Maybe so, but I still have far more respect for him than the likes of Shearer, Carragher, Neville etc. At least he's given it a decent go.
Take the examples of Shearer & Neville. Both get written off as a failure at management. Shearer tried to rescue a Newcastle team in free fall with players refusing to play so they were fit for the World Cup or for their new clubs & Neville gets written off as a failure for doing a favour for his mate who owns Valencia. Another club in free fall where he didn’t speak the same language as many of the players. Why would anyone in their position give management a proper crack when fans & pundits write them off so quickly?
Can’t comment on the American gig but I don’t think he did too bad at Derby. I think he made a daft mistake in taking the Birmingham job. At the time they’d gradually been cutting costs year after year following the Redknapp disaster & despite a good start they were always likely to be towards the bottom of that league with the quality of player they had at the time. It seems daft saying it now when they’re getting big crowds & selling out away ends but their championship crowds weren’t much bigger than ours. Realistically they were only going to get worse that season. Plymouth’s a tough gig too. Staying up at this level is an achievement for them. They’ve got a small budget at that level & players don’t want to go & play there as it’s miles from anywhere. Is he or anyone ever likely to do much more than survive by a few points? I wouldn’t have thought so. I also think that if you’re serious about a career in management you should start as a coach of number 2. When you look at some of the top performing managers like Thomas Frank, Maresca & Arteta they all had spells as number 2’s before they got a job as a number one. I don’t know if it’s an ego thing or whether it doesn’t make financial sense but surely Rooney would have learned a lot more from going & working under an experienced manager before getting the manager role himself.
TBF to the lad I know nothing about DC United but there are much easier gigs than the 3 he has had in English football. Derby & Birmingham were basket case clubs and Plymouth was always going to be a challenge in the Championship.
You could well be right there he did a cracking job at Hull. Sacking him looked a terrible decision at the time & looks even worse now
The German guy they've recently sacked at Hull reminded me of a Schopp style appointment, the league table is starting to psn out in similar fashion. Owners and their wild ideas eh
Honestly can’t even begin to think why Plymouth thought it was a good idea his record is failure everywhere he’s been
Controversial opinion - I think he did as well as could be expected of anyone at Derby at the time, and I don’t think many would be doing better at Plymouth currently. There are seven teams on less than 20 points in the league, none of them have won more than 4 games and they comfortably have a bottom five squad and budget. He was shi.te at Birmingham - but even then they weren’t in the relegation zone when he left. Tony Mowbray and Gary Rowett didn’t save them. No idea whether he underachieved in the MLS to be honest. His record in England isn’t great but he’s not had great gigs in all fairness. He’s hardly been shoehorned into plush jobs.
Birmingham had been sixth in the league when he took over and then only won 2 games in 15. He was the main reason they got relegated tbh.
I did hear - and this was from Johnny Vaughan on Radio X, so could have been made up - that Rooney applied to university to do law while he was at Derby, but then he left before he could start...
The goal for Plymouth this season will have always been to stay up. They were always likely to finish in the bottom third of the table. It's very tight at the bottom and he's still got every chance of keeping them up. A couple of wins in quick succession and it will look different. If we were where Plymouth are I would take that at the moment. Every chance of staying up and in a tight part of the league where you aren't adrift.
