Coventry City news from CoventryLive: Mark Robins discusses the most recent managerial scandals and considers what makes the Sky Blues’ approach to business so “exciting.”
This week, Millwall and Sunderland became the most recent Championship teams to fire their managers. Coventry City manager Mark Robins calls this a “awful” development.
Joe Edwards, the manager of the Lions since taking over from Gary Rowett at The Den in November, was fired on Wednesday after 19 games in charge, 11 of which ended in losses. While Michael Beale ended his two-and-a-half-year contract in December after taking over for Tony Mowbray, he only played in 12 games at the Stadium of Light.
Edwards and Beale are the fifteenth and sixteenth managers to take over in the division this year; only one of those, Steven Schumacher, left Plymouth of his own free will to be pursued by Stoke, where he is now, ironically, under pressure following five losses in his last six league games.
Yes, I’m glad that’s not my fault because I can’t take accountability for them. But for them, I think it’s terrible,” Sky Blues manager Mark Robins, who has been in charge for the longest amount of time in the Championship—behind only Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola—said.
The 54-year-old, who will mark his seventh anniversary early next month, is a legendary figure in English football management and a prime example of what happens when a team continues to support and believe in the person they went to considerable efforts to find and hire in the first place. Several teams could benefit from Coventry City’s strategy after Robins’ amazing achievement in leading the Sky Blues from League 2 to the Premier League’s edge.
He continued, thinking more deeply about the deaths this week, saying, “How can you do anything in that period of time? It’s simply not possible, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the managers are to blame; rather, it has to do with the clubs that initially selected the managers and the rationale behind that decision.
“The league can be extremely challenging and even cruel at times. As I’ve said before, there are moments when it truly is brutal. In any case, I believe there are difficulties involved when trying to establish yourself as a young manager, a new manager, or a new manager starting out at a club and needing to make an immediate impression. And it’s always challenging to be on the defensive if you don’t. However, there is far too much manager turnover.
Generally speaking, Robins gets along well with most of his teammates and has gained a lot of respect from other players, not the least of which is from young managers who are frequently eager to learn from him. Russell Martin of Southampton, who has always had nothing but praise for him, and Liam Rosenior of Hull, who benefits from the fact that the 39-year-old is his neighbour, are two more.
In response to a question about whether he occasionally feels he has a mentoring role or any obligation to help young managers who are attempting, in his words, a “brutal” business, the City manager said, “Honestly, I don’t feel that at all and I certainly wouldn’t be condescending to go out of my way to give people advice unless they ask for it.” To be sure, there are occasions when I speak with people and we have meaningful conversations.
I am curious about their experiences and methods of approaching their work, as well as how they are handling things and coping with it. Every club is different, so it’s always interesting to see how they do things differently.
However, I believe that the stability we’ve had and the stability I’ve managed to bring is crucial, especially considering the timing of my arrival.
“I believe that in order to succeed and advance things, you have to pay a price in the form of job loss, and that’s the challenge because you have some excellent people in positions who just need time to get things right. However, aspirations and unrealistic goals can occasionally get in the way. As long as your goals are grounded in reality, it’s acceptable to have them. Smart goals are talked about, but they must be reachable.
“You have to understand what you have at your disposal and make the best use of that,” he continued. “Sometimes you can set the bar too high, but sometimes you can set it too low as well. I’ve always maintained that this club and this work are about small, continuous improvement because of this.
We are unable to declare, “Okay, now we are going to get promoted,” as that would be absurd and neither realistic nor correct. You have to put in the work, and I believe your chances of success are higher if you can hold people together for an extended amount of time.
And that is how we are attempting to approach the task. We are working hard to find quality players and retain them with us so that the team can advance as a result. And eventually, if we can keep everyone together, things will just naturally fall into place.
The final two or three months of the season will tell whether that time has arrived, but regardless of the outcome in May, Robins maintains that just making the playoffs will be a bigger accomplishment this time around because of the drastic personnel changes he had to make last summer after losing his two best players, Gusavo Hamer and Viktor Gyokeres.
After reaching this point in the previous campaign, he said, “we went on a really good run in terms of winning games and snuck into the top six right at the very end.”
We have played there a little bit already this year, but there are teams all around you that are just now beginning to play, and the competition is to see who has played the best over the previous 13 games. Norwich City appears to be getting things going, while Hull has improved in the most recent transfer window and is playing some excellent football.
There are teams surrounding us, and Preston is pursuing us as well. It’s a fantastic league, so it will be even more of an accomplishment if we make it into the top six this year. It’s still a greater accomplishment in my opinion, even if we get closer to it.
“It’s possible for people to see it and assume that because they made it to the play-off final, they will automatically be promoted, but you have to understand the entire process that transpired between the game’s end and our current position, as well as how we are still working to improve.”
“We speak of a process, and it is a lengthy and ongoing process,” he continued. However, the process begins when you sell your players, so the players have performed admirably to reach this point thus far. We were aware that we would be acquiring very talented new players, and that the starting point this year was perhaps a little bit higher than in prior years. As a result, we will need to gradually increase both the quantity and quality of players in order to maintain our current level of improvement.
And it’s obvious what other clubs should learn.
“Even though I have been in this position for almost seven years—I believe it will be seven years on March 6th—I have been given that time,” he stated.
However, we have also made progress year after year, and now we’ve reached a point where things are a little different because, barring promotion, it will be difficult to top last year’s performance. However, we still need to take this step by step.
“To have a chance, you must remain involved, and after a year, things will truly click and we’ll succeed. It won’t be long now, either. It is, in my opinion, really exciting. Things are constantly changing, and we’re involved in a process that is changing in a very tangible way, which is really exciting.
