Beware men with white beards who might bring you the sack at this time of year.

As you undoubtedly know by know, Gary Mc.Allister has been shown the door by Ken Bates this morning, paying the price for a dispiriting run of defeats which threatened to wreck our promotion chances. The problems began in defence, but they showed no signs of being sorted out and soon a lack of confidence was spreading throughout the side.

Many Leeds fans assumed that Steve Staunton was responsible for sorting out the defence (perhaps conveniently, as we wanted to be able to absolve Macca of all blame) but ultimately the man at the top has to take responsibility for the poor results, and it was inevitable that Bates would reach for the ‘eject’ button sooner or later.

There is no doubt that the timing of the announcement has much to do with the transfer window, as Bates now has the Christmas holiday period to try to get a new manager in place so that the new man has the chance to sign the players he wants in January. Just as important is the need to be able to attract decent players to the club, and to be able to convince any potential signings that we aren’t a club on the slide.

Mc.Allister seemed a bit of a strange appointment in January, as his only previous managerial experience was an unimpressive spell in charge of Coventry, when he only won about a third of his matches in charge. But that was put down to Coventry’s poor financial position at the time, and the pressure of having to care for his terminally ill wife, which ultimately led to him giving up that job.

But he was welcomed by the fans as a big contrast to Dennis Wise, a decent man with impeccable Leeds credentials, who wanted his teams to play good passing football.

He inherited a squad that was low in confidence after the departure of the poison dwarf, and as he took over at the end of January he had to make do with Wise’s choice of players.

So it took five games for Mc.Allister to secure his first win, and in March we dropped some more vital points in successive games against teams in the relegation zone, so at the end of the month we looked quite likely to miss out on the play-offs altogether. But at the start of April we finally got it together, storming up to fifth place with a run of six wins in the final seven games. We did of course have that tremendous non-performance in the play-off final against Doncaster, but no Leeds fan thought we could possibly fail to go up in the new season, given the luxury of starting level on points with everyone else.

Once Mc.Allister had had the chance the buy and sell a few players during the summer, his squad seemed to have greater quality and a better balance than when he started, as well having greater strength in depth than every other club in the division. An indifferent start in the first four league games could be put down to the need for the new signings to blend in, and when we won the four league games in September, we seemed to be on our way.

At the time we thought that defeat at Peterborough was just a blip, and a sign that we would have to battle for promotion and that we couldn’t expect everything our own way. But in fact that was the start of a desperate run of results away from home, as we have lost every game since, apart from beating lowly Cheltenham in the league and Northampton in the FA cup. 

For a while our home form kept Mc.Allister afloat, and we still managed some impressive wins against Walsall and Hartlepool, but the writing was well and truly on the wall when we deservedly went down to Colchester at Elland Road last week. Not only was a lack of confidence very evident on the field, rumours were starting to surface that all was not well behind the scenes.

I heard that Mc.Allister had fallen out with a couple of players, one of whom went out on loan and one of whom has officially been injured all season. And it’s also been suggested that he was beginning to suffer from the stress of his job, suffering sleepless nights and starting to fell unwell. So perhaps a parting of the ways was always inevitable, but we certainly wish him well for his future.

Much as I would have loved Mc.Allister to be a great success at Elland Road, I remember that we spent most of the 1980s going nowhere under a succession of former playing legends, so reluctantly I have to accept that today’s decision is in the best interests of Leeds United. Like Eddie Gray before him, Macca may be a great coach but too nice a man to succeed in management, so maybe the best he can hope for in future is to be an assistant to a boss with a more forceful character.

So who do is going to ride to our rescue on a white charger to sort out the squad and take us to promotion? Quite a few names have been mentioned already on various sites, some mentioning Ian Dowie and Gus Poyet, while one Blackpool site seems to think we’re after their boss Simon Grayson. The Poyet rumour would seem the most plausible, given all his previous connections with Bates, but I doubt the Uruguayan would be a popular choice. He was supposedly the brains of his partnership with Wise, but he left at the first opportunity for a similar job in the Premiership and might do so again if he got the chance.

Meanwhile the Daily Mail are claiming that out former coach Aidy Boothroyd has been told that the job is his if he wants it. I don’t normally believe anything I read in the Mail, but this time I hope that they’ve got it right. I was very impressed with everything he achieved in his first season at Watford, and though it all went sour for him down there, a lot of that was due to his being undermined by their financial position. Who knows what he could achieve at a club when he won’t have to sell to survive and a good youth system already in place.

Oh, and he’s a Yorkshireman as well, just like the two most successful managers in our history. So some on Ken, it’s got to be Aidy. You know it makes sense.  

Photo: Action Images

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