Woody on Carraghers' 'The Greatest Game' Podcast

The best managers have a vision and articulate to their players. Clearly a massive dose of man management thrown in (who would want to perform for a person they don't like/get on with) but for me, Woodgate had neither. His pre-season press conferences were littered with "buzz words" and I was never convinced he had the intelligence, charisma or engagement to get his thoughts across to players. It almost felt like he had watched Liverpool and thought "we'll do that as well". Failing to understand that their style of play had been honed over many years with exacting recruitment policies to back it up.

Certainly naive, and judging from those soundbites about, arrogant as well - which suggests to me he might not learn from this going forward.
 
Woodgate has a lot of coaching ability. Pulis would never have had him as a number 2 if not - Woodgate even said in that podcast that Pulis promoted him from u18s to first team coach after the analysis he gave Pulis before taking the job.

The main reason for his downfall - as stated by Warnock (and Clayton) was the lack of experience alongside him. He needed an experienced no.2 beside him to add authority to his ideas, and stop needless tinkering. Having Keane next to him with half an eye on Ireland wasn't the structure he needed.

It was interesting to hear what he said about abandoning us playing out from the back - when we had our good run under him, it was with McNair and Howson as makeshift centre halves. Inexplicably, he moved them both back to midfield and we struggled again. Now Warnock is profiting again from Paddy playing it out.
 
Listened to it, conveniently skips over why he moved to spurs, regardless of my own opinion of him i have always found it strange hes never quashed a single rumour. true or not . Most are twisted and exaggerated of the actual truth.

It really would be could for him to stick 2 fingers up at those rumours, and come out and speak about them. theres 3 or 4 common ones.

he speaks about half of the fan base not wanting him, he must know why that's the case.
 
Nero said:
He calls it an agenda but it wasn't. Most on here didn't want him as it was likely he would fail. After the Luton away most fans got behind him too.
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Oh yes those memories of Luton away ...
Lewis Wing👍🏼
Britt’s moonshot🤬
 
I liked Woody. Did I back his appointment? No, frankly it was a massive job let alone a newcomer to management. His support team weren’t good enough. I got the feeling some posters were jealous of him.

I get he wasn’t of perfect character years ago. Always struck me as being a caring and passionate guy albeit this wasn’t always demonstrated in his demeanour. I have nothing against him and have struggled with how some posters were making criticism of him personally.
 
Feel Woodgate's rewriting history saying fans were 60/40 against him getting the job. More like 99/1 (The one being Woodgate himself).

He's done himself no favours with that podcast. He would be better thought of if he just said "yeah I gave it a go but I just wasnt quite up to it in the end".

He never should have taken the job on. He should have said he would only take the job on if an experienced coach is appointed to support him.
 
fmttmadmin said:
I really wanted him to succeed - he wasn't a player I thought would make the jump into management. But I saw a completely different side to him when he returned for his second spell at Middlesbrough. He was highly responsible and focussed and listening to him you could hear how he had distilled so much information and influences and knew exactly what he wanted to do. He had a plan. I also loved the way he really cared about Middlesbrough, the club, the town, the players, the people. And that matters to me.
I found him to be a very good communicator. Very friendly, open and likeable, despite all the negativity surrounding him. Much of that was his own fault and much of it wasn't. People constantly spread rumours about him that seemed so wide of the mark. I knew from talking to a former reporter in Newcastle or the parent of a youngster at Hurworth that they both had Woodgate marked down as very special with his knowledge and ways he could put it across. The report he gave that youngster before his debut for the U23s is the most detailed and practical I have ever heard. And again what that parent and what the reporter said was here was a player (and he was just a player at the time) who watched everyone in his club and thought carefully about their development.
Hopefully as Warnock said this week, Woodgate bounces back someday having added further knowledge from this experience because I believe he could go on to achieve big things just as Southgate has. Woodgate is the not the football person or indeed the person that many people take him for. He has a lot to offer in football.
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That looks like where his future lies to be honest - working within the backroom staff and developing players on the training ground, speaking with the club manager and trying to influence a system.

Standing on the touchline, making decisions, being ruthless when things aren't working, taking the hits and getting results in a pressure cooker environment? Nah, sorry. Nowhere near that.
 
Just listened to the full pod. Zero humility or self reflection at his own failings.

I really don’t think he’s done himself any favours with this podcast. He’s quite frank and honest when it comes to why Leeds won nothing “we weren’t good enough” but when talking about his time at Boro the line “I wasn’t good enough” never seems to enter his mind nevermind leave his lips.

He makes a series of excuses such as not given time, players leaving, not given the funding, the fans had an agenda against him and the players not being able to play the style of play he wanted to implement.

I’m sorry but that was all obvious when he took the job. My instant response on this forum was that he was promising unicorns as the high pressing, attacking football he was promising simply wasn’t deliverable with that group of players and him at the helm.

Everyone knew there would be cost cutting and players leaving, that’s the only reason he got the job in the first place.

The fans didn’t want him, but they never once turned on him at games. He was given as much time as the club could afford to give him, I’d argue too much. We were going down under his management it was that simple, and it would have been an absolute disaster for this football club.

He was given a job with next to no expectations, and still managed to under perform.

He’d have been better off just saying “I’m grateful to Steve Gibson for the chance to manage my hometown club. I wasn’t good enough at the time, but hope I can be a better manager for the experience”.

Instead he sounded bitter every time he spoke about Boro.
 
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changingman said:
The best managers have a vision and articulate to their players. Clearly a massive dose of man management thrown in (who would want to perform for a person they don't like/get on with) but for me, Woodgate had neither. His pre-season press conferences were littered with "buzz words" and I was never convinced he had the intelligence, charisma or engagement to get his thoughts across to players. It almost felt like he had watched Liverpool and thought "we'll do that as well". Failing to understand that their style of play had been honed over many years with exacting recruitment policies to back it up.

Certainly naive, and judging from those soundbites about, arrogant as well - which suggests to me he might not learn from this going forward.
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JM14 said:
Have to disagree with that, in his interviews he came across as extremely arrogant and very disrespectful towards the people asking him questions.
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I asked him questions - and I didn't feel he intimidated me or talked down to me in anyway. He had a sense of humour and that came across live and it is possible that out of context it looked like arrogance etc but in truth he was fun to chat with and had an awful lot of knowledge. But quite obviously nothing like the managerial experience of Warnock.
It was Gordon Strachan that had the experience and was probably a very nice person but was appallingly arrogant at press conferences. He seemed to set out to humiliate people at times.
 
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