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Why do interim managers fail as permanent managers?

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In hiring Michael Carrick off the back of a successful interim spell, Manchester United have made the same mistake they made with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. At least that’s the narrative the media is going to tell you (over and over again).

Nevermind the fact that the Solskjaer era ended the same way the eras of David Moyes, Jose Mourinho, Erik Ten Hag, and Ruben Amorim ended; with the manager being dismissed part way through the season.

Getting sacked is apparently the bar for what is considered “failure.” It doesn’t seem to matter what gets accomplished in between getting hired and getting fired, or even what your remit was.

In this context Carrick is almost guaranteed to be a failure. Over 99 percent of managerial reigns end with a sacking. Excluding managers who leave to take a job at a bigger club, it’s exceptionally rare for a manager to get to walk off into the sunset. Nearly half the managers who have won a Premier League title have been sacked, with most of those dismissals occurring the following year!

If essentially all managers fail, asking why interim managers fail isn’t really a fair question. A more fair question would be to ask why interim managers struggle once they get the full time job?

The answer to this question is pretty simple and logical.

Good teams tend to not sack their managers. Which means most interim managers are taking over sides that are not only not that good, but are also under -performing. By just getting the team to play to their regular level, improvement comes naturally.

In many cases - like Tim Sherwood at Spurs - the interim manager gets a very favorable run of fixtures when he first takes over. Those easy fixtures lend themselves to the team now over-performing and racking up some quick wins. Those quick wins lead to clubs overreacting to handing the interim a permanent job. Without doing anything differently the water tends to find its level. The poor team goes back to playing poorly and the manager is out by the summer.

It’s rare for interim managers to ride out a season as an interim and then be handed the permanent job over the summer. Those managers also tend to struggle once they get the permanent role. Why is that?

Again the answer is quite simple and logical:

The job is different.

It’s not that they forget how to manager. It’s not that players look at them differently, or the weight of the club gets to them. It is literally just a different job.

When an interim manager comes in they typically are coming in to fix something. The remit is simple, win games. Win games right away because we need to avoid relegation, or win games right away because we need to qualify for the Champions League (or Europe).

When Ole Gunnar Solskjaer came in the simple and public remit was bring smiles back to Old Trafford but it was also about, advance in the Champions League and try to get us back into the Champions League picture. The former was always possible, the latter seemed a long shot until Solskjaer got off to a great start.

Solskjaer quickly identified the best 12-15 players in the squad that he could rely on to get wins. He didn’t have time to experiment. He needed to win games right away. He rode those guys as much as he could until they broke down and he had to call on the other players.

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When Solskjaer returned the following year the job was different. Now it was about building a long term project at United - creating the next great squad, moving on the deadwood. High earners, with some being key players, departed, as the club looked to build a younger squad that would grow together over the next few years.

Along with building for the future came a change in play style. When Solskjaer first came in he quickly settled on a 4-3-3 shape with a midfield of Nemanja Matic, Ander Herrera, and Paul Pogba. Herrea left the club that summer and wasn’t replaced. Now he was trying to shift to a 4-2-3-1 that pressed less, held the ball more, and defended better. There were growing pains, with (key) injuries making those growing pains more acute.

It was the same situation for Michael Carrick. When he arrived the remit was qualify for the Champions League. Win now, no matter how you have to do it.

Carrick quickly identified his key players and narrowed the squad down to the 12-15 players he could trust and rely on. Casemiro was a key player for him and he installed a tactical system around making sure Casemiro could be on the pitch as much as possible.

Carrick got good injury luck and achieved his goal, finishing third and qualifying for the Champions League. Now he starts a new remit. It’s no longer about winning right now by any means necessary. His job has now shifted to implementing a new long term style of play on what is essentially a new team.

The addition of Champions League fixtures means Carrick has to rely on more his squad. Whereas an interim can rely on just 14 or 15 players, a full time manager needs to call upon his full squad. Especially early in the season.

