I think there is always more than one side to any story. I was one who defended Whitney, if not as a manager, but for what he gave to the club. I think he was treated really unfairly by the fans, he was pretty much written off by a large section after the Barnsley games. Forgetting of course he actually got our promotion challenge back on track, after the disaster that was O’Driscoll. There were some shocking away performances in that time, but his points per game matched up with Smiths until the end of the season.
We lost a great physio when he left the club, Smith wouldn’t have got close to what he did, if Whitney hadn’t consistently got injury prone players on the pitch for him, and go them in better shape than pretty much every team in the division. (That’s not a dig at Smith by the way) Some of the hatred aimed at Whitney wasn’t nice.
It was a downright disgrace. How many times did we narrowly avoid relegation outside the Smith years - not forgetting his first season when we did finish in a relegation place but didn’t get relegated? In a way it was a poisoned chalice because of Smith’s legacy. Pep would have struggled.
I enjoy following Walsall regardless of how good or bad we are on the pitch, but at that time I wasn’t enjoying it, there was so much hatred around. One game in particular I remember, MK Dons away, we were pretty poor in the first half. We equalised and played pretty well second half, could and probably should have won in the end. There were fans foaming at the mouth to send out abuse to Whitney. I’m not saying I have never got caught up in a moment and got angry with something, but this was on another level, and didn’t sit well with me.
I think you are right, I think the season when we almost made it, gave fans some sense of entitlement, when in reality that was a one off season, and all the jewels had gone.
Would’ve probably continued with that if likes of Eoghan O’Connell (whatever happened to him) and Wilson (ditto) had been signed full time.
Instead Whitney decided to fall out with O’Connor and let him go and it was a mediocre bunch of defensive options Keates inherited.
Also remember that pre season game at Cheltenham a week before the season started and there being 3 trialists in the back 4, none of them signed in the end.
We were at that game and he was getting loads of abuse for playing Baka. I seem to remember Whitney gave the away fans a sarcastic wave after we equalised because he’d been getting abuse about his team selection all game. Of course that meant he kopped even more abuse.
At one point in the first half some muppet shouted “Whitney shags kids!”.
The back two rows chanting in full volume “We Want Whitney out” for five minutes right after Morris had tucked away the third to make it 3-0 at Doncaster remains one of the most surreal football atmospheres I’ve been involved with. I wouldn’t have blamed Whitney if he’d resigned straight after the game as you know in the long run you can’t win.
He wasn’t cut out to be a manager in the long run but with a perfectly decent league one first 11 he delievered a comfortable mid table finish in 16/17 although throwing the last three games wasn’t a great look.
Then with a poorer 11 the following year the team struggled but still had reasonable difference to bottom 4. He was just a small part of the demise from the moment Barnsley scored the first goal in May 2016.
Edit: I think the Franchise away game was 4 days before Doncaster. Was certainly a strange aspect of Whitney’s management how often he started Baka ahead of Tyler Roberts and Agyei. After that Ismail came into the team and had his 3 game run of wonder form.
Just looking at the line ups from those games btw, what the hell happened to Maz Kouyhar?!
Currently a “fitness consultant” at non league Hartlepool? I think it’s fair to say he had his faults as well as the board
Inherited a good side, turned it into a mid table one, then with his own signings turned it into a relegation one. I was a BIG defender of Whitney at some of the criticism he received, particularly his press comments or people kicking up a fuss about dead rubbers (that they knew were dead rubbers before they brought their tickets) but he wasn’t a very good manager in the long run.
He seemed to be of the opinion that if he kept playing Baka he’d eventually score and it would give him the confidence to score more.
Problem was, he was playing crap, kopping abuse from the fans which made him even worse and yet Whitney still kept playing him. It was a vicious circle. He needed to be taken out of the firing line for his own good but Whitney effectively threw him under a bus. Roberts and Agyei were scoring more goals than him in less playing time. So Whitney got abuse for this too.
It would be interesting to see how he got on if he got another role. Keates was bombing at Wrexham on his return and had to make a public apology about one of the performances prior to lockdown.
The worst part about Whitney was the atmosphere around the place. Fans hated him, he hated us and would get the players to deliberately not celebrate with us when they scored. Bizarre, I remember Morris scoring at Doncaster abs Tyler Roberts grabbing his shoulders and turning them away from us.
Would imagine being 30 miles away from home, and the opportunity to play at Ibrox, Parkhead (spit), even Tynecastle, or Pittodrie, was better than Salford, Crawley, or Stevenage, and helped make his mind up.
Good header by Guthrie to beat Ross County (Ross County who have a ‘Camping and Caravan’ site next to their ground in Dingwall - Can’t be too many football clubs that can say that.
We weren’t members so had to camp elsewhere but I did drive around the ground.
I’ve seen Daniel Agyei’s name pop up a couple of times and his loan really summed up the Whitney regime for me. I remember he was paired with Bakayoko on his debut and they connected straight away, both causing problems with Agyei scoring.
The following game they were paired together but didn’t perform as well. I don’t think they ever played together again. We never seemed to stick with anything long enough for it to work
Tyler Roberts usage was also odd. Looked quality from scoring on his debut in that mad 3-3 v Bradford and also finished really well at Oxford a few weeks later. However every other week he seemed to be away with Wales under 21s or left on the bench. Then got injured, played one more game in January 2018 a day before his loan expired and then Leeds signed him. Will probably play a fair amount for them in premier league.
I still think on balance Whitney did o.k in 16/17 but the start of 17/18 really showed why he wasn’t going to make a manager, quickly changing from 3-5-2, getting rid of all the experienced players and leaving decent ones on the bench.
end.