Independent Leyton Orient Forum

EliotNes wrote: ↑Fri Nov 15, 2019 4:06 pm He’s not untouchable. But he’d really have to foul up before T & T got rid of him. But IMO he’ll never recommend a person as manager/head coach who he saw as knowing more than he did and therefore a possible threat to him. That’s one reason they’ll not offer the job to Russell

Prestige Worldwide wrote: ↑Sun Nov 17, 2019 10:48 pm

EliotNes wrote: ↑Fri Nov 15, 2019 4:06 pm He’s not untouchable. But he’d really have to foul up before T & T got rid of him. But IMO he’ll never recommend a person as manager/head coach who he saw as knowing more than he did and therefore a possible threat to him. That’s one reason they’ll not offer the job to Russell

Appointing JE blows a large hole in your theory.

Prestige Worldwide wrote: ↑Mon Nov 18, 2019 10:12 am Totally irrelevant to the point I'm making, well done.

Prestige Worldwide wrote: ↑Mon Nov 18, 2019 10:30 am And again. Gonna go for the hattrick?

Thor wrote: ↑Sun Nov 17, 2019 8:57 pm

EliotNes wrote: ↑Fri Nov 15, 2019 4:06 pm He’s not untouchable. But he’d really have to foul up before T & T got rid of him. But IMO he’ll never recommend a person as manager/head coach who he saw as knowing more than he did and therefore a possible threat to him. That’s one reason they’ll not offer the job to Russell

After yesterday’s Q&A what’s your opinion now? I’m not so sure he came across well, that he handled the questions well and was very defensive. Which was in contrast to Nigel who was being open, honest and engaging. Having worked for American companies I’m not so sure they would have been impressed with the public face of the football side.

PoundhillO wrote: ↑Mon Nov 18, 2019 10:49 am

Prestige Worldwide wrote: ↑Mon Nov 18, 2019 10:30 am And again. Gonna go for the hattrick?

Clearly if he is allowed to f*ckup again, Ling will be the one achieving an unacceptable hat trick.

Real Al wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 8:03 am Why is everyone perpetuating the myth that Ling chose the Head Coach? It was the board.

Sure, he put CF on the shortlist, but it's normal for a shortlist to have one or two candidates who are a little bit left-field

Real Al wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 8:03 am Why is everyone perpetuating the myth that Ling chose the Head Coach? It was the board.

Sure, he put CF on the shortlist, but it's normal for a shortlist to have one or two candidates who are a little bit left-field

RedO wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 9:02 am

Real Al wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 8:03 am Why is everyone perpetuating the myth that Ling chose the Head Coach? It was the board.

Sure, he put CF on the shortlist, but it's normal for a shortlist to have one or two candidates who are a little bit left-field

I’m sure someone who studies the unofficial podcasts in detail can confirm but didn’t ling host initial chats with half a dozen of the 40 candidates, got that down to 4 for interview stage with him and porter of which 2 dropped out, and of the 2 interviewed Fletcher was recommend3d to T&T who had a phone call with him?

THE JOURNEYMAN | GREGOR ROBERTSON
november 18 2019, 12:01am, the times
As Carl Fletcher found out, culture clash will make or break new Leyton Orient manager
gregor robertson



When Carl Fletcher was sacked by Leyton Orient on Thursday he took his place in an undignified list of English football’s shortest managerial tenures. There have been a handful of shorter reigns over the years — Leroy Rosenior’s ten-minute spell at Torquay United in 2007 is likely to take some beating — but Fletcher’s dismissal after only six games in 29 days was pretty hard to fathom.

For Orient supporters, though, it would be fair to say that no love has been lost. A 4-0 thrashing away to Plymouth Argyle in October was a chastening start for Fletcher, 39, especially on the back of a 4-0 win away to Grimsby Town in the interim manager Ross Embleton’s final game in the dugout. A 1-0 defeat away to lowly Morecambe felt like the nadir before last weekend’s 2-1 home defeat by eighth-tier Maldon & Tiptree in the FA Cup first round.

Even in Sky Bet League Two optics are vital and Fletcher’s post-match interviews were deemed uninspiring and littered with platitudes. Players and staff failed to connect with the former West Ham United, Crystal Palace and Wales midfielder. Sometimes, explained a repentant Martin Ling, the director of football, the “fit doesn’t feel quite right”.

