Feel for Shrewsbury fans to be fair. Still watched many of GAs interviews and despite the desperate situation he gave them some hope talking of the long term project there and his commitment to the cause. Leaving for Gillingham is a poor look IMO. Interested to see his interview tomorrow, expect he will hide behind the lack of takeover being finalised at Shrewsbury. He can't complain about a low budget as that was well known.
I saw this, and the fan is incorrect anyway - it was 9-10 points when GA arrived, and at one point he almost completely closed the gap. I am not sure what happened lately, but there was a point where they were level with safety in the live table!
Better move or not I'm quite disappointed. I thought GA would at least stay until the end of the season even if he went after relegation.hope the Shrews get someone who can make a fist of survival.
Totally agree. I watched his joining video and all his post match interviews and he said how he loved being in Shrewsbury and how proud he was managing the team etc etc. Persuaded Blackman, Wheeler and Gape to join and then moves on. Didn’t he also persuade David Waites to move as well. I always felt that Ainsworth was a man of integrity, honesty and certainly loyalty. We will never know what’s happened behind the scenes but this has tarnished his reputation.
This is going to get downvoted to hell, but IDGAF…
In a world where clubs will drop managers at the drop of a hat or managers get absolute dogs abuse from fans of their own teams, why are we expecting more loyalty show BY managers compared to the loyalty shown TO managers?
Spoke to my colleague this morning who is friends with GA.
Promises around budgets for next year hadn’t materialised due to the takeover stalling.
He was also really struggling with the 3.5 hour commute and not seeing his wife/kids. He’d been talking to the chairman around this for several months.
The statement the chairman put out yesterday is a bit disingenuous as he’d made it clear he was struggling for a while.
I can see the budget issue. If he is not to be given an adequate budget for next year - as perhaps now seems likely , this takeover has taken too long - another Reading situation? - then Gareth's future there would appear to be struggle in Lg2, trash his reputation further and probably get fired by Christmas. That doesn't sound attractive.
He could see out the season but no guarantee then that any alternative job would be available. Hard to see the real point anyway as Shrewsbury are doomed. Leaving now gives him the opportunity to get to know Gillingham players characters and abilities this season and give him a better chance of getting summer recruitment right.
It makes sense to move now if he thinks Gillingham is an attractive opportunity.
Honestly not convinced the commute is a factor here. Reading-Gillingham would be at least two hours and a much harder and less predictable drive than Shrewsbury. He is going to have to stay overnight in Gillingham (a much less attractive place to be) almost as much as he currently does in Shrewsbury. Dobbo from the new forest if anything worse.
Gillingham fans seem happy about this. The general mood is that League Two isn't the place for tippy tappy football and a 'thump it to the big man' manager should do well.
Its a good two hour drive one way from Reading to Gillingham. Given Gareth would likely have to travel at rush hour to get to training, that might well be higher. Can't see that being doable on a regular basis.
However nice the hotel is, there will be times when you just want to get out otherwise the walls close in. Shrewsbury is nicer than Gillingham to do that in.
Anyway it doesn't really matter. Gareth has chosen to make the move. I am sure he has his reasons. I wish him nothing but success in the role.
I understand there are practicalities to consider and I can understand if Gaz thinks he is over punching above the financial realities, but I am genuinely surprised that he left at this stage. I know great business minds and cynics will say it's just the way it is or that's what Gaz was always really like and we were just silly heads with rose tinted glasses who would not wake up and smell the coffee but, for me, the optics are really bad.
Saving a couple of hours a day is not a small thing, and they always used to start very early to be ready for when the players arrived.
It's their decision and I'm sure they have their reasons but I wouldn't entirely dismiss any thoughts of the Shrews fans purely because they were good to us.
Because football is quite unusual in being a business that people fall in love with. There aren't many jobs where people will turn up in their thousands and sing how much you mean to them. So, this misplaced loyalty can upset people when managers/players move to a new job.
I can't think of other examples outside of football but I suppose Innocent Drinks pretending to be hippies before letting Coca Cola take them over is a bit similar. Some of their customers were quite upset.
I don't think it is just simply people losing their minds over someone 'moving to a new job'. As we have seen ourselves, often it is the manner of the moving.
We could forgive (to some extent) GA leaving us to go to QPR. I would not have booed him on his return. Given the tone of his interviews and his promises to do the best for the club, I fear Shrews fans will be less charitable.
