Gino's Head Coach Track Record

Discussion in 'The Hornets' Nest - Watford Chat' started by WatfordTalk, Dec 22, 2020.

  1. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    How would you say we compare to the average club, when it comes to choosing our Head Coaches?

    Zola: Brought together a squad thrown together at the last minute and made them into arguably the best footballing side in the league. A couple of unlucky moments away from automatic promotion, and then a penalty away from a play-off final shootout. Couldn't bounce back with the hangover next season but overall a HIT.

    Sannino: Stopped the slump in 13/14, and left us in the autos in 14/15. Played his small part in promotion, but language barrier may have been an issue. Overall HIT-ish

    Garcia: Just the thought of managing our circus caused his heart to give out, so we'll never know. N/A

    McKinlay: Bizarre. Always thought he was supposed to be a caretaker for a couple of games and Gino made a typo on the job offer. Didn't look up to it, and to be fair, Gino rectified his mistake quickly. Still a MISS

    Jokanovic: Similar vibes to Munoz, completely random appointment, but a masterstroke. Proved it was no fluke with Fulham, too. HIT

    Flores: Mind-numbing football at times but his brief was to keep us up, and he did so comfortably, with a Cup Semi-final thrown in. HIT

    Mazzarri: Again a language barrier issue, but again fulfilled his brief (fairly) comfortably, and did so with no luck whatsoever with injuries. HIT-ish

    Silva: Made sense, and I think he'd have done well if his head wasn't turned. Didn't help that he wasn't backed properly in the summer. But can only really be judged on results, and it didn't work. MISS-ish

    Gracia: Best manager/HC we've had since GT, both in terms of how he represented the club, and success on the field. Cup final and record high league finishes, sadly suffered like Zola with a Wembley hangover. HIT

    Flores 2: Electric Boogaloo: Never go back. Awful decision and needed Gino to be as decisive as he was with McKinlay, but he held on too long. MISS

    Pearson: Wasn't the biggest fan of his, but probably the right appointment at the right time, ****ed over by covid. Despite all that, sacked with us outside the relegation zone. Hard to call it a miss considering our position when he joined. HIT

    Ivic: The right choice, if he had a few years to build up an Eddie Howe-esque dynasty. Can see the logic in a disciplinarian, but we weren't able to move out the big egos, so his my-way-or-the-highway style was doomed to fail. Left us in touching distance of the autos so deserves credit, but overall a harsh miss. MISS-ish


    Overall I'd say he's done pretty well for the most part, in that most Head Coaches we've brought in, have achieved their main task asked of them, or come close. It's easy to look at the volume of turnover but that's clearly our way of doing things, and the results have been positive, overall, for a club of our size, and financial standing.
     
    Last edited: Dec 22, 2020
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  2. Oscar calling

    Oscar calling Squad Player

    How can the Snake be considered a hit. Ask the Everton fans what they think of him.

    Would be interesting to get Deeney's ratings.
     
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  3. Keighley

    Keighley First Team

    What the Everton fans think is irrelevant to his performance at Watford, which was very good until his head was turned.
     
  4. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    Hadn't realised just how bad it had got by the time he was sacked, wasn't it rumoured that he basically downed tools when we stopped his move to Everton? Have amended to MISS-ish
     
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  5. hornetboy1

    hornetboy1 First Team Captain

    Can't agree with Mazarri or Silva as being hits. They were terrible appointments. I agree with the rest though.

    That's 6 hits 5 misses. This new one is anyone's guess, but will probably be a miss. A 50% strike rate.

    Plus you've got to factor in, they sacked the best coach they ever had in Dyche. A monumental bad piece of judgement.

    It's a real mixed bag and tells me they are not really all that astute when it comes to choosing coaches.......which plays out in the amount of managers they sack.
     
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  6. GoingDown

    GoingDown "The Stability"

    I'd argue Pearson and Walter as hits. We were falling apart and essentially relegated by the time he was sacked. We regressed under Mazzarri, although most of it wasn't his fault. Two goalkeeper legacy.

    So my view, less than a 50% success rate. Probably better than they get with players to be fair.
     
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  7. StuBoy

    StuBoy Forum Cad and Bounder

    A real mixed bag as HB has said above. I lean slightly more towards miss than hit, I really don't think apart from maybe Gracia, Joka and Silva (only at the very start) have we had any progressive kind of managers. Maybe more could have been hits if supported in the right way by the board. I'm interested to know @WatfordTalk what your overall opinion is of Gino Pozzo and where the club currently stands after the latest managerial departure?
     
  8. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    Another way you can look at things is only one of our managers was approached by another club - Silva.

