The curtain finally fell on David Moyes’ inglorious 10 month tenure as manager of Manchester United this week.
The Scotsman, who was personally passed the poisoned chalice of taking over from Sir Alex Ferguson, the most successful manager the premier league has ever seen, by the man himself, was sacked on Tuesday following a dismal run of results.
The reaction to the sacking – and the way Manchester United went about it – was generally less than positive: former United player and captain Gary Neville was “outraged”, Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti was “baffled” and the League Managers Association “sad”.
“It’s not the way in which the club should portray itself,” said Neville. “I’m a traditionalist and I think it could have been dealt with a whole lot better. The idea of giving people three- and four- and six-year contracts and then getting rid of them after 10 months is something that’s foreign to me.”
Neville, for all the success of his second career as a Sky Sports pundit, clearly hasn’t been keeping an eye on the ball of late. More top flight clubs have changed their managers in the English Premier League than in any other top flight league this season.
Ten managerial sackings have taken place since last August, including Spurs’ dismissal of Andre Villas-Boas, Sunderland’s early sacking of Paulo Di Canio, and Cardiff’s controversial red card to Malkay Mackay.
As a result, the longest serving Premier League managers table is bizarrely skewed. While Arsene Wenger is way out ahead, having been at Arsenal since 1996, the second longest-serving manager is Newcastle’s Alan Pardew, who has held the post since 2010 (and is facing the axe at the end of this season).
The fact that Ferguson lead Manchester United for 26 years is the exception rather than the norm, and his longevity the result of an incredible and enviable trophy-winning record. Even so, it famously took Ferguson three seasons to find success at the club, and over their first 31 games in charge, Moyes actually did better, winning 17 compared to Ferguson’s 12.
For investors, it is worth taking time to reflect on that fact. Rather like football managers, active fund managers could well produce better long-term results if they are given more time to see their strategies through. The challenge is not just that of trying to select a genuinely skilled manager at outset, it’s also about sticking with them during the inevitable bad patches
The need to stick with a manager over the long term is arguably even more important when it comes to pension funds thanks to their long term investment requirements. Even a very slight outperformance over a longer time frame can result in an attractive return once the impact of compound returns has come into play.
Given all the time in the world, Moyes may have still have proved to be out of his depth. The selection process – lead by the departing Ferguson and based not on track record but personality, was not ideal. But with only 10 months to prove himself, we can never know for sure.
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