@Kim_il_Swan The partners at Innocent actually sold to Coca Cola whilst keeping management control of business decisions for the brand (that they had taken the risk to create).
Wouldn’t that, arguably, have been more like a change of ownership at Wycombe but with Blooms continuing to manage the team?
Can’t imagine any of the clubs ‘customers’ would have been upset if that had been the case.
”Given the tone of his interviews and his promises to do the best for the club” - See, this is what I don’t get. Why would any manager do anything other than be positive as possible in interviews, especially when starting a new job? What would people expect other than the tone he gave and promises of giving his best?
I mean, it would be a certain amount of refreshing to rock up and say:
“Tell you what, compared to the bistros of Marlow, Shrewsbury town centre is a shit hole.
The players are average and can’t be arsed half the time and we’ve got no money to get anyone halfway decent.
my commute is such a pain in the arse, by the time I get to the training ground it’s time for me to turn around and go home. All in all, I’m going to give it about 75%, give you nothing in my interviews and put in the maximum claims I can on my travel expenses”.
Very interesting quote from Joe Jacobson on the BBC website (I hadn't realised he now worked occasionally as a BBC Shropshire match summariser).
"I saw Roland's statement (the open letter to fans from the club chairman) and I actually liked the statement. It was good the fact he talked about offering him a contract. You then start to think why didn't he sign the contract a while ago?"
If even JJ is left nonplussed by Ainsworth's actions you know he's done himself real reputational damage in the game. It's all very rum.
The link you posted does not include any comment from JJ. It does have comments from BBc match summariser Jamie Tolley. Perhaps it has been changed.
The comment you quote says "You then start to think why didn't he sign the contract a while ago". The reason for that is presumably he wasn't happy at the slow pace of the takeover and doubted he would have a workable budget for next year. The comments you post don't read to me as remotely critical of GA or that JJ is non-plussed. You do seem to have a great affection for shit-stirring.
The hard thing for GA is that his demonstrative and positive nature make the optics look different than when it is a run-of-the-mill manager upping sticks. In the article posted by @aloysius above he says:
"I'm never going to be a Salopian as I wasn't born there. But I feel as Salopian as possible. I get proud crazily with this team. We're going to go on one hell of a journey. Stick with us."
That was earlier this month. @TheDancingYak makes good points above about managers not usually being negative (with obvious exceptions), but I think GA's over-the-top hopefulness - a good quality in itself - makes a situation like this look worse. Instead of just saying "I am trying my best and will give my all as long as I am at this club" or something to that effect, he goes way beyond that with quotes about feeling "as Salopian as possible" and "one hell of a journey" ahead. These kind of quotes are great in the moment, but irrespective of what really happened, I can see why Shrewsbury fans themselves might be miffed having those quotes ringing in their ears.
As @eric_plant said above though, GA and Dobbo have not even spoken yet, and it's easy to make a quick rush to judgment. Ultimately it's not our club, and football is a broken sport.
Joey Barton didn't get a custodial sentence for kicking his wife in the head - IDK, but his wife didn't want to press changes - so presumably he is available to take the position if offered?
JB was the only example I could think of where we might all be of the same opinion. Massive t****r!
My point was, for me, Gareth of all managers, seemed to wear his heart on his sleeve and was not one for rolling out the usual platitudes and, in fact, I thought his interviews were not the usual incoming manager cliches and he seemed to have a real belief that he could get things 'rocking'.
Thus, the departure so late in the season seems out of character for me. Hope that helps you get my post.
Innocent led the way in folksy bullshit and crayon style packaging and claimed to be so, so ethical. Then they sold out to a company which symbolises capitalism. So that would be more like Bloomfield claiming to love Wycombe then......nevermind.
Comments
Feel for Shrewsbury fans to be fair. Still watched many of GAs interviews and despite the desperate situation he gave them some hope talking of the long term project there and his commitment to the cause. Leaving for Gillingham is a poor look IMO. Interested to see his interview tomorrow, expect he will hide behind the lack of takeover being finalised at Shrewsbury. He can't complain about a low budget as that was well known.
I saw this, and the fan is incorrect anyway - it was 9-10 points when GA arrived, and at one point he almost completely closed the gap. I am not sure what happened lately, but there was a point where they were level with safety in the live table!
Better move or not I'm quite disappointed. I thought GA would at least stay until the end of the season even if he went after relegation.hope the Shrews get someone who can make a fist of survival.
