Does Warne deserve the vitriol aimed at him?

[Bob The Badger]

If you look at Warne's record, it's actually not that bad.

Last season we came within a kippers dick of making the playoffs after what was possibly the most turbulent time in the club's history.

And last night, we could have gone top, and yet half the board would be happy to see the guy fired.

Does anybody ever remember that level of vitriol and animosity toward a manager who didn't have us struggling? And struggling badly.

Other than possibly Dave Mackay for a short period and entirely other reasons, I cannot remember anything like it.

For some while, I just thought it was Derby fans being entitled, but after conversations with @Eatonram, it seems like we're pretty bad every game and winning in spite of ourselves rather than because of ourselves.

I have to admit that I rarely get to see Derby play these days, so I base a lot of my opinions either on highlights or on what I read. As such, I accept that 90% of posters on this forum are better informed than me.

So, does he deserve all this piling on, or should we be sticking by him?

 

[SSD]

He doesn't deserve to be called a charlatan or gym teacher, that's very harsh. We can't argue that he is very successful at this level of football. With this budget and calibre of players, we should be a top 3 team in this league comfortably regardless of manager. And we are challenging for promotion based on our position and points.

I'm not sure why I can't warm to Warne though. Is it because I have been used to watching a certain style of football for years and now we have gone back to good old fashioned "hit it wide and cross it"? I don't think he is maximising the best out of the squad and financial resources at his disposal. There is a sense when I watch the team we are winning purely because we have better players, nothing that Warne is doing tactically to win us matches. It feels like the bare minimum to win and a number of supporters don't want bare minimum. We should be dominating and the team are not doing it regularly. The league is there for the taking and we keep missing opportunities. 

[trappatoni]

I thought we underperformed last season - top 6 should have been the minimum and I think Rosenior would have achieved that given he barely had McGoldrick available.   This year the league does feel weaker - hard to compare but if anything our best seems below last year's level even though we sit higher than how we finished the last.  

My worry us we seem very short term, unimaginative and reactive with a lot of our signings.   Nyambe only really came in when the back 5 idea was proving a disaster.   Waghorn was a panic buy.   Smith would be another Warne knows from Rotherham.   Part of this may be down to EFL restrictions but it all seems like fire fighting rather than building with a coherent philosophy.  If we don't go up I couldn't say we are further along than Summer of 2022 and given Bird and Cashin will leave and I can't imagine Hourihane, Collins, Sibley or Smith will be offered equivalent deals we'll effectively be starting from scratch.   Now Warne may welcome that but for me where would the evidence be he should lead that rebuild?  

[YorkshireRam]

I don't need to read the post- no.

(But having read the thread, also no. Criticism yes, personal digs, no.)

[Bob The Badger]

1 hour ago, SSD said:

He doesn't deserve to be called a charlatan or gym teacher, that's very harsh. We can't argue that he is very successful at this level of football. With this budget and calibre of players, we should be a top 3 team in this league comfortably regardless of manager. And we are challenging for promotion based on our position and points.

I'm not sure why I can't warm to Warne though. Is it because I have been used to watching a certain style of football for years and now we have gone back to good old fashioned "hit it wide and cross it"? I don't think he is maximising the best out of the squad and financial resources at his disposal. There is a sense when I watch the team we are winning purely because we have better players, nothing that Warne is doing tactically to win us matches. It feels like the bare minimum to win and a number of supporters don't want bare minimum. We should be dominating and the team are not doing it regularly. The league is there for the taking and we keep missing opportunities. 

The weird thing is, I think he's a likeable bloke (maybe I'm wrong), but he gets less leeway because of the style he adopts.

The reality is that if you play an ugly style and win, you can get away with it. But if you play one and lose you get less sympathy from fans.

[Bob The Badger]

3 minutes ago, YorkshireRam said:

I don't need to read the post- no.

(But having read the thread, also no. Criticism yes, personal digs, no.)

I probably didn't pick my words very well tbf, but I didn't necessarily mean abuse at home personally, but being attacked for results. 

[YorkshireRam]

6 minutes ago, Bob The Badger said:

I probably didn't pick my words very well tbf, but I didn't necessarily mean abuse at home personally, but being attacked for results. 

What you've said is fine haha, I was being deliberately flippant because I think a fair few people massively overreact about Warne when we lose a game. 

I'm just sick of reading the 'PE Teacher' comments and similar, from people literally not even qualified to lace up his boots. I acknowledge he knows far more about football than I ever will, this self awareness seems to be severely lacking in some.

[jimtastic56]

Yet Wazza is still “Gods Gift” to management . Warne was not a great player so how could he be a good manager?

[RadioactiveWaste]

No,of course he doesn't.

I'm not sure why he seems to rub some people up the wrong way but he seems to.

Perhaps it's something of a mismatch between his persona "tongue in cheek happy chappy full of jokes" and his football "work hard cross it work hard" - If he had the same team but gave off "I'm a no nonsense manager and trust in me lads" vibe perhaps fans would trust it more? Or maybe if we were a cheeky chappy team that was a bit gung ho even if they get it wrong some of the time people would buy into it.

