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Michael Appleton - Sacked 23/1/2024 (p105)

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Comments

  • I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Hardly going to say he’s got one game to save his job. 
    The word that kept coming up during the live stream was “stability”. At one point GC even said if sacking managers was a measure of success, we’d be in the Premier League already.

    That was music to my ears after going through Adkins, Jackson, Garner, Holden and now Appleton in three years if the fans had their way currently. I think at the very least 3/5 of those would be able to get us promoted if they had been properly supported. Instead they were disposed of at the first sight of trouble.

    The SMT could go back on their word and sack Appleton if we lose at the weekend. But I’m happy to take them at their word for now when they preach stability.
    I agree about stability, what upsets me is the random spin of our recent managerial wheel has landed on Appleton to bring that so called stability.

    I hope your optimism turns out to be true and Appleton wins every remaining game this season. 

    Then judging by results will be a happy experience.
  • edited January 11
    I don't know how good Appleton is. I do know, he hasn't got much chance with the squad he has and the injuries to key players. In the same way Holden didn't. I do think it is very important we have the right manager in place as even though promotion is not possible, the rest of the season, including this window is very important in terms of setting us up for next. 

    I would look back to Bowyer and Powell. The period they had in charge the season before promotion gave them a great picture of what they needed to do. In recent times they have been the only managers to bring success so I would look at what they did more than what Liverpool or Arsenal do. So is Appleton able to do this (I honestly don't know, but I think I would be unfair on him to decide no) and if he is, is the structure there that gives him the ability to? I was for Bowyer leaving as I think the toils of the club had taken its toll and he had lost the dressing room, but he has had a rest, and I wouldn't be averse to having him back in charge now. With Powell, he did it from a similar point to where we are now and he is in the game so hasn't lost touch. I don't know Appleton can do it but I know people who have done it can probably do it again if supported. Maybe, both Bowyer and Powell had more control over signings than this board woud want to give them.

    Going back further in time to our previous success, and again a manager who had the power to build his team, I am reminded that Curbs improved the team season on season until 2004, when we were the best Charlton team in my lifetime and probably the fourth best team in the country. Of course it is hard to maintain that, let alone improve on it. But the continuous improvement was down to having the right man, with the right amount of power and continuity. It is interesting when Curbs left that Murray couldn't wait to implement a new system which took a lot of the power away from the manager, despite what had brought us success, and it is a reminder that the egos of these people can be their worst enemies.
  • Croydon said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Genuine question if I may - what have you seen from him that gives you confidence he'll get us promoted? 
    When he's had an actual centre-forward at his disposal, and more than one functioning midfielder, he's had us looking pretty decent 
  • Leuth said:
    Croydon said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Genuine question if I may - what have you seen from him that gives you confidence he'll get us promoted? 
    When he's had an actual centre-forward at his disposal, and more than one functioning midfielder, he's had us looking pretty decent 
    We looked ok. I personally didn't see anything that would make me confident he'd get us promoted. 
  • Leuth said:
    Croydon said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Genuine question if I may - what have you seen from him that gives you confidence he'll get us promoted? 
    When he's had an actual centre-forward at his disposal, and more than one functioning midfielder, he's had us looking pretty decent 
    We beat a collection of the worst teams in the league at home. 

    I wouldn’t say we looked that decent either, more that if you have CBT, May, Aneke and Leaburn in your squad you probably beat those teams whoever the manager is 

    Never felt like we played that well or were set up well, just had one good spell in the game and those players were clinical and that was enough 
  • Wigan away was probably the only game we actually looked like a decent and well coached/set up team. And that game Appleton still picked the wrong team and only moved May central due to Camara’s injury 
  • Croydon said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Genuine question if I may - what have you seen from him that gives you confidence he'll get us promoted? 
    - Convincing home wins against Wycombe, Exeter and Reading. These weren’t scraped one nils, we put those teams away relatively comfortably each time in the end.

    - Battling performances to come back from behind to take points from Stevenage, Blackpool and Reading after we’d started to get a reputation pre-Appleton as a team that folds under pressure.


    IMO both of the above are far better than last season where we were prone to losing home games to Morecambe, Cheltenham etc. even with all our best players fit.

