Is David Moyes a Busted Flush as a Manager?
Pinned on the fridge of every struggling Premier League chairman is a shortlist of managers. It’s a collective shortlist, with the same names linked with the same vacancies until the person at the top is plucked.
It’s the same shortlist new Swansea City manager Bob Bradley bemoaned before pitching up in south Wales earlier in October.
"There’s certainly a network," he complained in November 2015, as per Associated Press (via ESPN). "There are some very good managers but also some others who aren’t very good but still manage to get jobs and opportunities."
David Moyes’ name was on this list for a while.
The Scot found himself in the managerial abyss following his unceremonious dismissal as Manchester United manager in April 2014, making the switch to the Basque Country in an attempt to revive his career.
In charge of Real Sociedad, Moyes did little to suggest his toxic stint at Old Trafford had been nothing more than a blot on an otherwise tidy copybook. Yet Sunderland still turned to him this summer.
The Black Cats were thrust into a situation they hadn’t envisaged at the conclusion of last season, when Sam Allardyce led the club to Premier League safety. They were preparing for another campaign under English football’s most consistent coach, only for Allardyce to embark on his own ill-fated reign as the England manager. It was an unfortunate scenario for the club to find itself in a matter of weeks before the start of the new season.
They turned to Moyes, who was almost certain to get whichever bottom-half Premier League job came up first this season. But why?
He had failed in his last two jobs, infamously so at Manchester United. But Sunderland still deemed him the man to lead them into the 2016/17 campaign. Eight games into the season, and the Black Cats are without a league win under Moyes, sitting slumped at the foot of the table with just two points.
They should have seen this coming. In his 10 months as United boss, Moyes showed his methods and practices were becoming outdated, so with more than two years passing since then, why did the Black Cats think the Scot would be any different?
Moyes was relatively successful in his 11 years at Everton, but even their fans began to acknowledge the Scot had become something of a passe figure toward the end of his tenure there. It’s why they greeted the appointment of Roberto Martinez with such enthusiasm and optimism. He was initially everything Moyes wasn’t.
The was a big difference between what Everton wanted in a manager at that time and what Sunderland needed this summer. Considering how often they have flirted with the drop over the past few years, the Wearside club seemingly goes into every season simply hoping to survive. Moyes certainly wasn’t the man to guarantee as much, and he hasn’t been that man since he took over at Everton 14 years ago.
His Sunderland team lacks direction, with Moyes failing to impose a style of play since he took over. They have struggled defensively this season, toiling for goals and creativity in the final third as well. What’s more, they have demonstrated a mental weakness that will not serve them well in a relegation battle. That particular deficiency didn’t serve United well at the other end of the table with Moyes at the helm.
So is Moyes finished as a Premier League manager? If he suffers relegation with Sunderland or, even worse, is sacked before he can even get to the end of the season, would the Scot finally be written off as a coach good enough for the top of the English game?
There’s a theory that even the best managers only ever enjoy 10 years of sustained success at the top of the game, with Sir Alex Ferguson the only notable exception. That hypothesis could also be applied to Jose Mourinho, who is a shadow of the force he was once as European football’s go-to guy for instant success.
Moyes wasn’t ever a manager of Mourinho’s stature; even when at his peak, he only led Everton into the Premier League’s top four. But the notion about the decade-long shelf life could still apply to the Scot—not that he has given up on the task at hand as Sunderland manager.
"There’s a big job to be done here, but I don’t think it’s impossible," Moyes said, per Louise Taylor of the Guardian. "There’s an awful lot of things needing to be fixed at this club, but I think they can be fixed. I really do. The revolving door needs to be stopped. Things need to be put right but to change them. There needs to be a period of stability."
Some might point out that Moyes’ teams tend to get off to a poor start, improving as the season progresses. The issue for Sunderland is that by the time they find their groove, they might have given themselves too much of a gap to bridge.
The Black Cats excel in making up for a sluggish start, normally disposing of their manager before staging a comeback in the second half of the season. But when will they run out of lives?
Fortunately for Moyes, there are few obvious replacements near the top of the collective shortlist of out-of-work managers. There are only so many times a club can twist before they decide to stick. That could prove fatal for Sunderland, though. Moyes’ last two clubs waited for things to turn around. They never did.
His insipid brand of realism is not exactly what Sunderland need to dispel the rot that has set in at the club over the past few months, with Moyes admitting after just two games of the new season that his side faced a fight against the drop.
As per Jefferson Lake of Sky Sports, after the defeat to Middlesbrough in Sunderland's first home game of the season, the Scot shrugged:
"That's where they've been every other year for the last four years, so why would it suddenly change? I think it will be [a relegation fight]. I don't think you can hide the facts. That will be the case. Yes. People will be flat because they are hoping that something is going to dramatically change. It can't dramatically change. It can't.
"
It’s just another strand of what makes him a bad fit. Moyes isn’t just unsuitable for Sunderland, but unsuitable as a Premier League manager in general.
The demise of a coach is often difficult to quantify, but the Scot has the look of a relic of a bygone age. That age might not have been so long ago, with Everton still a club very much in his mould, but his time has nonetheless passed.
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