Mick McCarthy sacked as Cardiff manager

I was fairly happy when Mick was appointed and although the campaign was underwhelming the toxicity that was there under MON is gone now. We are a fairly dull and unimaginative team but hopefully now with Kenny we can push on a little and try to be more creative and positive. Certainly Kenny will look to win games rather than draw 1-1. I think Mick can leave with a thanks from the fans as someone who steadied the ship. At the end of the day he  took it to the last few minutes in the group. We just couldn't find a winner. But onwards now with Kenny in charge and hopefully some new blood injected into the team as well.

Does he? I don’t think any fans expected us to qualify under Mick. If he didn’t think he could beat Georgia away he must have had no hope in Slovakia. Playing for penalties, and I would give us little hope of winning on them if we got that far, was ok for McCarthy but isn’t for Kenny?

tetsujin1979 wrote: Think the pressure will be higher than when Brian Kerr was appointed. Certainly the task he faces is much more difficult. Kerr was under pressure to rescue the qualification campaign for Euro 2004 by getting results against Georgia and Albania, plus had a friendly against Scotland to ease his way in and work with the players. Kenny has to win a one off game against Slovakia, away from home, and then (hopefully) another one off game, away from home, against either Northern Ireland or Bosnia, with a much worse squad than Kerr had to work with.

Bringing in David Mcgoldrick was Micks best decision as Ireland boss, as he's been player of the campaign. Other positives included improving the style of play and improving a team that had run out of ideas under O'Neill.

deise316 wrote: Crawford & John O'Shea confirmed as U21 manager and assistant, Duff coming on board with Kenny & Andrews, Alan Kelly staying as GK senior coach.  Pipkin made a point here or elsewhere about McCarthy's contract reeking of the 'old FAI' and it certainly did, right down to the 'exit payment' and bonus for qualification. One of those 2 things surely wasn't required, I think most fans would agree the qualification bonus should have been enough of an incentive.  The other one that reeked of old FAI, possibly even more so, is paying Robbie Keane a quarter of a million a year to put on maybe 20 coaching sessions, maybe 30 at most, for a few hours at a time during international games, and then maybe go watch a few other games involving Irish players when Middlesbrough weren't playing. A quarter of a fcuking million. Pare that down to hours worked for the FAI and he could very well be more expensive than McCarthy per hour.  I think a good bit of the reason we are paying vastly inflated salaries is because of JD's personal ambition to be seen as a 'football insider' and general big shot.  All these lads agents, who tend to be sharp operators when it comes to all things financial, probably recognised Delaney as a spoofer straight away and played on his desire to be seen as one of the 'big men' in football by asking for ridiculous money for their clients. Delaney, not wanting to be seen as a penny pincher or small time operator,  probably agreed all these contracts with very little fuss.

I would say McGoldrick's rejuvenation was the only major "player development" Mick achieved in his tenure; but given the short time period I suppose that side of things was never really at the forefront of his mind.

Drumcondra 69er wrote: deise316 wrote: Crawford & John O'Shea confirmed as U21 manager and assistant, Duff coming on board with Kenny & Andrews, Alan Kelly staying as GK senior coach.  Pipkin made a point here or elsewhere about McCarthy's contract reeking of the 'old FAI' and it certainly did, right down to the 'exit payment' and bonus for qualification. One of those 2 things surely wasn't required, I think most fans would agree the qualification bonus should have been enough of an incentive.  The other one that reeked of old FAI, possibly even more so, is paying Robbie Keane a quarter of a million a year to put on maybe 20 coaching sessions, maybe 30 at most, for a few hours at a time during international games, and then maybe go watch a few other games involving Irish players when Middlesbrough weren't playing. A quarter of a fcuking million. Pare that down to hours worked for the FAI and he could very well be more expensive than McCarthy per hour.  I think a good bit of the reason we are paying vastly inflated salaries is because of JD's personal ambition to be seen as a 'football insider' and general big shot.  All these lads agents, who tend to be sharp operators when it comes to all things financial, probably recognised Delaney as a spoofer straight away and played on his desire to be seen as one of the 'big men' in football by asking for ridiculous money for their clients. Delaney, not wanting to be seen as a penny pincher or small time operator,  probably agreed all these contracts with very little fuss. Exit bonus was clearly negotiated to replace the original second campaign that was mooted before the succession idea came to the fore.  Talk now the qualification bonus will be shared with Kenny if that's achieved.

Drumcondra 69er wrote: Exit bonus was clearly negotiated to replace the original second campaign that was mooted before the succession idea came to the fore.  Talk now the qualification bonus will be shared with Kenny if that's achieved.

Hardly McCarthy's fault that those were the terms given to him in his contract. I'd love to see anyone on this forum forgo a million quid...