    Recent struggles with late dropped points have not been ideal but our home record under Apples is still good (1.8 ppg) and there is definitely an uptick in performance since the beginning last season (1.53 ppg).
  • supaclive said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Hardly going to say he’s got one game to save his job. 
    The word that kept coming up during the live stream was “stability”. At one point GC even said if sacking managers was a measure of success, we’d be in the Premier League already.

    That was music to my ears after going through Adkins, Jackson, Garner, Holden and now Appleton in three years if the fans had their way currently. I think at the very least 3/5 of those would be able to get us promoted if they had been properly supported. Instead they were disposed of at the first sight of trouble.

    The SMT could go back on their word and sack Appleton if we lose at the weekend. But I’m happy to take them at their word for now when they preach stability.
    You want Appleton to have another 2 1/2 seasons to get us out of League 1?

    So we MAY be in the Chamionship in 2026/27?

    Great.....
    Yea that’s the reality of the world we live in. There’s only three teams that go up every year. You can have the best manager and have the best squad but also need a bit of luck to be one of those three teams.

    You tell me I’m too positive but now I’m being too realistic? Which is it?

    I will say that if we’re not seriously involved in the top six race next season then that’s a failure. And if the following season we are not in the top two race, the same would apply. Being in the race doesn’t guarantee anything though.
  • supaclive said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Hardly going to say he’s got one game to save his job. 
    The word that kept coming up during the live stream was “stability”. At one point GC even said if sacking managers was a measure of success, we’d be in the Premier League already.

    That was music to my ears after going through Adkins, Jackson, Garner, Holden and now Appleton in three years if the fans had their way currently. I think at the very least 3/5 of those would be able to get us promoted if they had been properly supported. Instead they were disposed of at the first sight of trouble.

    The SMT could go back on their word and sack Appleton if we lose at the weekend. But I’m happy to take them at their word for now when they preach stability.
    You want Appleton to have another 2 1/2 seasons to get us out of League 1?

    So we MAY be in the Chamionship in 2026/27?

    Great.....
    Yea that’s the reality of the world we live in. There’s only three teams that go up every year. You can have the best manager and have the best squad but also need a bit of luck to be one of those three teams.

    You tell me I’m too positive but now I’m being too realistic? Which is it?

    I will say that if we’re not seriously involved in the top six race next season then that’s a failure. And if the following season we are not in the top two race, the same would apply. Being in the race doesn’t guarantee anything though.
    Scott said not challenging and being in the top 6 this season would be a failure 

    I agree with him

    I also don't think Appleton and Scott can deliver it for us.   You disagree. 

    I hope you're right.  I don't think you will be.

    But.  The best team, with the best manager will get promoted out of Divison 3.
  • Croydon said:
    I still have faith in him - think he'll turn us around and if we stick with him for the next season or two, he'll get us promoted. Noticeable tonight that they didn't even entertain the question about how long Appleton has got / why he's still here.
    Genuine question if I may - what have you seen from him that gives you confidence he'll get us promoted? 
    - Convincing home wins against Wycombe, Exeter and Reading. These weren’t scraped one nils, we put those teams away relatively comfortably each time in the end.

    - Battling performances to come back from behind to take points from Stevenage, Blackpool and Reading after we’d started to get a reputation pre-Appleton as a team that folds under pressure.


    IMO both of the above are far better than last season where we were prone to losing home games to Morecambe, Cheltenham etc. even with all our best players fit.

    Recent struggles with late dropped points have not been ideal but our home record under Apples is still good (1.8 ppg) and there is definitely an uptick in performance since the beginning last season (1.53 ppg).
    I wouldn't say Wycombe was particularly comfortable, scoreline of course but we struggled second half and got a goal against the run of play and CBT got a bit of a solo goal at the death when they were chasing.

    I am quite cynical about wins against ten men, Exeter was 2-1 and then Will Aimson was wrongly sent off, so much so that it was overturned. If we couldn't beat a ten men Exeter that would have been poor, especially with only half hour to play. 

    Reading were just pants tbf, I think now we would have a hard time but we caught them at a good time. Even then they had as many chances we were just more clinical on the day. 

    If you look at last season you've said we were prone to losing home games to some shoddy sides, but we also beat Derby 1 nil, Plymouth 5-1 (similar to Exeter red card), Exeter 4-2, Pompey 3-0, Barnsley 2-0 by the 14th of Jan and then of course the highlight Shrewsbury 6 nil when players were at the beach. 

