Another manager in the ‘out of work’ category is Gerhard Struber, the forty six year old coach has some success behind him even if it is keeping a team in a league as opposed to anything else. He left his role at New York Red Bulls a few weeks back after a string of poor results and criticism regards his teams goalscoring record.
Struber started his football career at SV Austria Salzburg where he spent some six years earning fifty appearances. Coincidentally they are now known as Red Bull Salzburg, so there’s some refreshing pace regards his career choices. In reality he became a journeyman footballer after failing to make a name for himself, possibly shining only at Linz FC, another Austrian club. Like many footballers he took an early interest in strategy and methodology in the modern game, however a ten year sabbatical to work away from football ensued. He kept his hand in working part time for Red Bull Salzburg before returning to the game at FC Liefering and then on to Wolfsberger.
It was whilst at Wolfsberger he gained the attention of Barnsley who were in a perilous position facing championship relegation in 2019. They paid a decent sum of money to entice Struber to Yorkshire. He managed to keep them up right at the last gasp citing he wanted to stay at the club ( not sure if he loved the area ) and build a team. His win rate was around thirty six percent at Barnsley which New York Red Bulls liked. They bought him out of his contract and for the next two and a half years he enjoyed a lifestyle and appointment he could only have dreamed of when he worked in sales during his football sabbatical.
The racist remark : April 2023
Struber became headlines in the Major League Soccer scene when he failed to take one of his players off after they made a racist remark to the referee against San Jose Earthquakes. The player in question, Dante Vanzeir remained in the game, and Struber admitted failings and inexperience in his decision making at the time. Quite simply he froze. Talking afterwards Struber said. "The duration of the decision, in the end, was too long. Right now I could say very clearly … I must bring Dante out immediately. But it was also for me a very, very new situation in my coaching career. I think it’s not so easy to always handle everything in the right way and especially this was the first time that I was confronted with a direction like that.”
It has to be said he was also receiving conflicting information on the touchline regards the incident and its content.
That sort of indecision won’t go down well when making timely switches in the championship. Teams who want to compete at the top need guidance from the touchline, and of course respect from the players towards their leader. Say what you want, but Russell Martin had that in bucket loads last season at Swansea. For that reason, Struber and his recent poor record this year is concerning, not least how he dealt with it. We believe he is a contender but surely won’t be anything more than that ? The speculation is the Swans are aiming high, but may well have already received some knock backs. Managers of a certain calibre won’t find the Swans an attractive proposition, that is of course unless they have some vision to build again ? This makes Martin’s departure even more distressing after all the hard work. Some are saying now Struber simply isn’t the kind of material Swansea a city need at this time. He does have good organisational skills and possibly has come up against teams of similar levels to those in the championship, but he remains a huge gamble.
His final words as NY Red Bulls boss surrounded his teams lack of form against Philadelphia Union, hours later he was relieved of his position. "Not only for me, but also my boys. Again, we can see, we missed a lot in this game. Not ready in the moments when we get the chance, and one time very, very unlucky with a penalty. Yeah, that's very questionable in my eyes. We are in a special time, tough time. It's very, very difficult.” Since Struber’s departure the New York Red Bulls have won three league games from five, drawing one and losing to Seattle Sounders.
As we said with Chris Davies, he isn’t in the betting just yet, but you can ‘bet’ he may well feature very soon. Swans Indy rating 6/10. Not for us.
âš½ï¸ That watching brief is here –> Watching brief feature 1
Latest Swansea City manager odds as of June 2nd 2023.
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