The cliché goes that as long as a coach is getting results, the fans don’t care how they get them. But that has rather been disproved by the disgruntlement around Fir Park over the past few months, and the subsequent acrimonious departure of Stuart Kettlewell as manager of Motherwell.
If the fans of a club struggle to identify or connect with their team, then there is nowhere to go when results don’t go a coach’s way. Except, as evidenced in that particular case, the exit.
Kettlewell’s successor, Michael Wimmer, may be new to Scottish football and relatively inexperienced as a head coach in his own right, but the German clearly isn’t wet behind the ears. And as he met the media for the first time, it was evident he was cognisant of the issues that had led to the downfall of his predecessor.
“I want that we play proactive football, try to play with our principles, try to be dominant also and have high ball wins,” Wimmer said.
“And my building blocks are from control, [to be] dynamic, to be goal-oriented, and this I want to say, to bring energy into the club, have many duels and bring energy and atmosphere also to the fans.
“I think it's a traditional club, and a traditional club needs intensity.”
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Such a mission statement will be music to the ears of the Motherwell fanbase. While there is a widespread feeling among the Fir Park faithful that their general treatment of Kettlewell has been misrepresented in the past few weeks, there is also little doubt that the majority had grown disillusioned with a style of play that willingly ceded possession to the opposition.
Again, on this subject, Wimmer was in no mood to look back, but he acknowledged that forging his own connection with the support is one of his key priorities.
“This is the past, and it's not my topic,” he said.
“No, I'm looking forward, and I like to have good connections to the fans. I think if I work 24/7 for the club and give everything for the club, then yes, I think it could work.
“I can't say [anything about the past] just because I don't know what was before I came to the club, but I can say that I think it's very important that the relationship between the team, the club and the fans has to be tight.
“I like it to work in the traditional club because, in my opinion, the fans and also the club have this passion, and I like it.
“In my opinion, they live for football. In Germany you would say this is perfect. I like this, and this is honest football, and I think we should give the fans, with our performance on the pitch, this passion back to confirm this passion. Do you know what I mean?
“To confirm this passion with giving everything, giving everything on the pitch, to leave your heart on the pitch, to go into each duel, to play intensively.
“The result, I don't know, in football everything can happen, but you can always bring the best performance, you can always bring the best effort in the 90 minutes.”
If promises of high intensity football and relentless high pressing will go down well with the fans, they may not strike the ear of a squad who were built to play in a different style quite so favourably.
Wimmer was a spectator at training on Monday and now has his first session proper with his new players under his belt, but already he is convinced that he does have the tools at his disposal for Motherwell to play in his preferred style.
“Yes, I'm convinced that I can implement this, because I saw the players yesterday only in a meeting, and today in a meeting, in the training session, and I think the players are very hungry to get the information,” he said.
“In the session, they did it very well, and I'm convinced that it's possible. But it's not a sprint, it's a marathon. It takes also time to implement all the things.
“I think it's important now to get my playing style, my ideas into the club, and also to find the balance because it's the end before the table is split. So, it's also very important that we are successful, that we get points. I want to achieve, I want to reach the top six.
“This is now the balance between how to bring my ideas immediately into the team, or how to adapt it slowly and see what the players, the skills and the abilities of the players. But bring it into the club, bring it into the principles, into the players, and this is important.
“I've watched many games. The team is very, very interesting. I'm convinced that it fits to my playing style.
“So, yeah, as they say, come on, let’s do this.”
