Abbott axed ahead of Sheffield’s trip to Brunton Park strugglers

The Cumbrian club, who slumped to a fourth league defeat of the season at the weekend, lie third from bottom after registering just two points from their first six matches.

Assistant manager Graham Kavanagh and youth team coach David Irons have been placed in temporary charge and could lead the side in Saturday’s home encounter against Sheffield United, who have also made a poor start.

Abbott, 49, was the third-longest serving manager in the Football League having been appointed as John Ward’s successor at Brunton Park in December 2008.

A club statement read: “The board would like to go on record with their acknowledgement and appreciation of the hard work Greg Abbott has done since he joined the club as first-team and reserve-team coach in July 2006.

“The trips to Wembley and the year-on-year improvement in league position, prior to last season, were testament to his efforts and dedication to the job at hand.

“This has been a very difficult period and he has worked hard to find the players he felt would help to turn things round through what has been an unbelievable run of injuries.

“Unfortunately, the continued dip in attendances, in direct relation to results at Brunton Park, left all parties with no other option than to reach this conclusion.”

Abbott is the first manager of the actual season to be sacked, although Swindon’s Kevin MacDonald lost his job in July.

Abbott, who made over 280 appearances for Bradford and more than 120 for Hull during a 14-year playing career, joined the Leeds coaching staff before moving to Carlisle as assistant manager to Neil MacDonald in 2006.

He was appointed caretaker-chief when MacDonald was sacked in 2007 and was assistant to Ward before taking on the job himself.