Eddie Howe’s Success with Newcastle shows that Graham Potter can still revive his career.
Following Eddie Howe’s recent success with Newcastle — keeping them safe from relegation last season; getting them to compete with the Top-6 and securing Champions League football in the just ended 2022–23 season. Looking at it all, I find some parallels between Howe and Potter’s careers so far.
Eddie Howe burst onto the scene with A.F.C Bournemouth after a historic rise from the 4th tier of English football to the Premier League (2015), with many touting him as the next England manager, and even a potential manager of a top-6 club. After a 5 year stay in the top flight, everything cam crashing down for Bournemouth and Howe. Eddie Howe left the club by mutual consent after the 2019–2020 in which the Cherries were relegated. I must say that I never bought into the Howe hype and thought — “another overrated English manager” and his last stint at Bournemouth had me vindicated. The hype around Howe died down and had me wondering what his next step would be, would he succeed Gareth Southgate for the England job? Well in 2021, he made his return, inheriting a relegation-threatened Newcastle side. The rest is history.
Graham Potter started turning heads after taking Swedish club Östersund from the 4th tier of Swedish football to the top flight — the Allsvenskan. Potter then qualified Östersund to the Europa League in 2017–18 where they made it to the knockout rounds, eventually losing to Arsenal. Swansea was Potter’s next destination in the EFL Championship in 2018 where he recorded a 10th place finish and an FA Cup quarterfinal run. Eventually, Brighton in the Premier League came calling after dismissing Chris Hughton. Potter signed with Brighton on 20th May 2019, on a 4-year contract. In Potter’s tenure at Brighton, he managed to keep the club in the Premier League finishing 16th place with a record 41 points, recorded the club’s highest finish by placing 9th. The Sea Gulls under Potter where known for playing an exciting, fluid possession-based style with a young squad, and excellent recruitment, and accumulating high xG (Expected goals) but scoring less (I just had to add that). Graham Potter’s stocks were quickly rising with many touting him as the next big thing in English football, a potential England manager, etc. In the beginning 2022–23 season, Brighton and Potter were off to a flying start, winning at Old Trafford against Manchester United, beating Leicester, West Ham, placing themselves in the top 4. In September 2022, Chelsea hired Potter as a replacement for German coach Thomas Tuchel under the new ownership of Todd Boehly. This was meant to be a new direction for Chelsea, shifting away from the unsustainable quick-fire hiring and firing the club were used to and moving towards hiring managers for the long-term and backing them. However, there were concerns about Potter’s ability to manage a club the magnitude of Chelsea.
Potter went from Potter to glow-up, fresh trim and everything. A new man ready to take on the world.
The Potter-era started with a 1–1 draw away at RB Salzburg in the UEFA Champions League group-stage and a 2–1 win away at Crystal Palace. His first defeat happened on his 10th match away at his old club Brighton who were flying (and scoring goals) under Italian Roberto De Zerbi, a heavy 4–1 loss. The team continued to crumble under Potter. This led the club to make radical changes, recruiting a whooping NINE PLAYERS for a staggering 329.50 million Euros. Here are their signings from the winter window:
You can notice a pattern the closer you look. This is a strategy by Todd Boehly — sign young talented players for the future and build a young core of talent. This should have been right up Potter’s alley since he has a reputation of developing young players.
Despite the new arrivals, Potter’s Chelsea still had the same issues his Brighton side faced — goalscoring; creating numerous chances, ‘out xG-ing’ their opponents but lacking in the final third. Chelsea lacked a prolific and consistent goalscorer.
The losses became even more embarrassing until Chelsea made the decision to sack Potter. Graham Potter had the lowest- points tally of any Chelsea manager. He left with a record of 31 games, 11 losses, 12 wins and a 39% win percentage; and an 11th place finish.
Now to the point of this story. Graham Potter left with a bad reputation, ridiculed and memed by the cruel Football Twitter. Football is a ruthless industry, one minute you are flying and another minute your wings are clipped, unable to fly. I firmly believe that Potter’s story is not over, and he certainly not a bad manager. Behind the scenes, Chelsea were unstable in the midst of a transition so you can’t place all the blame on solely the manager. I won’t explain the Chelsea situation but there’s a very informative article by The Athletic detailing everything.
There are so many factors that go into a football team’s success, and the manager is just another part of the machine. If the other parts fail, the entire machine fails. Potter’s stint at Chelsea is one many of cases of good managers looking bad because of poor club management from those at the top. A few examples, Thomas Tuchel’s reign at Chelsea, Ancelotti at Everton, there’s many others.
One of the main themes of this story — Badly Run Clubs Can Make Good Coaches Look Bad.
Eddie Howe’s recent success at Newcastle wasn’t a fluke, just as Brighton’s wasn’t as well. It takes more than just the head coach to make a club successful. A successful club starts successful from the top of the organisation which trickles down to the coaching staff and the players.
So what is next for Graham Potter? Potter was linked with the Leicester City job during the just-ended season, currently he’s linked with a surprise move to Ligue 1 side OGC Nice. Nice are owned by Englishman and potential Manchester United owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe so the link is no surprise and it could be legit. Nice are a fairly young squad with an average age of 24.5 and in dire need of a rebuild. There is also a potential vacancy at Club Brugge in Belgium, a regular in European competitions. A team like Crystal Palace could do with Potter, they are a young team and play an expansive, possession-based style setting up a good foundation for Potter to work. Maybe a job outside of the noisy hive of English football is what Potter needs, make a name for himself and return to the Premier League or succeed Gareth Southgate as England head coach. Whatever his next steps are, I will definitely be following with interest because I still believe he’s a great manager with the potential to make it big.
Thanks for reading :)
