reactions at Blackpool & season ticket sales. I’ve heard about all sorts of scandals over the years, fighting, affairs, failed drugs tests but this time round nothing so I doubt something majors gone off to lead to a sudden sacking.

I don’t sit in the West Stand so I haven’t seen it with my own eyes but I was told that Devaney & Stead don’t even speak during the games & that Devaney only speaks to Tom Harban during the game. If so that’s ridiculous.

 

You would’ve sacked him during a really good run of form?

 

Yeah, let's sack him when we were 4 points off automatic promotion with 2 games in hand.

Comments like this are just factually wrong.

 

Pretty much this. I'd seen enough of Collins's football to see that he was not taking us forward. Bizarre timing to sack him unless there was a non-public reason for doing so.

Let's be honest though, being Collins or Devaney at the helm, you can only micturate with the appendage at your disposal and this team are - at best - a top half league one team who overproduced (if not always overperformed) in the first half of the season. We have been in decline since January and even if you had ideas on how to change that you can't do so in less than a fortnight. If there had been some magic turnaround under Devaney it would have been more luck than anything.

Luck hasn't been on his side and it's a shame that a loyal servant of the club will have the pinnacle of his coaching career with us, so harshly judged on what looks likely to be a failed play-off campaign.

 

He cost us that game by sitting back trying to defend a 2 goal lead if we’d won i’m certain we’d have gone on and got autos

 

Don't think he was sacked because the board thought Devaney could turn us into world beaters in a couple of days , think it was more season ticket sales ( I maybe wrong btw)

 

I didn’t see that at the time. We were pressing for a third at 2-0. It was only at 2-1 that I saw a defensive shift.

Pines was ruled out for the season after that game. I think it’s very optimistic to think we would have gone up automatically if we hung on that night.

 

If every club sacked their manager after a poor substitution, then there'd be no gaffers left in work.

 

He’s not gonna shag you mate.

We looked like a football team for a brief period for the first time in months.

We were bottom of the form table when Collins was sacked. Timing was incompetent and pointless given how far backwards he had taken most of the players and no manager could be expected to sort that out in 2 weeks but we are where we are.

 

the board make the decision not the fans utterly mad to say otherwise.

 

This. Obviously this.

 

Ah, the old "he's not gonna shag you" joke when you're all out of ideas.

Nice one.

Last night was a complete disgrace. Miles below the levels for the majority of the season. We had a difficult run under Collins before he was sacked. But before that we'd worked our way into the conversation for automatic promotion - including being the better team for the majority of the two games against last night's opponents.

 

John Mousinho commented that there’s obviously more to it than we know.

 

You mean the game where we were 30 seconds away from the top 2 with a game in hand? That game? Sacking him then would have been beyond insane, unless you were in possession of a fully functioning crystal ball.

 

They made the decision because they were put under pressure by a vocal minority chanting abuse at games.

There's no way in the world that the plan all season has been to sack the manager one game before the end of the season.

"Right JAQ. We're in 6th place, there's one game left. Let's finish our MasterPlan and sack him right before we play our last game. Its what we've been working to all season"

 

What is really odd is that Collins was dismissed but his entire backroom staff have remained. I understand Devaney staying but keeping Stead on is a bit strange. He was his man who he brought in after all.