George Elek: "Critch became a crutch"

Reaction as Neil Critchley leaves Blackpool for the second time.

Blackpool have decided to scratch that Critch, relieving Neil Critchley of his managerial duties at the club 811 days after he walked out on them in his first spell in charge to assist Steven Gerrard at Aston Villa. 

I sat in this very seat in this very cafe a week ago writing about Preston and Ryan Lowe’s conscious uncoupling, but this is more a reunion that hasn’t worked out. The once jilted has decided to do the jilting, and if we’re honest it never looked like love this time around. 

Critchley’s first full season in charge at Blackpool with an unmitigated success, with COVID having frustrated his chance to ‘cut teeth’ after being appointed in early March 2020. This may have had something to do with their abhorrent start in the 2020/21 campaign, winning just one of their first seven games. 

What happened after that was one of the merriest dances up a league table I can remember, amassing 73 points in 38 games, which was comfortably the most in the league in that time and catapulted them from 23rd to 3rd. They made light work of the play-offs and were promoted. 

The team that they made the lightest work of was Oxford United, the club I support, and I had the significant displeasure of returning to live football after the enforced break to watch us get absolutely hammered at home to Blackpool. 

Ellis Simms scored two of their three unanswered goals and he, along with his mates Jerry Yates, Kenny Dougall and Elliott Embleton, looked like they were playing a different sport to Karl Robinson’s side. 

It was striking just how well-coached that Blackpool team looked. Resolute in defence, efficient in attack and robust in between. They’d ease you off the ball and then effortlessly manoeuvre it into dangerous positions. It was hard to get near them, let alone past them. 

They finished 16th in the Championship the season after and all evidence to hand suggested that Blackpool had identified one the brightest young English managers around. The evidence since tells another story. 

We can skip past the ill-fated spells at QPR and as Steven Gerrard’s Assistant at Aston Villa with plausible reasons for failure at both, but it’s the chalk-and-cheese nature of his two spells at Bloomfield Road which should have everyone questioning the widely accepted idea of innate managerial talent.   

When Critchley returned to the club in May 2023 little had changed from the club left apart from a relegation back to where they had come. 

Simon Sadler was still the owner, and many of his players remained, albeit with some key attacking talent having moved on, Mike Garritty and Ian Brunskill were alongside him in the dugout again and the fans, the same Bloomfield Road faithful, were cockahoop to him back. ‘Once a snake, now a saint.’ 

Well, some were. ‘Once a snake, always a snake,’ was another commonly held view in a split fanbase when his appointment was announced. 

Very quickly, however, it became apparent that Critchley and his henchmen weren’t going to be able to walk into the club and just repeat the trick purely because it was them, and because it was Blackpool. 

They finished 8th last season in a relatively poor renewal of League One when a play-off berth should have been achievable, and have started this campaign with two defeats against teams just promoted from League Two.

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There is more to this than poor results too. Fans have criticised Critchley for how stubborn he has been, both in refusing to change shape or style despite the disappointing performances, and players within the squad clearly not being suited by the 3-5-2 formation. 

Rob Apter, for example, is a goal-scoring left-footed right-winger who lit up League Two on loan at Tranmere last season with 12 goals and six assists. He was recalled in January and then sent back to Tranmere as Critchley seemingly couldn’t find a place for him in his wingerless system. 

It’s fitting, or should I say apt, that he finally started a league game for Critchley in his final match on Saturday against Stockport. He played him at RWB in a 3-5-2. He had one shot, blocked, from 30 yards before being subbed off after 71 minutes. 

Another example, albeit less to the ire of Blackpool fans, was Owen Dale. He was shipped out to play-off rivals Oxford in January having played much of his football for Critchley at wing-back. Des Buckingham played him on the right wing in a 4-3-3 and he was a key player for them throughout their good run to finish the season, right up to his starring role in the 2-0 Play-Off Final win at Wembley over Bolton. 

It is ultimately this inability to adapt that saw Critchley lose the faith of the fans, lose his ability to win football matches and, ultimately, lose his job. 

“Never go back” is a saying that I hate in football. It suggests that there is some kind of voodoo at work where a returning manager or player’s impact is hampered by the very fact that they’ve been here before. It’s nonsense, and there are plenty of examples of why it’s nonsense. A nod to Eddie Howe and Nathan Jones at this point, who would be the poster boys for any ‘going back’ campaign.

What might be true though is that the levels of complacency when trying to hark back to former glories spike, with both the decision makers and the managers themselves believing that they can just pick up where they left off rather than actually taking charge of as many of the variables that they need to in order to succeed. 

This would explain why Critchley would have been so reluctant to change his system, given he was the man who brought Blackpool promotion back in 2021, failing to grasp the circumstantial changes which meant that change was needed rather than an attempt to go back in time. 

When David Artell was appointed Grimsby manager back in November last year he said;

“Quite a lot of other clubs think that I'm the plan and I understand that but, at the same time, it's not just that."

It feels like Simon Sadler and the powers that be at Blackpool fell into this trap and thought that, by re-appointing Critchley, they were investing in a plan for the club to progress due to his previous achievements. When that didn’t work, there was no alternative method to pursue beyond sacking him. 

Managerial talent isn’t innate and the trajectory that they will take clubs isn’t predetermined. It’s easy to fall into the trap of mistaking a manager’s ability with that of their team’s performance, when in reality it’s the decisions that are made, both by them and others at the club, which will dictate whether they are creating an environment conducive to success. 

Critchley got it very right in his first spell at Blackpool, but rather than being the guarantee that he would do so again it may have created a culture of complacency from which Blackpool were unable to perform. Instead of inspiring the club with his previous success there, that first spell of Critch became a crutch, and now they need something else, something new, to lean on.