Outside of the 24 managerial posts, the next best gig in the Championship is the man next to the man at Cardiff. Paul Trollope, Steve Morison and Mark Hudson have all been promoted to the top job in recent years, so if the call comes to help out the guy in charge, you accept because it’s essentially an apprenticeship.
Omer Riza is the latest to benefit from Cardiff’s high turnover of managers. Having joined in June, he was in the right place at the right time three months later to step in when form collapsed under Erol Bulut and in fairness, he has arrested Cardiff’s freefall, which is no mean feat.
Having scored a solitary goal in the first six games, Cardiff have taken the lead in all three of Riza’s games and there is now far more attacking intent to their play. At Hull, once they conceded, the frailties Riza inherited came to the fore, but despite losing heavily, they at least created plenty of opportunities. Against an albeit poor Millwall, they should have won by more than one goal, but the win was precious and a clean sheet was an unexpected bonus.
Much of this progress is due to Riza giving the people what they want and selecting all the ballers. Rubin Colwill, Ollie Tanner, Callum Robinson and Alex Robertson have all featured heavily and immediately repaid that faith. The first three were never trusted by Bulut and often singled out for criticism, but Colwill is in the form of his career and has formed a thrilling, telepathic understanding with Tanner.
Embed from Getty ImagesRobinson is finally injury free and tore through pre-season, but was still in and out of the side. Cardiff always look more fluid and unpredictable with him in the side, while Robertson has the composure and eye for a pass that Cardiff have long cried out for. Its thrilling to see them all riffing off each other, but it will forever remain mystifying why Bulut was so reluctant to let them all loose.
Cardiff went toe to toe with Bristol City and at the start of the second half were as thrilling and potent as they’ve been in ages, but then Riza changed it and may have in turn changed the trajectory of his Cardiff career.
Midway through the second half, Cardiff introduced an extra centre back and depending on how kind you wish to be, either anticipated or invited pressure. By choosing to defend what he had when Cardiff were in the ascendancy, Bristol found a way back into the game and equalised. That may have happened regardless, but we’ll never know and it’s instead accepted wisdom that two points were thrown away, at a time when Cardiff remain rooted to the foot of the table.
Football fans are not particularly philosophical in such instances, so the fall out was nuclear and Riza was hounded off social media as a result, which is shameful. He’s feeling the full force of the backlash, but the anger and frustration has more to do with the bigger picture than a misguided tactical switch.
Embed from Getty ImagesIf you sack a manager without any forethought, someone has to step up to fill the void and that is always the case at Cardiff. Steven Schumacher, many people’s preferred choice for the role, was dismissed by Stoke earlier in the season and they approached their intended replacement the same day. That sort of joined up thinking has always been lacking at Cardiff and is unlikely to change anytime soon.
The fact that it happens so frequently at Cardiff means that interim managers are even more maligned than they are in general, plus the track record of those that have preceded Riza is not great, so that is being used against him too. Everyone has to start somewhere though. Ironically, Schumacher also got his break by making the step up from assistant manager at Plymouth.
People have very definite perceptions of managers and its often based on very little. It could be a thing they said one time, or what happened in a particular game. This guy is a dinosaur and that guy should be a number two. The reality is that we know very little about what a manager is actually like and how good they actually are. The proof is in the pudding and results are the litmus test, but sometimes the internal and external reputation of a manager are very different.
Embed from Getty ImagesRiza was written off from day one and some will never go back on their first impression. Had he won all three games, some would still insist he’s insufficient and unworthy. Yet had a new permanent manager overseen the last three games, I think the general consensus would have been that progress was being made and that Cardiff were heading in the right direction.
We’re talking about a small sample size and you would expect uplift after the removal of a seemingly unpopular manager, but Riza has probably done enough to deserve a little longer. If that is frustrating for some, that’ss not Riza’s fault, but he will still likely bear the brunt of the anger. Some will have hoped that Cardiff would have made a permanent appointment by the end of the international break and that may still happen, but that would have been uncharacteristically prompt and decisive.
Riza may yet get until the next international break, but despite demonstrating that he’s a far more attack-minded manager than Bulut, he will remain associated with the sort of conservative switch that his predecessor would have made. By hanging on to what he had, a lead and a job, which was perfectly understandable in both cases, he has armed his critics and may have sealed his fate.