Stuart McCall & Form

It’s a lack of leadership in the squad for me. I think he approaches games and briefs his squad the same as but whereas we had leaders like McArdle and Vincelot before, this time there is just little in the squad..

Clarke is the only player who shows any semblance of leadership quality. I can’t have a GK as captain, ever, either.

Jones wasn’t a McCall player but could you imagine him tolerating this losing run? He dragged his teammates back into games. Ironically, so did McCall the midfielder.

Until we address the lack of leadership in the squad things won’t improve under Stuart or the next man.

 

He picked up a top 6 squad which PP built that's why.

 

Its not just here jon its something that affected him at scunny and to a lesser extent motherwell.

Scunthorpe were relegated with us in 2018, mccall took over them after 4 games and went DDD followed by WWDW. Unfortunately after that followed a run of 5 straight losses a draw, a win and 6 more straight losses. He somehow went 6 games unbeaten after that before another run of 1 win in 6 cost him his job.

I think when a teams on a good run its like a crest of a wave and its easier to swap like for like with players etc, but when push to shove and you're scraping the barrell for ideas and solutions then unfortunately he aint the man.

A mccall team on a bad run is a desperate struggle to turn around.

 

To be fair, there were extenuating circumstances last time. He had a horrendous number of players out with injury and was forced to play several players out of position. He also had Rahic intervening in team selection issues and generally undermining him in any way possible.

This time I feel it's down to him. I do not believe he is capable of managing at this level. He has formations and tactical expectations that are simply beyond the ability of L2 footballers to execute. It seems only now that it has dawned on him that many of the players we have, are simply not good enough. When he had the chance to recruit better in the summer he flunked it. There's no excuse for re-signing Guthrie and DMH or failing to recognise that our CBs haven't been good enough for for two seasons.

 

Maybe, he is just a good number 2.

I said he worried me in the fans forum by the the way he was talking. In fact the whole fans forum was an utter shambles.

I also said a while back he seems to be trying to hard to prove he is a good manager. @JonButterfield you hammered Kewell a while back but I think he has learnt what management is about is about and he has beaten McCall 3 times now in 32 days I believe. Maybe, Kewell has a more modern network and in his trained on his weak points. Kewell is a better manager than McCall. I would rather Kewell as our manager than McCall. Hope you can deal with that mate.

McCall getting frustrated in interview. Playing a formation that isn't suitable for most teams. Not building a decent squad and taking about his ipad.

Bradford City don't need a recruitment person. It's a DOF that this club needs but McCall needs to go either way.

 

That team you mention was full of leaders, the three you mention plus the likes of Law, McMahon, Cullen, Stephen Darby was still there etc. It was such a tight squad off the field as well. This current squad has none of that, was told by someone who sees them as a squad through work they don't interract like a squad, theres no chemistry there.

Obviously results don't help but its been clear from before the season started this squad wasn't good enough, relying on youngsters from other clubs, our own inexperienced youngsters and a few players who have played non league.

Throw this in with a virtually non existent scouting network, a poorly assembled and light on numbers backroom staff and an
owner and ex CEO who didn't really care, is anyone really surprised we are where we are? Theres no set method to anything we do either on or off the field, its easy to blame the players and wrongly accuse them of not trying.

I'll guarantee you there isn't one player on that field that wants to be in the bottom two, but each player as an individual is only as good as the players around them. And those individual players did not assemble themselves into a squad. But somebody did, and those are the people responsible for where we are now.

 

Rahic intervening? I have heard this numerous times but if true are people saying he was only intervening towards the end, or the whole time? If the whole time surely the time spent at top end of the league has to be partly down to him to. The good can not be down to McCall and the bad down to Rahic intervening unless he only started intervening towards the end in which case the question should be why the sudden change from Rahic?

 

I think he’s a number 2 as @Fordy117 says or he needs some real experience with him to succeed. Which begs the question if you do that how much would it cost and are you better off without him?

he gets on really well with the players or it seems so. They seem to respect him but on the other hand he’s too close and I don’t think Black is enough of a bad cop to nip problems in the bud. When we are a good side and playing well he keeps the momentum going with his closeness to his trusted players and they probably enjoy playing under him.
But then when the wheels come off he’s too close to them to tell them how it is. He can’t seem to dig out his players.

his tactics are also baffling. We are so open and he’s not suited to league two. We can’t defend as a unit and he hasn’t built his side physically enough to cope with this level. He did well in Scotland and league one with a good side. Maybe he isn’t suited to a lower level where man management and defensive side of the game really comes into it?

