Brendan Rodgers has built a very good reputation based on what he can achieve at a club in his opening season, but history has shown that he is not a manager who can stay at a club for a long time.
It’s not clear why his teams always crash after an initial period of success – perhaps the players get sick of his smug faux-intelligence or it’s also possible that he just can’t adapt when other managers figure out how to nullify his teams.
He did well to move to Liverpool from Swansea when his stock was still high, but he’s been living off that ever since, and there’s a clear pattern that’s emerged.
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He comes in and introduces a positive style of play, the fans buy into his bizarre soundbites ( Claiming a Rangers fan came up to him and thanked him for being a breath of fresh air is the pinnacle of things that just didn’t happen) and everything looks rosy.
Unfortunately after a year things start to slide, results will go against his team and he doesn’t know how to fix it, and the players will stop buying into his methods when it doesn’t result in success.
It was often said his good season at Liverpool happened because he accidentally stumbled on the diamond formation with Sterling, Suarez and Sturridge linking to great effect, but he didn’t have any answers when Sterling left.
His time at Celtic looks better because they had zero competition, but again his team stopped playing for him, other sides figured out how to play against him and he left before things had a chance to go wrong.
Finally it’s happening again at Leicester – the loss to Everton today means they are in serious danger of dropping out of the top four – just months after they looked set to stroll to a third place finish and Champions League football.
They are now only three points clear of Wolves in 6th spot and still have tough games coming up against Man United, Spurs, Crystal Palace, Arsenal and Sheffield United, so the fans must be worried.
It seems churlish to say that Leicester should look for alternatives this summer after the start that he had – but if this slide continues for the rest of this season then they are gambling on him suddenly finding a way of turning things round – something he’s yet to do in his career.