Finally a Premier League managerial change

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A couple of days ago I wrote about the sudden rush of sackings in Leagues One and Two, probably the most ridiculous of them coming at Notts County where Harry Kewell had hardly got his feet under the table.

Then, no Premier League manager had lost his job. Arsenal, Chelsea, Everton and West Ham all made changes during the summer but the last Premier League manager to leave his post during the season was Alan Pardew who was sacked by West Brom on 2nd April, just two days after our first win at the Hawthorns since 1969.

Embed from Getty ImagesThat changed yesterday with the news from Fulham that not only had Slavisa Jokanovic been sacked but they’d replaced him with Claudio Ranieri. It was a shock because Jokanovic had been told his job was safe even though they’d dropped to the bottom of the league.

But their position in the league has cost him his job, a manager who has twice won promotion to the Premier League, with Watford in 2015 and Fulham this year, yet his only Premier League victory was Fulham’s 4-2 win against us in August.

Ranieri wasn’t first choice. It’s surfaced now that they’d approached Arsène Wenger, Andre Villas-Boas and Quique Sanchez Flores prior to making their move for former Chelsea and Leicester boss Ranieri who was at Leicester last Saturday where he received a warm reception from their fans.

The departed and the new Fulham managers know each other very well. When Ranieri took over at Chelsea in 2000 his first signing was Jokanovic.

There has been a lot of rumour that here is dressing room unrest at Fulham with a number of the players who won them promotion being ditched as they went money crazy in the market, spending over £100 million in the last window, a figure only beaten by Chelsea and Liverpool.

I’m delighted to see Ranieri back, his press conferences are good fun. Dilly ding, dilly dong.

So, finally a Premier League managerial change, but who will be next? Mark Hughes is the current favourite, closely followed by Jose Mourinho and Roy Hodgson.

 

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