Will Brian McDermott turn things around for Leeds United? | Tom Stevens
If McDermott performs as well for Leeds as he did for Reading, the club will move up the Championship table
The 11 days Leeds United supporters endured without a manager felt like an eternity. Neil Warnock said goodbye on Easter Monday after a poor performance against Derby County dashed the club's already fading hopes of making the play-offs. The defeat at Charlton Athletic under the caretaker managerial team of Neil Redfearn and Richard Naylor was the club's fourth in a row, an alarming slump in form that sucked Leeds the relegation dogfight. That run of results forced the hands of the owners, who brought in a new manager sooner rather than later.
Brian McDermott was appointed to the job last Friday and went on to win his first game in charge the next day. McDermott is Leeds' fifth manager in as many years, which suggests the club is crying out for stability. His first game in charge was a spirited fightback victory against Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday. McDermott's tactical changes, deploying Luke Varney as a centre-forward after the ineffective Steve Morison had come off, proved decisive. Varney headed home two Ross McCormack crosses in the space of six second-half minutes as Leeds won 2-1 at Elland Road.
McDermott was named Premier League manager of the month in January, but by mid-March Reading's Russian owner, Anton Zingarevich, had replaced him with Nigel Adkins, who had himself been touted as a possible candidate for the Leeds job. Having worked for Reading since 2000, holding down positions as chief scout, Under-19s coach and reserve team manager before replacing Brendan Rodgers as manager at the end of 2009, McDermott's sacking seemed particularly harsh.
Working with a modest Championship budget, he had built a hardworking squad with a strong team ethic. Despite losing Gylfi Sigurdsson in the August 2010 transfer window, Reading reached the play-off final. Their opponents, Rodgers' new club Swansea City, proved a bridge too far.
Although the departures of Shane Long and Matt Mills in the summer of 2011 resulted in a slow start to the 2011-12 campaign, a remarkable run of 15 wins in their final 19 games of the season propelled Reading to the top of the Championship, just ahead of Adkins's Southampton.
That run included a 2-0 win against Leeds on Good Friday at the Madejski Stadium, a particularly feisty affair in which Leeds United's Zac Thompson was dismissed after only 12 minutes, while Jem Karacan hobbled off just before half-time, having been targeted by some strong challenges. A late Adam le Fondre brace edged Reading further to the title that day. The win completed a league double over Leeds; the 1-0 win at Elland Road just before Christmas began the slide that eventually cost Simon Grayson his job.
McDermott had expressed a desire to get back into management as quickly as possible after leaving Reading so abruptly, but the 52-year-old was quick to emphasise that he would pick his next job on his terms alone. McDermott said that both the finances and the relationship with the board and owner had to be right. The ownership of Leeds always seems to be clouded in doubt from an onlooker's perspective, but McDermott has obviously been given the necessary assurances by GFH Capital and the club's board.
Having had a strong relationship with his former Reading chairman, Sir John Madejski, McDermott would surely demand the same level of support from his new employers. Madejski revealed this week that he would have kept McDermott on at Reading and, having seen little improvement in their form after his departure, a majority of Reading fans would no doubt agree.
Madejski went on to say that many Reading fans would be happy to see the club back in the Championship, describing it as a "more interesting league" when compared to the "procession of the Premier League". Reading supporters may or may not agree, but Leeds fans would certainly beg to differ. Currently lying 11th in the Championship, Leeds would give anything to have Reading's current predicament. With the managerial acquisition of McDermott, the club might just have taken a significant step closer to it.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/football-league-blog/2013/apr/16/brian-mcdermott-leeds-united
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