He did wonders for Wigan last season, you can easily forget that toshj...
Undoubtedly - he took over an under-performing side and completely rejuvenated them, all that with cup and European competitions (I think Wigan played over 70 games last season!) - he's a really strong motivator and works his nuts off. But that run and his management career to date can be summed up in one moment - one up away at QPR in the playoff semi-final, totally dominating, thenwent completely defensive, lost, momentum gone. And that lack of momentum and defensive attitude has seen Wigan plummet this season.
I remember in his first season, we were away at Bury and stood a decent chance of picking up three points, we were tearing them apart and they were in the relegation zone. Bury are down to ten men, so Uwe, in a bid to protect the lead, goes 4-5-1, takes off our attacking players and we subsequently concede with 5 minutes to go... the next bloody season we went up there and played 5-4-1 and scraped a 0-0!!
When it comes down to managing an entire club, he lacks the ability to see the bigger picture. He was very fortunate to have significant support at Brentford last season. With Warburton as DoF, Benham pumping money into the club and lending it all his expertise, and having probably the strongest backroom staff in the division, Uwe was able to build up a head of steam. But he has very limited coaching experience within English football, and lacks the necessary contacts to source strong domestic players. As soon as he left, he broke his non-competition clauses that were part of his transfer to Wigan, and went after Warburton, 3 of our first team players, including contacting Chelsea to request they recall Saville from his loan with us so he could sign him, and then went after the back room staff. The conditioning coach was the only one who joined him.
Since then, he's really struggled to source and attract strong domestic talent, with the majority of their signings this summer being the players chased by every other club (he paid Delort's agent a fee of over £650,000... then it turned out it wasn't even his agent at all!) and his defensive tactics and lack of cohesion has resulted in their dreadful run.
The guy got a decent pay off from Wigan, and was well remunerated whilst he was there, so I don;t feel bad for the guy at all. However, he does put his all into a job and works his socks off - everyone likes a trier, I just hope his management reputation hasn't been tarnish by assimilating the costliest squad int he division and turning them into one of the worst sides.
"mind the gap" etc just one month into the season.