O’Donnell Points to Conflicting Style of Play as Fundamental Issue at Bradford City.

Richard O’Donnell is shed light on his time at Bradford City and the goings on behind the scenes over the last four years in a recent interview with The City Vent. He gave his view on why he thought the high turnover of managers at Valley Parade have had a detrimental effect on progression and explained some of the feelings by the players over the treatment of members of staff by the owners.

It is probably no surprise that O’Donnell said that he would have been happy to stay at Bradford City had he been offered the opportunity by Mark Hughes, however he is excited at the the thought of the next phase of his career at Rochdale Football Club.

Looking back at the club when he first arrived from Northampton Town, when fans began turning against owners Edin Rahic and Stefan Rupp, although he didn’t have any major issues with Edin Rahic, the owner that has received most of the blame for the downward spiral of the Bantams, it was clear he could feel the tension that existed at the club when he arrived.

O’Donnell said it was “pretty obvious there was a lot of discontent around the club with the chairmen” when asked whether the players knew about what was going on behind the scenes with Edin Rahic. O’Donnell continued  “My personal dealings with Edin were fine” but “at the same time I didn’t really agree with a lot of the things that were going on with the club at the time”.

He continued “even  before I came I heard stories of people who had been around the club for a long, long time, 20 odd years getting sacked from the club”. This was in reference to the outcome of a purge by the German owners in which there was already ominous signs in the 2017 documentary ‘Matter of Heart’ when Stefan Rupp stated “We found out about something we that we’re not too happy about, a sort of company within a company has being developing here over the years” his solution “within the next three to six months we’re likely to see some personnel changes in several positions”. And that’s exactly what happened, with many members of staff who had been at the club being sacked. In one case the club were taken to an Employment Tribunal by a former kit man.

It is easy to forget that Stefan Rupp was not just an innocent bystander in the period that Edin Rahic has taken all of the blame for. Even if  Rupp wasn’t being told the whole truth by Edin about what was going on at Valley Parade, should Rupp get a free pass for ignorance or poor judgement. And sacking managers on a regular basis is something that has still remained a consistent feature at the club since Edin’s departure.

Asked if he could see any fundamental issues that have been holding Bradford City back Richard O’Donnell explained  “During the first two years or so we were going through a lot of managers” pointing out that “every manager when we had a transfer window recruited players for his style of play. Then another manager would come in who’s got a different style of play” why is this an ongoing problem “the incoming manager has players brought in to suit a different style of play, that he’s still stuck with for another two years”. This, since Stuart McCall was given a new contract and then fired, is of course now the job of CEO Ryan Sparks. 

What ever you think of Derek Adams, he was another more recent example of this policy of hiring and firing fast, as his tenure lasted just over six months.  As a result the club are now going through exactly the same transition once again under Mark Hughes, just as we did under Adams. Derek Adams inherited players with a year remaining on their contract more suited to playing an attractive style of football, and Mark Hughes has inherited players with another year on their contract that are suited to a more direct style of football. 

This means that although the manager may on paper have a competitive budget, in reality they have a lot of players that aren’t suited to the new system and will either be asked to play in a way that doesn’t bring the best out in them, or not used at all. O’Donnell even had his own example of how in his role as a goalkeeper he was getting unfair criticism from some of our supporters for “kicking the ball long to Eoin Doyle” under David Hopkin.

Mark Hughes now faces the task of squeezing the most out of what remains of that budget to get the footballers who are best suited to his style of play, and there is a risk to this. With a bit of luck the extra income from recent sales of academy players, and perhaps the compensation that will come to Bradford City should Elliot Watt find a new club, will alleviate some of the problems that his predecessors have faced.

So who is the best manager that Richard O’Donnell has worked under? The answer to that question wasn’t anybody he had worked with at a club he has spent the last four years at, but no other than Dean Smith who took Aston Villa into the Premier League and is currently manager of Norwich City. O’Donnell was managed by Smith when he was at Walsall. When you hear players speak highly of managers it hardly comes as a surprise when you see the success they have achieved. However it shouldn’t be considered an insult to any of those managers that have managed him at Bradford City, not Mark Hughes, nor Derek Adams, it is more of a testament to the quality manager that Smith has turned out to be.

It would be hard for anybody that supports Bradford City not to wish Richard O’Donnell every success in his future career and hope he has a great time at Rochdale. About his move to Rochdale O’Donnell said he was looking forward to having a “fresh challenge” and gets “a really good feeling from the place”. On the football front he said “from speaking to the manager it sounds like a good project  he’s trying to put together for next season”. And the early signs are positive as they’ve added former Shrewsbury Town centre back Ethan Ebanks-Landell to their squad with more new faces expected through the doors over the next month. It’s early days but they do seem they have a bit of ambition about them and could be a surprise package.