Adams & Sparks out!

But that cuts right across what Sparks said in the summer. He said publicly that the final decision on all new players was the manager's and by inference not Turnbull's. And yet the only interpretation of what Adams said last night is that that wasn't the case.

to add to this, having a final say is no where near the same as actually scouting and recruiting players directly. what do you mean "wasn't the case"? he wasn't forced to accept them but it was them or nothing. by all means if January is a failure let rip. but saying its entirely Dereks fault is a mistake.

If its Dereks fault why was Turnbull sacked?

 

he will have given the scouts specific qualities to look out for, with specfic players in mind. rather than just being told as soon as he comes in we have players A-G lined up. he had no idea of the weakness of the squad or which players needed to go out. people are expecting DA to come in know exactly what players are being brought in (as if Derek has a working encyclopaedia of all players..) which is just nonsense.

again no one has actually answered this question and I'll ask you. If the responsibility wholly lied with Derek, why did Turnbull get the sack?


I wonder if I have caught a thread mid-whinge.

 

Adams has been working in and around this league for years the signings are hardly unknowns, he'll have known exactly who they were.

Adams is a deflector, always has been when things have not gone his way, that's exactly what he is doing now and one of the reasons that he is not a popular figure even at clubs where he has had successes.

 

Again, If its Dereks fault why was Turnbull sacked? if you are implying that Derek pulled the wool over sparks eyes that's on sparks not Derek.

 

Phil Parkinson didn't work under a DOF and he assembled pretty decent squads over his time.
This for me is one of the major reasons Ryan would be stupid to even contenplate changing the manager (which I don't think he will) even though as we all know football is a performance driven business, that can only happen when you have given the present incumbent chance to build a siquad with his stamp on it.

 

Who is it easier to sack? A Head of Recruitment or a newly appointed manager?

Sparks has totally bought into Adams and given him free reign to do what he wants (going against what he said was his vision after appointment), time will tell if that turns out to be the right decision but there aren't any promising signs to date.

 

I don't think anybody said the blame lies solely with Adams. But he certainly should take a fair slice of it. Turnbull was let go because Adams wanted his own men in and also because he wasn't very good. I don't think anybody would disagree with that. He wasn't sacked because he signed all the players and Adams didn't rate them. That's just nonsense.

 

We had the same losing mentality before Parky and he used a sports psychologist to sort it. Adams should do the same.

 

So how do we know he wasn't good, if he didn't pick the players? thats a tad contradictory.

replace signed with picked and that is where my opinion is. If dereks got a few weeks to get transfers done and not step on eggshells he has to trust his DoF right!? Really he should trust him regardless, which is repeatedly what i have been saying. He misplaced his trust in the DoF now he is getting stick for doing so.
Its not Dereks fault at all.

 

I know Sparks can split opinion but despite some quick hirings and firings, I do think he has identified that the constant revolving door of managers is a key component for why we are where we are. Although questionable at the time, the McCall new contract was a reach for some stability - something we haven't had in a very long time. And thankfully, I think Sparks has enough poise and patience to realise that sacking another manager isn't the answer this time either.

Frustratingly for Sparks, he has shown inexperience in his part for hyping the season up somewhat. In reality, this season seems to be shaping up to be more like one of Parkinson's transition seasons like 11/12 or 14/15 where we knew there is some good in the squad of players, but it needs another window or two to continue the build. Adams is the only one at the club who has an iota of knowledge in building a promotion winning team - we as fans should trust that, Rupp & Sparks should back it.

 

That is one way of looking at if, Ryan having told us the DOF is the way forward and then to back the manager and part company with the very thing he said would bring stability to our club was a big call. Some fans will say it was the wrong call, as you say time will tell were all hurting with where we see our club and what we expected but we can't once again go down the route of sacking the manager .

 

My view is that, the DoF did not preform. Look at Scunthorpe.

we will have to wait until the Jan window. I hope he delivers.

 

This where the total lack of any football knowledge at a senior level is hampering us.

We don't have anyone making sure that appointments at senior level are a good fit, in the same way there has been no apparent work done to ensure players brought in have the right character for our situation.

Let's be honest, Turnbull came into Head up recruitment because McCall had worked with him at Scunthorpe, there was no process to find the best fit for the club - Sparks has gone on record in saying he wants the club to be self-sufficient and identify and develop young players - that does not match the profile of players that were subsequently brought in.

It's the same with Adams - the first real manager Sparks spoke to and he was won over from the start. It didn't seem to matter that Adams MO contradicts what Sparks said he wanted to instil at City and that, impressive as his achievement at Morecambe was, the level of expectation and circumstances are completely different to Bradford City. Adams thought he could bring in 3 or 4 of his Morecambe team and just try and repeat last years formula, when that didn't happen he's been lost.

 

Absolutely spot on.

people nowadays want instant results and instant success. Not going to happen in L2

 

Why are you promoting him to DoF? He was Head of Recruitment.

If we did have a DoF in place making sure that all the football side of the club was on the same page rather than the muddled way things are being done then we'd be in a much better position than we are at the moment.

 

I really cant see them sacking him for some time yet, he'll be given January for sure regardless of results. They wont completely change the recruitment setup for Adams about 2 or 3 months back just to bin him off without having a chance to build a squad.

I think the recruitment was probably 80/20 in favour of it being Turnbulls men he brought in. They were even joking about it on Saturday, if anyone watched the stream of the match, Turnbull was doing the commentary for BBC Humberside and they had a few "theres a lot of old Scunthorpe influence on this Bradford team isn't there?" lines of that effect said with a giggle a few times. Turnbull wasn't exactly glowing with his words about Adams either, so i imagine it was DA who had the say on Turnbull leaving.

But lets say for sake of argument, we do the idiotic thing and sack another manager....... Who in their right mind would apply for this job? It would be the third sacking in a year of Sparks being CEO, no manager worth anything is going to look at that as an appealing boss to work for. Do you think Richard O'Donnell, our former captain is suddenly going to perform under what would be his 7th permanent manger since signing? Or Paudie will great his 6th new manager in a City shirt and the penny will suddenly drop with our current captain to get the squad back on track? Not a chance.

No manager would look at the shape of the club being the scenes, or the dross left on the pitch after 3 or 4 years of poor recruitment, and think this is a job worth going for. Only people we'd get are people that just want back in the game. Anyone who thinks we would attract a Flynn or out of work manager with any sort of name value, really needs to give their head a shake.

 

nope, to play tit for tat he was the "Recruitment Director"!

and probably, I do think getting a DoF would be very expensive or would have to new to it. pretty sure Jewell was at swindon recently. out of a job at the minute i think.

 

My concern is we are seem to be on a parallel line with Southend. Seven managers in four years, relegated from League One after being relatively strong in that league a couple of season before, and a CEO that doesn't know what he is doing and makes daft appointments (Stan Collymore as effective DoF).

We aren't going down this year, but if we end the season the way we did last year then 22/23 could be a real challenge.

 

Yet Ryan said there was only one candidate he wanted as our next manager approaching Morecambe around Christmas/New Year last year with regards his availability do you believe that was not the case and Ryan is a liar ?.

 

He came in after Stuart had gone and was effectively DoF to oversee the two rookies, he had total control on recruitment which is what a DoF does,