Obviously, Steve Bruce isn’t going to go down as one of the best managers of all time, but it’s hard to think of how he could’ve been treated any worse since the Newcastle takeover went through.
The looks like the new owners want to throw some cash around and if they want a different manager to entrust with that investment then that’s fine, but it’s actually been easy to forget the Bruce is still employed as the team’s manager.
The rumours about potential replacements are done in a way where Bruce is spoken about as a manager who’s already lost his job, and might be best to just put him out of his misery.
A report from the Daily Mail has suggested there are even more problems behind the scenes, with reports of a bust-up between Jamaal Lascelles and Isacc Hayden after the Spurs defeat.
On top of that it’s suggested the players aren’t happy with Bruce’s tactics and they simply want him gone, so there’s now a real chance that they’ll just down tools and stop playing for him until he’s gone.
It’s an interesting situation because while the players may have the power to get rid of Bruce now, it’s also worth remembering that this Newcastle squad is packed full of average Premier League players, so there’s every chance that most of them will be replaced in the next few years too.
If he was sacked today Bruce would leave with a win rate of just under 29% from 97 games which isn’t good enough, but he should be able to claim that he was undermined at every turn by the players and Mike Ashley so it’s unlikely that he would be out of work for too long.