    All the others may have achieved some things but ultimately all ended in some sort of failure, maybe apart from QSF and Slav who we just didn’t want to keep, so they’re a kind of half way house between being sacked and being poached but it was still failure in many respects.

    We've yet to find a manager that can keep us moving forward over a significant enough period to the point another club come in for him.

    You can’t count Silva, because his successful period with us was actually minuscule before Everton came in.

    I’m talking about a manager that can improve us over two or three seasons, Unfortunately we’re 17-0 on that front.
     
  9. davisp2

    davisp2 Reservist

    We often don’t go after proven players or managers. Often they wouldn’t come to Watford, and if they did we would pay over the odds. We look for riskier options that normally don’t have experience of the league etc. Riskier options will generate a higher % of failures. It’s how we roll. But if you look at Gino success with the clubs he has owned, his record smashes to bits pretty much every other owner on the planet - whose success is largely based on the fact they are rich and can buy success.
     
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  10. Steve Leo Beleck

    Steve Leo Beleck Squad Player

    How much did you like each coach (excluding the two that were here for five minutes...)? In order I'd go:

    Jokanovic
    Zola
    Gracia
    Pearson
    Ivic
    Mazzarri
    Sannino
    Quique
    Silva

    Interestingly, the only two that could've been considered up and coming coaches were Silva and Ivic, both of whom made noises about being let down on transfers. The others were all either trying to get careers at the top level back on track (Zola, Quique, Mazzarri, Pearson) or journeymen coaches (Jokanovic, Sannino). Good to see we've gone for a fourth category of Bloke That's Never Really Coached Before this time.
     
    Last edited: Dec 22, 2020
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  11. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    My overall opinion of Gino is still positive, as I tend to compare Watford with the clubs we usually competed with before he arrived. I'm sure the fans of Ipswich, Coventry, Birmingham, QPR, Derby would swap our last 8 years with theirs. And even the more well-run clubs like Brentford and Norwich haven't achieved the success we have over the past few seasons.

    I see supporting a football club as somewhat of an endurance sport, where ever so often your patience is rewarded with memorable moments. Since the takeover, off the top of my head we've had: Deeney's goal against Leicester, a (horrible) day out at Wembley, promotion at Brighton, Guedioura vs Arsenal, a Cup Semi Final, beaten Liverpool 3-0, beaten United 3-1, beaten Arsenal away, beaten Arsenal at home, beaten Chelsea 4-1, Deeney/Deulofeu vs Wolves, an FA Cup Final appearance, beaten United 2-0, beat Liverpool 3-0 again. In 8 seasons.

    How many moments like that did we have in the 8 years previously? 2004-2012? Promotion aside, I can't think of too many.

    That's not to say he's the perfect owner. He's made several huge errors in his time here. Some he's rectified quickly (McKinlay), some he got away with for a while before they came back to bite him, like the lack of investment in defence, and some were just downright brainless, like the second coming of Quique.

    But overall I think he's been a net positive for the club, and I think it's a case of better the devil you know. There are better owners out there, but there are much much worse ones too, and I wouldn't roll the dice of removing him, if it was up to me.
     
  12. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    Silva moaned about not getting the players he wanted, then went to Everton and got all the players he asked for and failed, a fraud.
     
  13. Arakel

    Arakel First Team

    He's got close to 5 years of coaching experience. It's just the head coach role he's somewhat new to.

    Honestly, his background is on par or ahead of many of our immediately pre-Pozzo managerial appointees, e.g. Dyche. Malky. Boothroyd. Given that he is a winger who played at a decent level, I reckon he might be well positioned to get the best out of the likes of Sarr and Pedro (who we really should be building the team around, all things considered).
     
  14. wfc4ever

    wfc4ever Administrator Staff Member

    I guess Richarlison was someone he wanted but probably not Andre Gray!
     
  15. Steve Leo Beleck

    Steve Leo Beleck Squad Player

    Wishful thinking. Did Pearson get the best out of Kabasele? Did Mazzarri get the best out of Doucouré? Did Quique get the best out of Holebas? Did Ivic get the best out of Cleverley?

    Not sure I really buy into this "he played in the same part of the pitch so he'll be able to improve a player..." thing.
     
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  16. Arakel

    Arakel First Team

    Those coaches named all improved that particular aspect of the team, though. E.g. Pearson, QSF and Ivic improved us defensively (shame about the other bits of the team, of course).

    We don't necessarily need someone to improve Sarr and Pedro, just use them correctly. They're both more than good enough to do the business at Championship level as it is. I will be very surprised if a former attacking winger doesn't set us up to use attacking wing play, a situation which is bound to see us get more of our Sarr (assuming he hasn't stopped caring).
     
