I’ve put together this article about Eddie Howe and Newcastle United’s owners replacing him with a ‘proven winner’, in response to an interesting piece that appeared in The Mag earlier today (Wednesday).
The article was from ‘BarrowMag’ and was entitled ‘Saudi Arabia PIF had their Newcastle United plan and four years later Eddie Howe didn’t feature’…
The author talked about how he believes the original plan from Newcastle United’s owners was to bring in Eddie Howe for a limited period and then replace him with a ‘proven winner’ in the not-too-distant future.
Rather bizarrely, having not done so for almost four years, BarrowMag reckons that last summer would have been an ideal time for Eddie Howe to be replaced, after winning a trophy and qualifying for the Champions League for the second time in three seasons.
He believes that if the owners of Newcastle United had already appointed their new CEO (David Hopkinson) and director of football (Ross Wilson) at that time, they would indeed have replaced Eddie Howe with someone else, a ‘proven winner’ or a not-so-obvious new manager.
I found the article interesting, although I disagreed with most of it, which is of course the great thing about The Mag. There are articles from countless Newcastle United fans and why would we all think the same, that would be really bizarre!
There’s a reason they’re called “op-eds.” It’s one person’s opinion and I enjoy reading probably 90% of the opinion articles that appear on The Mag, including those I disagree with.
Proven winners
What I wanted to talk about was the idea of Newcastle United bringing in a ‘proven winner’ to replace Eddie Howe.
I have heard other Newcastle United fans and even journalists talk about the idea of a ‘proven winner’ who can take the team and the club to the next level, yet it often seems like a lazy thing to say to me, with very rarely any of these ‘proven winners’ actually being mentioned. Who would automatically be expected to do better than Eddie Howe?
In today’s article, the author mentioned Carlo Ancelotti or Guus Hiddink, when he talked about ‘proven winners’ in his article.
I checked and Hiddink has won a lot of trophies, especially as a manager in the Netherlands at PSV. However, he will turn 80 later this year and his last few jobs were with China Under 21s and then Curacao, before his apparent retirement from football management in 2021.
As for Ancelotti, he will ‘only’ turn 67 later this year and appears to be winding down his career, having opted to leave Real Madrid to become coach of Brazil. A job that has high demands, but has much less daily intensity than club football. He has won quite a few trophies, but it’s worth pointing out that in addition to his age, these were also his last two jobs before Real Madrid saw him sacked by Napoli and then finished 12th and 10th in the Premier League at Everton.
If Eddie Howe were to leave Newcastle United for whatever reason, I wouldn’t be upset if Carlo Ancelotti replaced him. However, at his age I wouldn’t see it as a long term appointment and with the same resources/players as Eddie Howe, with PSR/SCR limitations, would he really be a magic answer? He certainly wasn’t at Everton.
However, I think in terms of ‘proven winners’ the names that come to mind are generally older guys who were successful at the time. Be it Fergia, Wenger, Mourinho, Rafa and so on.
Who exactly are the ‘proven winners’ these days, who are still…’proven winners’? Certainly not someone from the quartet mentioned in that last sentence.
There is Pep Guardiola BUT different from him???
Premier League ‘Big Six’
I think if we give the idea of Newcastle United appointing a (mythical!) ‘proven winner’ it might enlighten us to look at who the ‘Big Six’ have appointed in recent times.
After all, these are the clubs with a lot more money than Newcastle United, which they can spend on transfer fees, wages and ‘proven winners’…
Pep Guardiola is obviously at Manchester City for the long term, so we need to focus on the other five.
Arsenal
Mikel Arteta was recruited from Man City, he had never succeeded before and was Pep’s assistant.
He has now been at Arsenal since 2019 and, apart from winning the FA Cup in his first season there, has not won anything since.
Chelsea
In their last few appointments, Chelsea have brought in Enzo Maresca, who had previously only performed in the Italian second tier and the English Championship.
The Chelsea owners subsequently sacked Maresca and replaced him with Liam Rosenior, who had previously only performed in the Championship with Hull, and before that in France with Strasbourg, the club the Chelsea owners also own. He only spent one full season there, finishing seventh in the weak Ligue 1, despite huge help from the Chelsea association, helping with players etc.
Tracks
They have just sacked a manager who had made his name at old-school Brentford and failed to win any major trophies there, his only other managerial experience in Denmark.
Spurs previously employed Big Ange, who had only done so in the weak leagues of Australia, Japan and Scotland.
Manchester United
Ten Hag had only succeeded in the Netherlands, Amorim only in Portugal.
Now fed up with paying compensation, Man U have hired Michael Carrick, who was sacked from his only previous job at Championship Boro.
Liverpool
Klopp had been at Liverpool for a long time, but when they replaced him, they hired someone who is now 47 years old, who had previously only scored in the Netherlands.
Proven winners again
If you can’t be moved by all these ‘proven winners’ walking around, you have to ask the question: why do the richest clubs in England keep ignoring them when they need to make a change?
It’s almost as if these ‘proven winners’ don’t really exist, regardless of Pep Guardiola.
You only really appreciate what you have…
I also love it when you have Newcastle United fans who are keen to hire one of the ‘promising’ young managers in place of Eddie Howe.
I’m just blindly happy to part with someone who is still only 48, who took minnows Bournemouth all the way from almost non-league to the Premier League. Then came and rescued Newcastle from an almost impossible position, previously in his three full seasons to date, achieving two Champions League qualifications, two cup finals and one trophy, all against the odds.
Yet Newcastle United fans, some at least, would without a doubt replace Eddie Howe with Andoni Iraola or Fabian Hurzeler, to name just two.
I think it’s incredible.
People will say look at these young managers and what they have done with less resources etc.
We all thought Thomas Frank was someone who could take things a step further. Graham Potter before him and so on.
The fact is that Eddie Howe is already a ‘proven’ success story at Newcastle United. With far fewer resources and other advantages that the ‘Big Six’ have, he has succeeded against all odds and continues to do so, under very difficult circumstances this season.
Put it this way, if the likes of Man U, Spurs and Chelsea were to fire their managers this season, they would have dreamed of signing a ‘proven’ success story like Eddie Howe.
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