    If we manage to beat Peterborough on Saturday, we will be 1 point worse off than we were last season where we had 34. 


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  • Appleton had a decent run to start with, but since then he hasn’t even tried to go back to that formula that was working well for him. 

    If it looked like his plan was to go back to that 4-2-3-1 with May as a 10 then I’d be ok with giving him time. But all the evidence points to his plan being a 4-3-3 with May on the right 

    His plan wastes the talents of our best player, so it is really hard to get behind him and trust that he will turn this around given time and resources. 

    Personally I think we could get a better manager with a much better plan (Michael Duff, 3-5-2, May and a partner) that has a much better recent track record that Appleton does. 
  • He had a fit Aneke and Leaburn to start with.
  • Best manager we've had since Curbs? I'd say so 
  • MrBurns said:
    Best manager we've had since Curbs? I'd say so 
    He’ll be gone in February.
  • MrBurns said:
    Best manager we've had since Curbs? I'd say so 
    He’ll be gone in February.
    Fucking hope so.
  • Get rid of him now. Should never have been appointed in the first place. 
  • MrBurns said:
    Best manager we've had since Curbs? I'd say so 
    He’ll be gone in February.
    I bet you he wont. The season is dead we ain’t going down, and we sure as hell ain’t getting into the playoffs even with a wonder run.

    He will get this season at least, and it makes sense to considering it looks like there’s going to be a big rebuild going on during the next two transfer windows - and he’s already had big input into that. 

    If results don’t improve with the new January signings, then I expect he will be out of work end of this season. If results do improve and say we start averaging 2 points a game again like we did when he had Leaburn and Aneke fit - then justifiable he will stay.

    Down to him really. 
  • edited January 13
    Very tough run of fixtures until end of February. Must be at least 9 without a win in the league now. Once you hit double figures you’re always at risk. If we haven’t won by Reading away and that gap between relegation is down to 1 or 2 I I think he will be gone. 
    I’m certain he won’t be in charge by pre-season. 
  • edited January 13
    Very tough run of fixtures until end of February. Must be at least 9 without a win in the league now. Once you hit double figures you’re always at risk. I’m certain he won’t be in charge by pre-season. 
    It's 10 games since we won.

    1 win in 11 in the league.
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  • Very tough run of fixtures until end of February. Must be at least 9 without a win in the league now. Once you hit double figures you’re always at risk. I’m certain he won’t be in charge by pre-season. 
    It's 10 games since we won.

    1 win in 11 in the league.
    That one win was over Cheltenham, with 2 pens, it really didn’t feel like a win.
  • The bloke simply has to go. Wrong line up yet again
  • I would say he has to pick things up and whether he does or not will determine whether he stays of goes. The second half against one of the better teams in this league was good. Not perfect but a step in the right direction which now needs to be followed by other steps. I think we can't keep sacking managers and we do need to see where we are after the window and whether we look to be in a position to push on next season. I would rather a considered decision rather than one from the gut. 
  • It’s taken him months and he’s ruined our season, but finally second half today he put us in a 3-5-2 and it was the best we’ve looked for ages. Hopefully he keeps playing it, then I might be prepared to give him a bit longer (I have been Appleton out for ages). If we go 3-5-2 and build for that then I think that’s a good plan and I’d give him time, unless we keep losing 
  • MrBurns said:
    MrBurns said:
    Best manager we've had since Curbs? I'd say so 
    He’ll be gone in February.
    He needs to go tonight 
    I agree, but after Wednesdays’s Q and A the owners would have to do a big U turn on their cunning plan.
  • NabySarr said:
    It’s taken him months and he’s ruined our season, but finally second half today he put us in a 3-5-2 and it was the best we’ve looked for ages. Hopefully he keeps playing it, then I might be prepared to give him a bit longer (I have been Appleton out for ages). If we go 3-5-2 and build for that then I think that’s a good plan and I’d give him time, unless we keep losing 
    We cant really play a 3-5-2 with CBT in the team though. 

    And for me, and why I keep banging on about it - it’s the biggest issue we have currently. Our squad is not fully suited to play a 4-3-3 or a 3-5-2.

    It feels like maybe we are buying players for a 3-5-2 especially with the money we are willing to spend on a striker. 

    Guess we will see soon enough if that’s the way we are going. 

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