23 managers have been fired in England since the beginning of the season. As many of half of England’s 92 league clubs have had a manager who has been in position for less than a year.
Despite some prominent exceptions, it is not a managerial merry go round in which managers leave one club and quickly find a berth at another one. 55 per cent of first-time managers never manage again (although some of these may not have been suited to the job). Only 36 per cent of those sacked last season are back in work. It takes an average of 1.63 years for a manager to find another job.
23 managers have been fired in England since the beginning of the season. As many of half of England’s 92 league clubs have had a manager who has been in position for less than a year.
Despite some prominent exceptions, it is not a managerial merry go round in which managers leave one club and quickly find a berth at another one. 55 per cent of first-time managers never manage again (although some of these may not have been suited to the job). Only 36 per cent of those sacked last season are back in work. It takes an average of 1.63 years for a manager to find another job.
The League Managers Association is now calling for the Football Association to impose sanctions on clubs who flout employment law when changing technical staff. The ultimate sanction could be directors of offending clubs being banned from holding office.
Richard Bevan, chief executive of the LMA, argues that most sackings in football are unfair dismissals and that the law doesn’t dissuade clubs. In normal business, before someone is made redundant the employer will sit down with the human resources department and lawyers and look at their obligations. In football it works the other way round, claims Bevan: fire first and look at the legality later.
On one level, this does not surprise me as the ‘world of football’ often thinks it is outside the rules and norms of society, with its laws being seen as an unwelcome intrusion.
What is more difficult to fathom is why it is thought efficacious to sack managers. All the evidence suggests that in most cases it has little effect and it costs the game about £100m a year in compensation. However, with so much at stake, directors are under pressure to ‘do something’ from fans and sacking the manager may seem the easiest option.