Totally agree. I watched his joining video and all his post match interviews and he said how he loved being in Shrewsbury and how proud he was managing the team etc etc. Persuaded Blackman, Wheeler and Gape to join and then moves on. Didn’t he also persuade David Waites to move as well. I always felt that Ainsworth was a man of integrity, honesty and certainly loyalty. We will never know what’s happened behind the scenes but this has tarnished his reputation.
Tarnished? I don’t think so.
Also, they are all being paid a wage aren’t they? Didn’t see a queue of other clubs coming for Wheeler and Gape, he’s done them a favour.
This is going to get downvoted to hell, but IDGAF…
In a world where clubs will drop managers at the drop of a hat or managers get absolute dogs abuse from fans of their own teams, why are we expecting more loyalty show BY managers compared to the loyalty shown TO managers?
Spoke to my colleague this morning who is friends with GA.
Promises around budgets for next year hadn’t materialised due to the takeover stalling.
He was also really struggling with the 3.5 hour commute and not seeing his wife/kids. He’d been talking to the chairman around this for several months.
The statement the chairman put out yesterday is a bit disingenuous as he’d made it clear he was struggling for a while.
I can see the budget issue. If he is not to be given an adequate budget for next year - as perhaps now seems likely , this takeover has taken too long - another Reading situation? - then Gareth's future there would appear to be struggle in Lg2, trash his reputation further and probably get fired by Christmas. That doesn't sound attractive.
He could see out the season but no guarantee then that any alternative job would be available. Hard to see the real point anyway as Shrewsbury are doomed. Leaving now gives him the opportunity to get to know Gillingham players characters and abilities this season and give him a better chance of getting summer recruitment right.
It makes sense to move now if he thinks Gillingham is an attractive opportunity.
Honestly not convinced the commute is a factor here. Reading-Gillingham would be at least two hours and a much harder and less predictable drive than Shrewsbury. He is going to have to stay overnight in Gillingham (a much less attractive place to be) almost as much as he currently does in Shrewsbury. Dobbo from the new forest if anything worse.
Disagree. The commute time will be at least one and a half hours less if avoiding the rush hour.
If your just staying overnight in a hotel it doesn't make much difference if it's in gillingham or Shrewsbury. Your not on holiday!
Gillingham fans seem happy about this. The general mood is that League Two isn't the place for tippy tappy football and a 'thump it to the big man' manager should do well.
Its a good two hour drive one way from Reading to Gillingham. Given Gareth would likely have to travel at rush hour to get to training, that might well be higher. Can't see that being doable on a regular basis.
However nice the hotel is, there will be times when you just want to get out otherwise the walls close in. Shrewsbury is nicer than Gillingham to do that in.
Anyway it doesn't really matter. Gareth has chosen to make the move. I am sure he has his reasons. I wish him nothing but success in the role.
Finchampstead. So a little bit closer.
Leave a bit earlier and probably closer to 1hr 40 then 2 hours.
Either way a lot easier than a minimum 3hour trip whatever time you leave.
If ten years at Wycombe isn’t proof that GA is indeed a man who values loyalty and integrity then I don’t know what is.
I understand there are practicalities to consider and I can understand if Gaz thinks he is over punching above the financial realities, but I am genuinely surprised that he left at this stage. I know great business minds and cynics will say it's just the way it is or that's what Gaz was always really like and we were just silly heads with rose tinted glasses who would not wake up and smell the coffee but, for me, the optics are really bad.
Saving a couple of hours a day is not a small thing, and they always used to start very early to be ready for when the players arrived.
It's their decision and I'm sure they have their reasons but I wouldn't entirely dismiss any thoughts of the Shrews fans purely because they were good to us.
Because football is quite unusual in being a business that people fall in love with. There aren't many jobs where people will turn up in their thousands and sing how much you mean to them. So, this misplaced loyalty can upset people when managers/players move to a new job.
I can't think of other examples outside of football but I suppose Innocent Drinks pretending to be hippies before letting Coca Cola take them over is a bit similar. Some of their customers were quite upset.
I don't think it is just simply people losing their minds over someone 'moving to a new job'. As we have seen ourselves, often it is the manner of the moving.
We could forgive (to some extent) GA leaving us to go to QPR. I would not have booed him on his return. Given the tone of his interviews and his promises to do the best for the club, I fear Shrews fans will be less charitable.
45 minutes to Gillingham from St Pancras on the train. Reading to London about 25 minutes. Would imagine he could stand a cab at either end too.