However hard it is to justify sacking a manager after less than a month, Orient, given all they have been through, are in a unique situation. In June, a month after leading Orient to promotion from the Vanarama National League, Justin Edinburgh, the manager, had a cardiac arrest and died at the age of 49.

When Fletcher joined from Bournemouth, where he had been an academy coach and loans manager, he recognised that the wound was raw. His first act was to call Edinburgh’s wife, Kerri. “That was a classy thing to do,” Nigel Travis, the chairman, said.


There was a determination not to affect the “culture” at Brisbane Road. Fletcher’s backroom staff consisted of Embleton, Edinburgh’s former assistant; Danny Webb, a former Orient manager; and Jobi McAnuff, a player-coach tipped as a manager of the future.

He was an outsider among a band of brothers. “It was a culture shock and he may not have had the personal skills — which we didn’t assess — to deal with that,” Travis, 69, said. “You have to reach out, you have to integrate, you have to talk to people. This is a very difficult place to manage. Because they’re a group who’ve gone through . . . you can’t go through anything worse.”


Since Travis and Kent Teague, the Texan businessman and principal investor, bought the club in 2017 there have been very few missteps. Their engagement with the community is in stark contrast to their predecessor Francesco Beelzebub, the erratic Italian waste-management magnate who bought the club in 2014. With debts of more than £5.5 million, and a winding-up petition, buckets rattled at Brisbane Road as Orient lost their Football League status for the first time in 112 years.

Edinburgh’s appointment two years ago was the catalyst for the renaissance but Ling, a former manager of the club, told his wife he had made a mistake only ten days after appointing Fletcher. The decision to extend the contracts of much of the title-winning squad looks misguided. The failure to replace Josh Koroma and Macauley Bonne, who were sold after scoring 34 of Orient’s 73 league goals last season, continues to be felt.

Fletcher had highlighted players that he wanted to move on in January, many of whom were among 18 players contracted for next season — a huge number for a League Two club. Ling and Travis disagreed with Fletcher’s assessment, believing Orient’s squad have a chance of gatecrashing the play-offs. A degree of loyalty and a desire for continuity should be lauded, but the fear is that Orient’s vision has become clouded by sentimentality.

Did Fletcher stand a chance? “The toughest thing was for [Fletcher] to come in and try to embrace that culture,” Embleton, 38, said. “He had intentions and a direction about how he wanted to work and it was almost like he wanted to get to that before embracing the culture. Sometimes those relationships with the players and the staff might need to be built first, and then you can drip feed your football [ideas] in from there.”

Embleton, the interim manager, turned the job down last month. The club would like him to reconsider. The alternative is an experienced manager with broad shoulders, or an acceptance, despite it all, that nothing lasts for ever.

Prestige Worldwide wrote: ↑Sun Nov 17, 2019 10:48 pm

EliotNes wrote: ↑Fri Nov 15, 2019 4:06 pm He’s not untouchable. But he’d really have to foul up before T & T got rid of him. But IMO he’ll never recommend a person as manager/head coach who he saw as knowing more than he did and therefore a possible threat to him. That’s one reason they’ll not offer the job to Russell

Appointing JE blows a large hole in your theory.

DuvB wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 4:42 pm Given where we were when T&T bought the club, Ling did a brilliant job in getting a squad together and a manager in, in super quick time. For that he deserves the utmost credit. Yes, not every player was great and the first manager didn't work out but what happened thereafter was PROMOTION.

I for one, am grateful to the guy.

BiggsyMalone wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 4:45 pm

DuvB wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 4:42 pm Given where we were when T&T bought the club, Ling did a brilliant job in getting a squad together and a manager in, in super quick time. For that he deserves the utmost credit. Yes, not every player was great and the first manager didn't work out but what happened thereafter was PROMOTION.

I for one, am grateful to the guy.

Deserves credit? It was his job. If anything, it was easier for him. He had a clean slate to work from pretty much and didn’t have to sell to buy.

Prestige Worldwide wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 3:47 pm I dont know what you're going on about, EliotNes said they wont go for experience because its a possible threat to Ling, yet Ling has appointed two experienced coaches in Davis and Edinburgh.