As the Terriers look to replace Darren Moore, their owner Kevin Nagle has laid out what qualities he is looking for in a new manager. Town decided to fire Moore on Monday following the team’s 1-1 draw with relegation rivals QPR, which leaves them three points above the relegation zone and in fourth place.
Following Sunday’s draw, Town had won just one of their previous 11 Championship games, and Moore was fired after just three of his twenty-three games in charge.
In the interim, academy manager Jon Worthington will oversee this weekend’s pivotal home match against second-bottom Sheffield Wednesday, while the club’s administration works to name Moore’s replacement.
As was agreed upon with Moore, Nagle is still eager to appoint someone for a “longer-term” role, and the owner has stated that he would prefer to work with someone who has successfully fought against relegation in the past.
Although the owner of the Terriers was keen to seek guidance from his former boss Neil Warnock, it didn’t seem like he would seek out the 75-year-old for another firefighting assignment.
In a diary entry published on X on Tuesday night, Nagle discussed the hiring process for the new manager, saying, “You always have a list of potential candidates, but that changes really in real time.”
“When we made the announcement about Darren, we had a list of about nine, and that ballooned out to a rather substantial number. Now we’ve cut that back down, we’re going to interview about 12 people, many of them have been interviewed.
“We’re looking for certain qualifications. We don’t want to do just a short-term deal, I want to do a longer-term deal, even though I’ve got a number of former managers on our payroll.
“The reality is we’ve got to get it right, there’s just no question. We want a certain type of football, and we’ve also got to have somebody who’s hopefully had some experience with fighting relegation.
“I am aware that many will tell you to go back to Neil, but we must consider the big picture in the long run. I adore Neil, I’ve spoken with Neil, and I will definitely get in touch with him. However, the truth is that while I think Neil can do a great deal to support us, we must focus on the long-term success of the club.
The club wants the next manager to have “a big short-term impact, but also to fit with our longer-term strategy of building an attack-minded, progressive style of football over a number of seasons,” as CEO Jake Edwards stated in the statement announcing Moore’s departure. Nagle has reaffirmed this desire.
“We want to attack football, that’s something that’s really top (of the priority list),” the owner added. “We’ve started to get the player personnel to move in that direction, and I think when Del (Delano Burgzorg) comes back, we’re going to have three really solid people up front.
“We’re going to need more I think, but the reality of it is we’re going to be able to play much more aggressive football.”
With just 17 games remaining in the season, Nagle paid tribute to Moore upon his departure while also acknowledging that the team “had to move on” if they were to stay in the Championship.
“Darren is an amazing person. The owner stated, “I think he’s a great manager in many ways; the timing just wasn’t right for us.”
“I think we gave him enough time to see if we could make it work, we got some players of course in the window, we had a couple of games to try and see if that made sense. It just didn’t happen, but Darren is a great human being.
“I was a little bit disappointed when I had a chance to see some people wanted us to lose so we would terminate him, that really bothers me just in general, and I think others maybe are just a bit less sensitive about the human being. He’s a father and he’s somebody son, he’s a wonderful guy. I’m disappointed he didn’t get to know our fan base better, but we have to move on.
“There’s no denying that the leash was becoming shorter. We played a lot of ties that, in my opinion, we ought to have won; in particular, the last three games were all winnable. We would be in a very different place now if we had won all three. It becomes more difficult as a result.
“I don’t find it difficult to make decisions of this nature in business; however, we must move on. I have compassion.” Moving up the table is necessary, and I believe we have a chance.
“I know we have some difficult games after this one, which is definitely winnable. We cannot ignore it. We made improvements to our player roster, and I think that will be enough to get us through.
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