It doesn’t look great but I’ve never seen any behaviour from GA that would suggest he’d cut and run without good reason.
@Kim_il_Swan The partners at Innocent actually sold to Coca Cola whilst keeping management control of business decisions for the brand (that they had taken the risk to create).
Wouldn’t that, arguably, have been more like a change of ownership at Wycombe but with Blooms continuing to manage the team?
Can’t imagine any of the clubs ‘customers’ would have been upset if that had been the case.
How about when Bob Dylan went electric? Now that's betrayal!
”Given the tone of his interviews and his promises to do the best for the club” - See, this is what I don’t get. Why would any manager do anything other than be positive as possible in interviews, especially when starting a new job? What would people expect other than the tone he gave and promises of giving his best?
I mean, it would be a certain amount of refreshing to rock up and say:
“Tell you what, compared to the bistros of Marlow, Shrewsbury town centre is a shit hole.
The players are average and can’t be arsed half the time and we’ve got no money to get anyone halfway decent.
my commute is such a pain in the arse, by the time I get to the training ground it’s time for me to turn around and go home. All in all, I’m going to give it about 75%, give you nothing in my interviews and put in the maximum claims I can on my travel expenses”.
Very interesting quote from Joe Jacobson on the BBC website (I hadn't realised he now worked occasionally as a BBC Shropshire match summariser).
"I saw Roland's statement (the open letter to fans from the club chairman) and I actually liked the statement. It was good the fact he talked about offering him a contract. You then start to think why didn't he sign the contract a while ago?"
If even JJ is left nonplussed by Ainsworth's actions you know he's done himself real reputational damage in the game. It's all very rum.
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/cr42gx4p3e9o
I was always pretty sceptical of BrewDog but I didn’t think their owner would turn out to be a massive Tory and wannabe Elon Musk
Never ceases to amaze me how many people are so keen to offer an opinion when they don't know the facts
As far as I'm aware neither Gareth Ainsworth nor Richard Dobson has said a word about the circumstances surrounding their departure from Shrewsbury
Those would be the only opinions, along with those of the Shrewsbury chairman and board, that I'd be interested to hear
The link you posted does not include any comment from JJ. It does have comments from BBc match summariser Jamie Tolley. Perhaps it has been changed.
The comment you quote says "You then start to think why didn't he sign the contract a while ago". The reason for that is presumably he wasn't happy at the slow pace of the takeover and doubted he would have a workable budget for next year. The comments you post don't read to me as remotely critical of GA or that JJ is non-plussed. You do seem to have a great affection for shit-stirring.
The hard thing for GA is that his demonstrative and positive nature make the optics look different than when it is a run-of-the-mill manager upping sticks. In the article posted by @aloysius above he says:
"I'm never going to be a Salopian as I wasn't born there. But I feel as Salopian as possible. I get proud crazily with this team. We're going to go on one hell of a journey. Stick with us."
That was earlier this month. @TheDancingYak makes good points above about managers not usually being negative (with obvious exceptions), but I think GA's over-the-top hopefulness - a good quality in itself - makes a situation like this look worse. Instead of just saying "I am trying my best and will give my all as long as I am at this club" or something to that effect, he goes way beyond that with quotes about feeling "as Salopian as possible" and "one hell of a journey" ahead. These kind of quotes are great in the moment, but irrespective of what really happened, I can see why Shrewsbury fans themselves might be miffed having those quotes ringing in their ears.
As @eric_plant said above though, GA and Dobbo have not even spoken yet, and it's easy to make a quick rush to judgment. Ultimately it's not our club, and football is a broken sport.
Union busting scum who treat their staff like shit too.
Joey Barton didn't get a custodial sentence for kicking his wife in the head - IDK, but his wife didn't want to press changes - so presumably he is available to take the position if offered?
JB was the only example I could think of where we might all be of the same opinion. Massive t****r!
@TheDancingYak I do know how the world works.
My point was, for me, Gareth of all managers, seemed to wear his heart on his sleeve and was not one for rolling out the usual platitudes and, in fact, I thought his interviews were not the usual incoming manager cliches and he seemed to have a real belief that he could get things 'rocking'.
Thus, the departure so late in the season seems out of character for me. Hope that helps you get my post.
Innocent led the way in folksy bullshit and crayon style packaging and claimed to be so, so ethical. Then they sold out to a company which symbolises capitalism. So that would be more like Bloomfield claiming to love Wycombe then......nevermind.