At the start of the season Carrick may not be pushing the same tried and trusted button he pushed at the end of last season because he has to give chances to his whole squad. He has to give players a chance to show him the work they’ve put in over the summer. He has to give them chances to show they belong in the circle of trust.

This is basic early season squad management that every manager (new or returning) deals with every season. Identify which young players deserve more chances, figure out which veterans can’t be relied upon as much anymore. The way squads are utilized in April or May hardly ever resembles the way they were used in August or September.

United are different this season, as we knew they were going to have to be with the departure of Casemiro. There have been frustrating growing pains as the team adapts to a new style of play.

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These growing pains have nothing to do with Carrick being a former interim manager. They are very normal things to experience when a manager changes something.

Last March Tottenham Hotspur handed Roberto De Zerbi a five year contract, committing to a long term project with the Italian at the helm. Before he could get started there was a more immediate need: don’t get relagated.

Essentially, De Zerbi was being as an interim - whose job it was to win right away - before he could get started on implementing his true style of play over a long term period. De Zerbi got the initial part of the job done, doing just enough to stay up. Now De Zerbi is trying to get Spurs to play his brand of football. Despite spending north of £300m on new players it is not going so well. Spurs are winless in their first five games.

Occasionally managers get appointed full time in the middle of the season and are not under immediate pressure. The season is considered a lost cause but there’s no threat of relegation. Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool, Mikel Arteta at Arsenal, Thomas Tuchel at Chelsea, or Ruben Amorim at United to name a few.

This lack of pressure allows them to start implementing their long term ideas right away, even if their league form continues to suffer. Of course, going on a cup run can help you buy some crucial time. Arteta won the FA Cup, Tuchel won the Champions League, Klopp and Amorim made runs to the Europa League final1.

These growing pains aren’t even exclusive to managers who take over in the middle of the season. Most managers experience the most success early on in their tenure. Then results start to tail off after a year or two2.

Look no further than Erik Ten Hag. He arrived at Old Trafford with grand plans of implementing a certain style of play. He gave up on that style very quickly, perhaps sensing it could get late early if he kept going. He implemented a style that would win games right away, essentially acting like an interim in that first year. He barely rotated his squad in cup matches as a trophy could buy him some time.

On the back of a successful first year Ten Hag implemented several changes in his second season and experienced much less success. This was by choice - though part of it may have been forced. He couldn’t just run back the same tactics as a year before. New signings meant the composition of the squad had changed while key players Luke Shaw and Jadon Sancho were no longer available. As he tried to shape the team more in his mould, things got away from him.

This is where Manchester United are right now. Carrick is no longer deploying a just do whatever you have to do to win right now strategy. He’s not just trying to keep the good vibes of his interim period going. Rather he’s now acting like any new manager who took over in the summer would be and trying to implement a new style of play.

This season United are playing slower and holding more possession. Per Opta their average sequence time has gone up over two seconds from 9.6 to 11.75. They’ve gone from averaging 10.8 sequences with 10 or more passes per game to 14.8. They’re moving the ball effectively as well. They lead the league in touches in the final third and touches in their opponents box. It’s a completely new style the players are getting used to.

What they’re not doing is turning that possession and territorial dominance into quality scoring chances. Their 0.09 xG per shot is 5th worst in the league. That leaves the question as to whether Carrick’s new style is bad or if United just don’t have the players to really implement it yet? If it’s the latter, should Carrick even be using this style? That’s a question for another time.

Ultimately Michael Carrick is going to fail. Nearly every manager does. It won’t be because he’s an interim manager made permanent. It’ll be because he’s not going to be in the job long enough to compete for the title. Right now United (generously) have the 4th to 5th best squad in the league. Given the financial contraints, age of the squad, and amount of holes they need to fill, it’s going to take several years for United to build themselves into the top two squad you need to win the Premier League. No matter how much Carrick treads water, eventually patience will run out.

Or maybe United just made a mistake. But given the aforementioned outlook of the squad, had they not made the same mistake they made with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, they would have just made the same mistake they made with David Moyes, or Louis van Gaal, or Jose Mourinho, or Erik Ten Hag, or Ruben Amorim…

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