An article from the Rod :

TS Eliot was wrong. It is October, not April, which is the cruellest month, for football managers at least. The time of the great sackings. The month is usually cited on the first day of the season when your team has just drawn 0-0 with Wigan, or something. “We’ll give him until October . . . ” Well, October is here, in its bluster.

My lot sacked our manager last week after a draw with Luton Town. Or, at least, Neil Harris “stepped down” as manager of Millwall, where he has been for more than four years, during which time we have won a promotion from League One and reached the FA Cup quarter-finals twice.
Last season, however, was a grim battle for survival, the quality of football often abysmal and despite spending a fair whack of money pre-season, this campaign has been even worse. Until yesterday, when Millwall beat Leeds United 2-1, I can’t remember the last time we scored more than one goal in a game, and as we are incapable of defending one-goal leads this is a recipe for trouble.

Still more crucially, no team in Europe lost more points through goals conceded in the final 10 minutes than Millwall last season.

Harris had a penchant for securing a lead and then making defensive substitutions which invite the opposition to attack — most notably in our quarter-final against Brighton last season when we were two goals to the good and subsequently lost. It happened again, midweek, against Luton. You would have hoped Neil might have learnt, but nope.

What is interesting, though, is the increased rate at which these sackings occur: according to Business Insider, the average tenure for managers, especially in the top flight, reduces almost year on year. It is now nosing down to three years.
My suspicion is that social media plays a part in this. I have watched the Millwall message boards as support for Harris declined from almost unanimous acclaim two years ago to virtually nil today. The odium and poison poured upon the bloke — a club legend, both as a player and a boss — has been remarkable in its personal vituperation.

These message boards are always more confrontational and impatient than the rest of the fanbase, but these days the loathing transfers itself to the stands and, of course, the boards are read (with epic disdain) by club insiders.

Lose a few games in a row and the shouts of “Out!” can be heard, first in the moronic inferno of cyberspace and later during games.

Possessed of unrealistic expectations, the online contingent (of which I am one) hasten the fall of managers who may simply be going through a bad patch. Such as Mauricio Pochettino at Tottenham Hotspur, the 5-2 favourite to become the next Premier League manager to get the boot. The odds shortened dramatically after Spurs’ hilarious 7-2 defeat by Bayern Munich in midweek and Pochettino’s position looks even more insecure following yesterday’s 3-0 defeat at Brighton.

Pochettino has stated that he wished to be still at Spurs five years from now. There is a growing feeling among the fans, however, that he should leave — a poll last week on one of their fan forums suggested 37% wanted him to get lost, citing his stubbornness and a disaffection for his diamond formation. That’s still a minority of supporters — but give it a few more games with mediocre results and that number will increase.

Should he go? Supporters had hoped Spurs might establish themselves as part of the gilded top three. That does not quite seem to have happened, yet, at least. But it is only a few months since they contested a Champions League final — which, along with their trophies in the early 1960s, is surely the pinnacle of the club’s achievements. Even by today’s hectic standards, nudging Mauricio towards the door seems to me a little pre-emptory, you know?

Does changing a manager work? On average the stats tell you that it doesn’t make much difference. Most of the long-term studies suggest the importance of the manager is overstated by the press and public, and that while a new boss can sometimes exert a short-term change in a team’s performances, this is usually a kind of dead-cat bounce which soon regresses to the norm.

Again, the stats indicate that the surest way to transform a failing team is, in this order:
1) find a new owner .
2) buy some better players.

The manager comes a lowly third.

At Millwall, we wait a little trepidatiously to see who will be brought in. Gary Rowett and Chris Hughton are among the favourites, and Roy Keane has been mentioned. Harris? I doubt he’ll be out of a job for long.

I just hope that wherever he goes, he doesn’t read the message boards.