Mick: I know I’m not first choice with Cardiff fans
MICK McCARTHY knows he wasn’t the first choice to become Cardiff City manager among the Bluebirds’ faithful.
Maybe not second or third either. The scepticism suits and will act as a spur.
‘If you ask every Cardiff supporter who they would like to employ, you would get a long list, and a lot of people in front of me,’ acknowledged McCarthy at his first press briefing yesterday.
‘I can’t do anything about that. I just want to come in, enjoy these 22 games and do as well as I possibly can. Then, hopefully, the ones who didn’t want me will be proven wrong.
‘If you form a committee to design a horse you get a camel anyway. Someone has got to make a decision,’ he added.
Some football folk reckon McCarthy, 61, a former manager of Wolverhampton Wanderers, Sunderland and Ipswich Town, among others, is akin to a managerial dinosaur, a charge he would dispute and one he intends to counter between now and May 8 when the regular Championship season finishes.
‘To come in and say, on the back of the defeats we have had, that the target is now the play-offs, some will wonder if I’ve gone off my rocker,’ he said.
‘If we beat Barnsley on Wednesday, then Millwall, maybe we can say it. But we need to get back to winning games
‘I have to get a tune out of the players and get them to improve. I think we can and I think we have got the quality to do it. When we start picking up points we can set targets.’
As for the way his teams play, he didn’t back down.
‘Me and my style of football is trying your best to win the game by passing the ball to one another, however that might be,’ McCarthy said.
‘It makes me laugh because I look at Liverpool play and they hit long balls behind the opposition.
‘Suddenly they get found out and the ones who beat Liverpool hit balls and get runners in behind.’
McCarthy took training with the Cardiff players for the first time yesterday.
‘I wanted to get out on the grass with them. I worked with them for an hour and a half.
‘I wanted to see who were the aggressive ones, who were the progressive ones, are there any voices in the camp?
‘Who needed an arm around them, low in confidence? It seems to me there are a few of those. It’s
only normal, when you’re losing games.
‘I have had two, three, four individual chats. I find that more productive than me stood preaching to players.’
McCarthy arrives in Cardiff after a rare failure as manager, at APOEL Cyprus where he was dismissed earlier this month after a run of three defeats.
‘I can run through a litany of excuses. We had 19 players who had Covid-19 from December 8.
‘We came back and lost all three games. Whether that’s Covid or me and TC (Terry Connor), it didn’t work. It’s the first time ever that has happened and I was disappointed.’
McCarthy displayed nimble footwork when asked if there was an increase of regret about leaving the Republic of Ireland job in light of Stephen Kenny’s failure to win any of his eight games.
‘I’ve got Barnsley on Wednesday. That’s my sole interest. Then Millwall on Saturday.
‘If you would like to speak to me about my job at Cardiff then I would love to do so. If not, I am happy to leave the meeting.’
He played a straight bat too when brought back to the early end of his Ireland experience last April.
‘My contract ended in July and it was never going to be extended beyond that because I accepted Stephen Kenny was taking the job.
‘I wanted to take the Slovakia game, but it just wasn’t feasible and it was Stephen’s time.
‘I have no anger, ire, ill-feeling, it was a contractual issue. I have got unfinished business with football as opposed to any other job I’ve had before.
‘I loved being back with Ireland and it was an absolute honour to manage them for the second time,’ he added.