English Football Betting: My manager of the year awards

Football Food For Thought / Paul Moon / 03 May 2010 / 4

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Paul Lambert transformed Norwich's fortunes, arriving shortly after they were mauled 7-1 at home to Colchester, managed that day by....Paul Lambert

"For stabilising the absolute chaos at St James’ Park Chris Hughton deservedly takes the award for best manager in the Championship this season."

Paul Moon looks at who are the most deserving managers to be crowned the best in their division across the top four leagues in English football...

As the English football season draws to a close, it's time to look at which manager has performed best for his club with the players or resources available or which team over-performed or exceeded expectations because of the manager's influence. Despite an effort not to nominate winners of their respective divisions, the nominees effectively picked themselves.

The summer take-over by Munto Finance promised millions of pounds of investment for Notts County in League Two but despite the arrival of Sven-Goran Eriksson as Director Of Football, the funds never materialised. A turbulent six months followed before the club was eventually sold to new chairman Ray Trew for £1 and it was he who had the foresight to reject the option of administration, before securing the services of Steve Cotterill.

Although only managing the club for 17 games his impact was immediate and decisive with 14 wins and just one loss. The club scored 40 goals in that time and conceded just six. When Cotterill joined the club they were 14 points behind leaders Rochdale and outside the play-off positions with promotion far from assured. It was his enthusiasm that galvanised the players to complete an outstanding second half of the season.

The latest news from the County Ground is that he will have his position rubber stamped within the next few days and will be given a decent budget to work with for League One, so able to bring his own players and ideas in to the club early. He looks certain to succeed.

The obvious nomination for manager of the year in League One must be Paul Lambert, 40, of Norwich City. He has wasted no time in getting one of the founder members of the Premier League back into the Championship after being relegated last year. Ironically, he replaced Bryan Gunn shortly after his side were thrashed 7-1 by his then team Colchester United on the opening day of the season.

His professionalism stands out and he has the makings of a first-class coach. He is a winner and will surely secure Norwich in the Championship next season. Interestingly, he became the first British player to win the European Cup with a non-UK team and the first British player to win the Champions League since its inception.

For stabilising the absolute chaos at St James' Park Chris Hughton deservedly takes the award for best manager in the Championship this season. Please see here for my thoughts on Newcastle's near future.

Roy Hodgson has the most colourful curriculum vitae and is obviously worldly experienced and astute but what he has done for Fulham is akin to defying gravity! One can only imagine the euphoria and fantasy gripping the club at this moment. They are now just 90 minutes away from creating history and providing the biggest shock in European club competitions since Nottingham Forest won the European Cup in 1979. Latest Betfair prices on the UEFA Europa League Winners are: Atletico Madrid [1.65] Fulham [2.5].

For resurrecting a proud old club he is being tipped to receive the 'Manager of the Year'. Since the former Inter Milan boss has taken over at Fulham his stock has risen massively. Before addressing tactical naivety he immediately tackled the lack of resilience and then the defensive shape, making them much harder to beat. As his composure transmitted itself to the players, he instilled self-belief, thus allowing them to recover from reversals even within a match. One senses that there could be a high profile job in the offing sooner rather than later for this clever 62-year old, should he want it of course.

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Mike | 03 May 2010

Forgive me for being a little bit narked off with all this 'Roy Hodgson' praise for getting Fulham to the Europa League final.

Fair does, he's done a great job, but calls for him to be named Manager of the Year, the next Liverpool manager, and to be appointed England boss (when our nation already has a manager) are a complete over-reaction... or perhaps more realistically, plain and simple Southern bias from the media.

Let me remind everyone the I'm a proud Boro fan, and that not long ago Steve McClaren guided Middlesbrough to seventh in the Premier League and - believe it or not - got Boro to the same Euopean final that Roy Hodgson has.

Where there any calls for McClaren to be named Manager of the Year? Absolutely not. True, he got the England job, but that was only because there was an actual vacancy, and because two managers (Scolari and Hiddink) had already turned it down.

What I'm trying to say is, little Middlesbrough (or should that be Northern Middlesbrough) achieved exactly the same as Fulham that year (if not more), yet McClaren got very little recognition outside of the North East. Hodgson on the other hand is suddently the best manager in the world.

Congratulations to Fulham, I sincerely hope they win the Europa League, but if they do, I won't be reading a newspaper for at least a few days, because the Southern bias from the tabloids really does get on my nerves.

Apologies for this rant... it's just gone midnight and this World Snooker final isn't even close to a conclusion. I have to pass the time somehow :-)
James Pacheco | 05 May 2010

Mike, why don't you wait until the final of the Europa League is played? If Boro had won the final or at the very least made a real fist of it in the final I'm sure both McClaren and Boro would have got a lot more praise than they did for just getting there. Let's not forget that Boro were spanked 4-0 on the night against a pretty good side but it's not like they played Barcelona or Ac Milan in Eindhoven.

If Fulham win it then both them and Hodgson deserve a lot more praise than Boro got. If they don't then they deserve about the same amount. In my mind they're clubs of roughly the same stature so beaten finalists would equate to a similar achievement.
mike | 13 May 2010

what about Eddie Howe in league division 2 for Bournemouth? A year ago he came in mid - season, the season they were docked 17 points, and worked wonders to keep them in the league. This year he has got them promoted on a budget and with the crippling restrictions that the FA placed on him. Pub teams would have had an easier time! It is all well and good to hark on about Steve Cotterill and what he has done in 17 games but, how much money are his squad worth compered to B'm'ths and what pressure did he have on his shoulders at the start of the season? Clearly there is only one person you have looked at but, then again, some of us live in reality!!!
Paul | 16 May 2010

Mike

I must confess you make a compelling argument for Eddie Howe of Bournemouth and on reflection I think you may be right! I should have taken the previous year into consideration.

Thanks for your comments.