Clement's record

Fantastic in Belgium, no argument there at all. Winning the title with Genk was especially magnificent.

It's the pattern in his last three jobs which interests me. Started incredibly with Monaco, with a 9-game winning streak getting them into the CL qualifiers. But they fail in those, and slump dramatically at the end of the season to fall out of contention and lose him his job.

Then started just as incredibly at Rangers. He inherits a shambles, the fans are pissed off and hugely sceptical about him, then he immediately wins a ridiculous 18 from 20 - including another 9-game winning streak. By this point, they look like favourites for the title.

Whereupon just like at Monaco, they suddenly fade. To some extent, they choke. And Celtic gain a psychological hold over his team which is fatal to any manager in Glasgow. In his first full season there, they really never get going. They're not terrible, but they're far from good enough to challenge Celtic - and the Queen's Park defeat is a historic humiliation, probably the worst result in Rangers' history.

Now he's with us. Again he's started like a train: fans rubbing their eyes in disbelief at the transformation. But the pattern so far says that he's an unusually talented impact manager, with much less evidence that he can keep it going over a longer period.

I'm not saying this to piss on anyone's chips. It's honestly quite confusing that we're good all of a sudden, finally entering a new era with a new team and new heroes, and it's great to be able to look up the table and dream. But when posters say things like "he's the best manager I've seen in 50 years following the club", I think "easy there! He's not done anything tangible yet - and new manager bounces are a thing".

Whatever the underlying reasons were for what happened at Rangers and Monaco, he's clearly smart enough to have analysed, reflected on and hopefully learnt from them. But for now, I'm just happy that following Norwich is fun again. For the first time since you-know-who. A huge cloud has lifted thanks to what he's done so far - which is wonderful. It's how fast it's happened which is simultaneously so exciting - but maybe unsustainable too.

Posted By: thebigfeller, Jan 21, 16:44:34