A factor of why Gary might be doing so well also, in comparison to how he did here, is that it’s an entirely fresh start.
Here, he was the holdover from a successful at points, but very sour and mechanical set up with Parker. He was merely a coach in an intensely disliked regime. Both from the fans and also the players. With the squad he had, he may well have found it easier to default to the very bland, sat back style that Parker utilised. He probably wasn’t realistically in the position to really try and play the way he would want to.
Again, as much as the wider footballing world wants to laugh at us, you just need to look at the stats. Overall, we were the worst team in the league under him, and it’s very easy to make a case for the players keeping him up, rather than the other way around.
At Wolves, however…he’s got a MUCH better squad with somehow much lower expectations than even we had here. They’re expectations at the start of the season, with a squad of quality footballers full of internationals (that had regularly finished in the top 10), was to just stay up. That is insane! I genuinely can’t think of an easier job for someone of O’Neil’s specific talents. That is, motivating a borderline depressed squad that actually has a lot of talent, under absolutely NO external pressure (relative to the talent level of the players) from the media or other neutrals.
He is doing very well, and I think this is his first true managerial job where he’s able to stamp down his actual style without any kind of baggage. But I also can’t think of a manager that’s had an easier job, personally. That Wolves squad were ripe for a solid coach to tell them they’re not as bad as they’ve been told they are. It’s basically the situation our players were in, on crack. The media were practically BEGGING for him to succeed, and the barometer of what success is from their fans and the media both was very low.
I can’t think of a worse job for O’Neil than the England job, as has been suggested. A job where you have the most massive of expectations, dealing with players that will have these expectations of the coach. He would get absolutely eaten alive imho. Get real.
