Well it’s certainly been an eventful week at Derby County. It started on Monday when head coach Paul Clement was sacked and will end on Saturday when the Rams play MK Dons with interim manager Darren Wassall in charge.
It’s difficult to sum up my thoughts on the sacking of the head coach. I was both surprised and not surprised by the announcement.
Surprised because Derby County owner Mel Morris had said on a number of occasions that Clement wouldn’t be sacked this season even if the Rams didn’t get promoted. He also said Paul Clement could go on to be our Sir Alex Ferguson and have a long and successful spell as head coach. Even the recently mailed season ticket renewal information contained a letter from Morris singing the praises of the head coach.
Not surprised because the Rams are on a poor run of form – four draws and three defeats since the last win against Fulham on Boxing Day.
Not surprised because performances during those seven games have been poor. The Rams have been struggling to create chances, let alone score goals.
And not surprised because rumours and media reports of an imminent sacking had been emerging.
On Monday evening I felt it was harsh on Clement but now that Morris has explained the reasons behind the dismissal it feels like the correct decision was made. That said, Clement will probably have a different take on his eight month tenure.
Perhaps the biggest surprise this week was the admission by Morris that promotion wasn’t the main priority and had never been the priority. This seems to be somewhat at odds with a £25 million spend on new players but Morris explained that away as believing in a ‘no excuse’ culture and fully backing his head coach.
So why was Clement sacked then?
The answer appears to be that Clement was out-of-sync with Morris on the plan and was short-sightedly focussing on promotion and losing sight of the bigger picture as a consequence.
Morris mentioned three things specifically:
Firstly, an improvement in individual player and team performance.
I don’t think Clement completely failed in this area because he improved us defensively (well up until the turn of the year any way) and Cyrus Christie, Richard Keogh and Stephen Warnock have definitely improved this season. But this came at the expense of creativity and fluidity in attack and Chris Martin and the wide players have been poor for the majority of the season.
Secondly, a return to ‘The Derby Way’ or, as Morris explains it, “It was typified by this high intensity, high-tempo game, on the front foot with our wing-backs both attacking, midfielders running through to Chris Martin. It was exciting to watch.”
Morris is right. It was exciting and entertaining to watch… but it also left us vulnerable at the back and we conceded too many goals. So, in many ways, Clement was right to shore us up and make us more solid and difficult to break down, but he took it too far and we lost our cohesion, creativity, and ability to play on the front foot at a high tempo. Without the ball we improved but with the ball we were a shadow of the team that thrilled and excited for the majority of Steve McClaren’s tenure.
And thirdly, to develop the youth players and bring them into the first team squad.
This is a difficult one to judge because developing youth players into first team players takes time and Clement only had eight months.
But he did have an opportunity with young Jamie Hanson who has been the mainstay of the U21s for a couple of seasons now and impressed during this pre-season. With the injuries to Will Hughes, Craig Bryson and George Thorne early in the season. Hanson made two starts in August and did well, a further six substitute appearances, but never made the 18-man squad for a league game after the home game on Tuesday 3rd November.
A good opportunity to blood Hanson was missed and the additions of Jacob Butterfield and Bradley Johnson, plus the return from short-term injury of Thorne pushed Hanson down the pecking order.
The thing is, as head coach, you have to be in it for the long-term to give youth a chance, and the more senior players you have in your squad – and the Rams squad is very big – the braver you have to be to leave a senior pro out in order to give a young player a chance with a decent run of games.
In normal circumstances, Craig Forsyth’s injury would have presented an opportunity for U21 captain Max Lowe to become part of the first team squad, but Lowe suffered injury himself so we’ll never know now if Clement would’ve given him his chance.
With Warnock the only recognised left-back in the squad, I can’t argue with the signing of Marcus Olsson but there were rumours and reports of interest in Olsson during the summer transfer window.
When directly asked the question, Morris said he didn’t think Clement shared his focus on youth development.
For any plan to work, all the key people at a football club have to work together for the same aim. And the most important people are the owner and the head coach of the first team. If, as seems to be the case here, they are out of sync and the gap is widening with no likelihood of them getting back in sync, then the owner is well within his rights to sack the head coach.
So, as this week progressed, I’ve reached the conclusion that Mel Morris was right to sack Paul Clement.
But let’s not forget the good work Clement has done.
He managed the Rams through a great run of just one defeat in 19 league games.
He led us to the top of the league on Boxing Day.
Clement leaves Derby County fifth in the Championship table, a mere five points off an automatic promotion spot.
With 16 games to go, promotion to the Premier League remains a possibility. We currently hold a play-off position and the automatic promotion places are still within our sights.
But to keep the promotion push alive, the poor run of results needs to be reversed and reversed sooner rather than later
Derby County desperately need a win
And so the focus moves to the next game at home to MK Dons on Saturday.
Darren Wassall takes up the first team reigns as interim manager until the end of the season.
The big question for me is: Does Wassall want the job permanently or does he see it as a short-term secondment to help the club out before going back to his day-job as Academy Director?
If Wassall wants the job then he has 16 games to state his case and prove his worth; if he doesn’t, then he needs to buy the club’s owner time to complete a thorough due diligence on the prospective candidates to make sure that next time Morris appoints a head coach who is wholeheartedly committed to and fully bought into the plan.
Over to you Darren Wassall and the best of luck!
Stuart Hughes
Twitter: @StuartHughes65