Why Billy Would Not be the Right Choice




People are once again clamouring for Billy Davies to return as manager, as I write this Mick McCarthy has seemingly turned down the job, and the reasons are not fully clear yet. Now that the likely option has been and gone, the pro Davies gang are out in force again.

However Davies would be a horrific choice right now and I shall explain why. Not just that Davies burned a lot of bridges with the previous regime and does with every board that he has ever worked for, and not for his commuting from Glasgow.

It essentially boils down to the fact it will not end well at all. Davies likes, in fact demands control over transfer activity. We saw that all too clearly when he clashed over the now infamous Acquisitions Panel and David Pleats role in that. There were wars over the fact Davies wanted players that the panel didn’t agree with and that the panel provided players Davies didn’t want. George Boyd is an example of this.

Now one thing that is clear is that the board will be involving themselves heavily in transfers and would look to bring in some Middle Eastern players. Davies does not like this. So in any recruitment phase when they ask the Scotsman about this, I am pretty certain he would make it clear he is against it, as some are saying McCarthy has done.

Ok, he doesn’t have to play them, but under Doughty he pretty much had free reign over the players he had in his squad, we still don't know if there will be board level input into this. Davies would have board level liked players foisted upon him.

Davies is a fiery character who doesn’t like interference, to be honest who would, and I cannot see him being given free reign here. There are reports of deals already being done and Davies is pig headed enough to potentially ignore these players regardless as they aren’t his.

Davies holds this aura amongst some fans that puzzle me, they claim it was always good football under him, and yes sometimes it was, but there were times it was bloody awful too. His abrasive personality makes him notoriously difficult to work with. Any new regime would not want someone who questions their decisions or judgement. They’d want a more complimentary figure, someone who sings from the same sheet as them. This is not Davies. And that is why he would be an appalling choice to work with the al-Hasawi family.

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