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Richard Sutcliffe: Bradford exit door should be barred to keep McCall
WHEN Stuart McCall accepted the challenge of reversing Bradford City's slide down the divisions in the summer of 2007, it was the news the Valley Parade faithful had been waiting for.
The return of the most popular player in the the Bantams' history immediately heralded the return of a feel-good factor to a club that had forgotten how to smile amid the financial collapse that followed relegation from the Premier League.
Bradford might have just been relegated to the basement division for the first time in a quarter of a century, but there was no mistaking the wave of optimism that swept through the city as fans clamoured to take advantage of the cut-price season ticket offer that had been running since February.
In the end, more than 12,000 fans signed up for the McCall revolution and expectancy was high as the 2007-08 season kicked off.
Unfortunately, such optimism proved unfounded with the former Scotland international admitting last summer that his lack of knowledge about a level of football he had never before played or coached at proved too big a hurdle to overcome and City finished well off the promotion pace in 10th.
A much more targeted recruitment campaign last summer suggested better things this time around and five wins from the opening six games put City on top of League Two.
Back-to-back defeats then saw Bradford slip to sixth and they have been in and around the upper echelons of the table ever since. A trio of defeats on the road in the past 10 days has, however, damaged their promotion hopes and after Tuesday's 4-1 hammering at Bournemouth McCall admitted he was considering his future.
The 44-year-old might have only signed a new two-year contract extension at Valley Parade last month but he was adamant: "If we don't get in the play-offs, I won't be here in the summer. It is as simple as that. It is killing me."
McCall was clearly hurt by what he had seen at Dean Court and his words have to be taken in the context that they came at what is often the most emotional time for a manager – the immediate aftermath of a defeat.
He may well have calmed down since, and yesterday afternoon saw both Mark Lawn and Julian Rhodes – City's joint chairmen – meet their manager and seek clarification over his plans.
The upshot of that meeting is still to be revealed but what is not in doubt is just how passionately McCall feels about Bradford, the club he joined as a teenage apprentice in the early Eighties.
Even when playing for Everton, Glasgow Rangers and Sheffield United, his thoughts never strayed far from Valley Parade.
When City were deep in the relegation mire two years ago and due to travel to Huddersfield Town, McCall took time from his duties as Neil Warnock's assistant at Bramall Lane to phone the local media and make a rallying call for the supporters and players.
His words unfortunately fell on deaf ears – the Bantams were abject in a 2-0 defeat at the Galpharm – but the gesture spoke a thousand words for the depth of feeling the former midfielder has for the club.
That passion is a positive, no matter what his critics might claim to the contrary about it, and it is this column's fervent hope that McCall has had a re-think because if any club needs some stability in the dugout, it is his beloved Bradford.
Since Trevor Cherry was succeeded by Terry Dolan in 1987, City have had 13 managers and it is no coincidence that, but for the promotions won by Chris Kamara and Paul Jewell in 1996 and 1999 respectively, that success has been hard to come by.
The chopping-and-changing that comes with a manager's lifespan in the job being less than every two years has to end and it is to be hoped that McCall can be persuaded to honour the newly-signed contract extension regardless of how the next eight games pan out.
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Sunday 12 February 2012
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