He’s not honest enough with himself or what squad he has. Earlier in the season he was saying we are only 6 points off of play offs for example and we were saying on here stop thinking of that and make us hard to beat. Fast forward another 6 defeats and now he starts to talk about only finishing 3rd bottom being hard to beat. He’s so reactive and not ahead of it. If you have injuries you go to type. A flat 4-5-1 and you defend and get a few 0-0s and maybe Nick the odd result.

His recruitment which he is getting help with is poor too. He doesn’t seem to know what he needs until the window is shut. Not sure if that’s because he can’t pick a tactic or he doesn’t know it. No wingers signed, no dominant center half, no dominant central midfielder and No experience up top for when we inevitably get injuries.

It’s all gone wrong and he isn’t the man to turn it around sadly. He has to go

 

I think Rahic's interventions to try to influence McCall's team selections etc did increase greatly in the period between the playoff final loss and McCall's sacking. All the while McCall had us in the playoff positions/challenging for auto promotion, playing great football, Rahic had limited justification to poke his nose into team affairs as much as he wanted to. The playoff final loss was the catylist that changed that.

It is well known that Rahic wanted McCall to be sacked after the playoff final. By the beginning of the following season Rahic had started his plan to bring in ex-academy youngsters and was openly declaring to supporters that SM should be picking them ahead of his preferred choices. He made no attempt to hide his lack of confidence in McCall.
It must have been extremely difficult for McCall to manage during the period before his sacking, with the guts of his team ripped out from under him, an extraordinary injury crisis and Rahic undermining him at every turn end. In those circumstances it was pretty remarkable that he still managed to keep us in and around the playoff places, untill the combination of detrimental circumstances became too much and Rahic pounced to do what he had wanted to do seven months earlier.

 

I think there's a lot of truth in that.

I think Stuart seems to perpetuate it, I've lost count of the number of times I've heard him say "there's no leaders in football any more" but that's rubbish. So if he believes there aren't any available, then that's not a characteristic he looks for in recruitment, and it shows.

Overall, in addition to the leadership issue I think its simply down to his limited managerial skillset in terms of improving players and recruitment. People sulk when I say that but in the 6 years he's been here there are no more than 5 players he's signed that I've both liked, and actually rated. Apart from Mark Marshall I can't think of a player he's improved either.

So, I think if he takes over a team which has been built by a superior manager (Parkinson here and Brown at Motherwell) then his personality will keep it rolling in the medium term. He's not going to cause any upset with players so he can ride that momentum with his character.

But over time, the more input he has into the actual development of the squad, the worse its gets. Eventually the momentum ends and he seems confused about why so panics and makes bizarre decisions. That eventually ends in a significant period of poor results and (usually) him leaving.

 

For 'no leaders anymore' also see 'there's no point in signing free agents because they won't be match fit'.

 

Yet he's prepared to rush players back before they're ready or play them for 90 minutes on return and have them break down again.
It's hard to believe that uninjured, out of contract players, who've continued to keep themselves fit (as most will do if they've any hope of getting signed) can be any worse than the sick notes, has-beens and never-will-be's he's working with now.

 

And it's a pound to a pinch of sh that he'll sign a couple in Jan, on the basis anyone half decent with a club will stay put, loans will be a lot scarcer this window as no one can afford to reduce squads under the ongoing pandemic and where is the attraction of signing for City currently?

 

Exactly my point

 

I think it's his stubbornness, pride and blind loyalty that stands in the way of him being a good manager. Trying to be friends with everyone rarely works in any form of life. I also fail to understand this 'us and them' stance he's built between the fans and the squad. Bring overly critical and condescending to anyone who dare question him.

During his first tenure he failed to address poor form and the similarities between then and now are very similar. I don't totally agree that he was wrongly sacked the 2nd time. We were in the same position as we are now only Rahic had the excuse he needed to cut him loose. The problem we have now, is should we get rid of Stuart, will history repeat itself and we continue to lose game after game, with the players remaining sulking because their comfort blanket has gone.
Alternatively allowing a new man in before the window allows him to bring in enough new blood to mitigate that scenario.

 

Spot on.

I watched Matter Of Heart for the first time last night - someone posted the YouTube link on here (might have been Broncs) and you forget how many strong types were in that playoff final squad. All those you mention. Kilgallon too.