He really didn't. He inherited an absolute mess after that diabolical relegation season, I'm still surprised we did as well as we did.
For league one level we had a great squad of players. Far far better than we do now. The objective was promotion the end result failure. Daniel stendel could have used that card had he failed... taking over a relegated side having to pick players up etc.
I thought Duff wasn't duff when he was here. There were clear weaknesses in the squad but he got them playing as a solid, tight unit. The football was measured and seemed to have structure to it. My opinion of course and I sometimes talk more bollux than Donald Trump... Edit: Duff's team was the last one I enjoyed going to watch