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  17. Steve Leo Beleck

    Steve Leo Beleck Squad Player

    Pearson improved us as an attacking force, not defensively. Ivic was an attacking midfielder so his defensive strengthening was at the opposite end of the pitch from where he operated. I'll give you that ex full back Quique improved us defensively but I'd argue that almost anyone would do that if they decided they had no interest in attacking whatsoever.

    I just don't see a strong correlation between coaches playing in a position and players in the same position subsequently improving and think it's blind optimism to think that Muñoz is going to make Sarr's game better. Moving to another club where he actually wants to be would be far more likely to do that.
     
  18. Abdi

    Abdi Academy Graduate

    Calling Mazzarri a hit is revisionism as it's finest, he was terrible. Behrami and Watson in midfield ahead of Doucoure still astounds me.
     
  19. WillisWasTheWorst

    WillisWasTheWorst Its making less grammar mistake's thats important

    Sorry, but Ben Watson didn’t start in any league games under Mazzarri.
     
  20. Guy

    Guy Squad Player

    What we just don't know is if some of these coaches would have been able to turn things round and develop squad over time had they not been replaced at the first sign of trouble
     
  21. foxywfc

    foxywfc Reservist

    As much as Silva got found out and ended up a fraud. I think if he’d of stayed with us for a few seasons things could of been different.

    Out of all our coaches the players loved it under him the club had a vibe things were clicking together.

    All until that **** from Everton came calling.

    The Pearson Shakespeare combo if called upon when QSF got the 2nd try could of been a better story or the COVID coming along.


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
     
  22. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    Ben Watson played a total of 51 minutes in the league under Mazzarri. Revisionism indeed.

    Again, he wasn't great, and probably not a great fit in hindsight, but he achieved the goal set of him, and in difficult circumstances.
     
  23. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    Agree. Gracia especially I'd have like to see if he'd have been able to turn things around. I think we'd have had the individual quality in the squad to keep ourselves up during a 'settling in' year, but it looks like Gino panicked slightly with our league form after the Wolves semi, and feared the worst.
     
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  24. wfc4ever

    wfc4ever Administrator Staff Member

    The manner of the cup final defeat would have not helped .

    And losing 2 winnable home games early on the next season left him on the brink sadly .
     
  25. Lloyd

    Lloyd Squad Player

    With the exception of QSF2 (and not including Garcia and McKinley) the appointments have been fine. The mistake has been booting reasonably successful coaches out too soon
     
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  26. The Voice of Reason

    The Voice of Reason First Team Captain

    How can you say FLORES Mk One was a HIT, but say that VLAD was a MISSish? You cannot know whether Vlad would not have gone on to achieve similar results to Flores and his, and I quote, "Mind numbing football" had he been given the chance?
     
  27. Supertommymooney

    Supertommymooney Squad Player

    Mazzarri was not a hit in my book.

    He was supposed to be the one to settle down the managerial merry go round.

    He was also supposed to have learned to speak English.
     
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  28. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    What's so hard to understand? He likes the club as is ran? Got it?

     
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  29. Loyalhornet

    Loyalhornet Reservist

    Generally the head coach appointments have been spot on . Even in the case of Mazarri and Silva you can see what the intention was , even if they may not have worked out quite as intended.
    The decision to axe McKinley and get Slav in was impressive in the sense that they admitted to a potential error and rectified it .

    Fir me the dubious appointment was the second coming of QSF. It smacked a bit of desperation and if big Nige had come in at that point I think we would still be a premier league club .

    Ivic may not have worked out but I can again see the logic. He had a good track record and clearly it seemed a disciplinarian was needed to deal with the wantaways etc .

    This latest appointment is the most left field . But Gino has generally got it right , so I’m giving.him the brbfut of the doubt at this stage .
     
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  30. The Voice of Reason

    The Voice of Reason First Team Captain

    The jury is out, but like all true Hornet fans, I really hope the GAMBLE of appointing "The Kid" pays off.
     
  31. WillisWasTheWorst

    WillisWasTheWorst Its making less grammar mistake's thats important

    Yes, I think we should all give him the brbfut of the doubt.
    Covfefe.
     
  32. luke_golden

    luke_golden Space Cadet

    I’d forgotten how utterly tinpot the shirt was that season. Abomination.
     
  33. wfc4ever

    wfc4ever Administrator Staff Member

    One thing you couldn't accuse him of was not showing his emotion and "passion" some might call it by the touchline which many thought was lacking in Ivic.
     
  34. Burnsy

    Burnsy First Team

    Another Pozzo masterstroke. Signing us up to a kit manufacturer that had to pull out of manufacturing kits before the end of the 1st year of the deal because they were so bad at it.
     
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  35. Abdi

    Abdi Academy Graduate

    Not interested in facts lads - my uninformed opinion is what counts.
     
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