This article is part of Football League World’s ‘Terrace Talk’ series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…
Stockport County has had their fair share of problematic managers, most notably during their collapse to the sixth division.
But the Hatters’ return to League One hasn’t been without its challenges.
That includes the hiring of Simon Rusk as head coach, with his brief tenure in 2021 seen as a complete disaster.
Stockport fan explains where Simon Rusk’s tenure went wrong
We asked James Crop, our Stockport Fan Pundit, for his thoughts on the worst manager to ever take command of Edgeley Park.
His selection stems from County’s climb up the divisions, when the club’s new owners were wanting to stamp their mark on the club, which saw Rusk emerge as a very modern, highly thought-of coach – it didn’t last long or end well, though.
Speaking with Football League World, James stated:
“I’m definitely going with a recent pick again, Simon Rusk, who managed us briefly in the National League.
“And, I believe, the reason things went wrong was that he had clearly taken over from the famous Jim Gannon, who had just promoted us from the National League North.
“So, he had to have something unusual about him, and he just didn’t act like a manager.
“We removed him from the Brighton Under-23s management, because he had no prior managerial experience.
“At first, it appeared he was going to do well. He signed in January 2021 and went on an 18-game unbeaten streak in the National League, but the start of the following season demonstrated the type of manager he was.
“It was just that we were performing so poorly, and he didn’t comport himself in the way you’d anticipate.
“His interviews were not great, and, it’s quite difficult to explain, because he’s probably a better manager tactically than some of the managers we’ve previously had, but he’s just really not a very good man-manager, and it showed because the players didn’t look like they wanted to be there and he didn’t look like he wanted to be there towards the end.”
Simon Rusk had a difficult job on his hands with Stockport County
As James points out, the County post was Rusk’s first senior managerial experience, which meant greater duties interacting with the press and fans than he’d had in his previous academy-level jobs.
He also had the difficult burden of succeeding Jim Gannon, a club legend who is still highly valued at the club and whose dismissal many fans disagreed with at the time.
Gannon was the manager inherited by Mark Stott when he took over the club and placed Simon Wilson as director of football – a leader who was accustomed to having a big say in talent identification and signings.
Simon Rusk’s record as Stockport County manager – according to Soccerbase
Played
42
Won
21
Drawn
12
Lost
9
Stott made it clear that he wanted his own man in control, and Rusk was his choice.
But County were a challenging club at the time, adjusting to new riches, rising expectations, and dealing with a fanbase that, understandably, believed they were well below the level a club like County should be at.
It was a position that required an experienced operator to propel the club ahead, and after Rusk’s tenure, they finally found such man in Dave Challinor.
Rusk has since gone on to coach Premier League clubs and has worked with England’s development setup, so he is obviously no slouch in the coaching game — but it appears that it was simply a case of the wrong position, for the wrong man, at the wrong time.
Read more…https://sportupdates.co.uk/
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