Alex Reid looks at whether the once ever-present appearance of English clubs in the later stages of the Champions League is set to become a thing of the past
Craig Dobson looks at QPR's decision to sack Neil Warnock and replace him with Mark Hughes
Andy Pakes previews this Sunday afternoon clash in the first edition of Game of the Week for 2012
Dave Hughes tells us about his sporting hero, Wes Morgan
Yet anyone following events at Ewood Park a little more closely would find it hard to feel anything but a sense of disgust at the way that fans have turned their back upon their own club. Protests at every game and chants of ‘Kean out’ and ‘Venkys out’ at every opportunity possible have only served to create a siege mentality with a full scale war about to break out. It is without a doubt a case of fans vs club, and like any battle it has turned very ugly.
When managers are about to come to the end of their tenure, there are usually the tell-tale signs. Uncertainty and a lack of clarity on the part of the owners of the club usually arrives first, then a period of silence before the dreaded phone call which confirms that said manager is no longer in a job. When fans choose to vent their frustration towards the manager, they very rarely aim such hatred and venom towards the owners of the club because even the most short sighted football fan is able to realise that it is only the owner who has the power and control to dismiss a manager.
Likewise when club owners are the ones to feel the force of the fans’ frustration, it usually accompanies a sense of backing of the manager and team to create a mood of team vs club. Driving such a wedge often, albeit sadly, again results in the loss of a manager because he is the one man that the owners have direct control over.
I suppose many Rovers fans would have been sat around the Christmas table this year and wished for both Venkys and Kean to depart the club, but the foolish nature of their misguided protests have only served to strengthen the bond between the manager, the owners and the team. In shouting for everyone to leave the club, even when the team is winning, the fans have isolated themselves as the bad guys, and almost inconceivably the man who has only guided his team to eleven wins since taking reign over a year ago has drawn praise from all corners of the football world and is the good guy in a situation best described as a pantomime gone wrong.
When Venkys took over at Blackburn last year and immediately proceeded to sack Sam Allardyce, many Rovers fans would have dreamed of a big name appointment to take the club forward. So when the decision was made to give the job to then First-Team Coach Kean, it was hardly met with the greatest amount of optimism. Whether Kean was a cheap option or not is irrelevant, he was the choice of the owners and crucially remains their pick despite a torrid year.
Perhaps it is about time that the fans at Ewood Park started to show some backing towards their team as we move into the New Year. Whether they approve of Kean or not has gone beyond the point of irrelevant because it appears as though he is going nowhere any time soon. With a bit less shouting from the fans, if Rovers’ results don’t pick up then there will be nothing to cloud the issue. Judging Kean on his record admittedly would leave the Blackburn manager out of a job in no time, but while ever the fans continue to get on his back, the team’s back and the owners’ backs, it will only serve to galvanise the troubled club in their mission for Premier League survival.
You must log in to submit a comment.