Although for some it might just be the indignity of league 1 being compounded by the indignity of a former Rotherham manager.

Who knows.

Win the next two games and all will be happy again.

[ramboy63]

No i think sometimes the abuse is border line bullying to be fair and not deserved

I dont like to see the brand of football we are playing to be honest however if were winning then thats fine

However with this squad he as at his disposal and the teams in League One this season i think if we do not get promoted i do not think i could stomach another season of him and in this division

[Dcfcsr92]

32 minutes ago, Bob The Badger said:

The weird thing is, I think he's a likeable bloke (maybe I'm wrong), but he gets less leeway because of the style he adopts.

The reality is that if you play an ugly style and win, you can get away with it. But if you play one and lose you get less sympathy from fans.

I get people like him for being nice but it does my head in hes too nice its like hes being fake sometimes you have to have abit aggression to be a football manager and he doesnt its why refs are crap all the time, you get someone like warnock and it changes 

[Bob The Badger]

7 minutes ago, Dcfcsr92 said:

I get people like him for being nice but it does my head in hes too nice its like hes being fake sometimes you have to have abit aggression to be a football manager and he doesnt its why refs are crap all the time, you get someone like warnock and it changes 

I listened to the podcast he was on when he was Rotherham's manager, and I don't think it's fake at all. I thought he came across as a really genuine person. Could be wrong of course.

[Dcfcsr92]

2 minutes ago, Bob The Badger said:

I listened to the podcast he was on when he was Rotherham's manager, and I don't think it's fake at all. I thought he came across as a really genuine person. Could be wrong of course.

I know what you mean, i think sometimes people try too hard to be nice ( i think personally he trying too hard to be nice)

[Mick Brolly]

I think being 3 points off the top with a large chunk of the season to go it would be nice to get behind the team and managerial staff and see how it plays out before all the name calling begins. 

[Crewton]

If you'd heard him talk about JJ after his injury last night, you might change your view that he's a "fake". Some times he does come across as flippant but then so did some of the greatest managers in the history of English football, and he's nowhere near as dismissive or condescending as some of them. Even opposition fans find his post-match interviews refreshing : he might temper his criticism of his own team's performance, but he never denigrates the opposition or fails to give them credit.

The sense of entitlement I get from some of our fans comes from a different planet to the one I come from - I'll never agree with it, hence I will disappear from time to time just to get away from it. Allot of the criticism and questions raised by the more thoughtful posters is absolutely fair, but so many have now put the recent past struggles behind them, almost as if it's a trauma they want to bury, that they seem incapable of measured opinions.

In summary, I never believed that Warne was the Messiah, but he's not a naughty boy either and I wish that those who will never accept him would at least tone down the abuse.

[trappatoni]

57 minutes ago, YorkshireRam said:

What you've said is fine haha, I was being deliberately flippant because I think a fair few people massively overreact about Warne when we lose a game. 

I'm just sick of reading the 'PE Teacher' comments and similar, from people literally not even qualified to lace up his boots. I acknowledge he knows far more about football than I ever will, this self awareness seems to be severely lacking in some.

 Surely a pointless comment - he has more experience than any of us so why bother reading this forum?    There is a difference between being able to  manage a professional football club and being able to recognise when someone isn't making a great job of it.   

[BathRam72]

I think, those who resort to insult and abuse are generally lacking in intelligence and don't have the argument to back up any criticism. So they resort to vitriol abuse.

Or they fall under the 'yeah yeah, what he said' group.

[GeneralRam]

What really grates me is when we lose he just seems to shrug his shoulders and goes “that’s football”.

There’s just something about this team I don’t like. Even in the Prem, Clough or Rooney seasons I felt attached to the team and the characters within it. Right now? Not so much and I don’t know why that is.

Edited January 24 by GeneralRam

[ramsbottom]

The past few weeks have started to remind me of late stage Clough Jnr, where you were either for him, in the belief that he'll get the squad firing, or you were saying he should go as he should be doing a lot better with the players he had at his disposal.  I think the majority of fans have the former outlook, but that's only because we've been winning, and being 4th without ever really being on top form (Oxford away being the exception) can't be sniffed at.

For what it's worth I'm willing to give him more time, because you can see in flashes what he's trying to do, (I don't think for a second he's wanting us to swing it in from the side line 30 yards out, more flash it across from the edges of the box) but it does make you wonder why he's been unable establish what he wants after a full pre season, and half of it gone.

[YorkshireRam]

15 minutes ago, trappatoni said:

 Surely a pointless comment - he has more experience than any of us so why bother reading this forum?    There is a difference between being able to  manage a professional football club and being able to recognise when someone isn't making a great job of it.   

Not sure I understand your point. I'm calling out the personal insults, not discussion in general? Also, I probably wouldn't trust anyone on this forum to judge if Warne's doing a good job overall- we, as fans, only see a fractional percentage of what a manager does, nowhere near enough to form a proper judgement. Except maybe @Owen87ITK as he's more privy to behind the scenes stuff.