Moore’s sacking is the most ridiculous I’ve seen

THESE things should not surprise me. I have been a professional footballer for more than 20 years and I’d like to think there is nothing much I haven’t seen.

Then something happens like last Saturday and you find yourself openmouthed, shaking your head in disbelief. Managers get sacked all the time these days but how on earth did West Brom find reason to get shot of Darren Moore?

Honestly, it is the most ridiculous — and needless — sacking I have ever seen. I’ve read the reasons West Brom gave but, really, they don’t add up. I spent the first half of the season watching the Championship story unfold and it is a ferocious league. Believe me, Darren had done a fantastic job.

Darren is someone who I have always respected. When I was 19 and moved away from home for the first time to Portsmouth, he was my skipper at Fratton Park. In those tough, early days, Mooro was always there, offering advice and doing all he could to help me settle.

He knows football inside out and understands what is required to make a dressing room run smoothly.

Mooro was a brilliant captain and you could see the natural progress for him after he finished playing was into coaching and management.

So when West Brom appointed him last year, I was delighted. He took over a club that had gone into freefall and had sacked two managers. They looked dead and buried after Alan Pardew had gone but, against the odds, he almost pulled off a miraculous

escape. It’s worth a reminder that among his first results were a 1-0 win over Manchester United at Old Trafford and 2-2 draw with Liverpool at The Hawthorns after West Brom had come from two goals down. You could see that the players bought into what he was doing.

West Brom had a duty to give him a proper crack at the job after his caretaker spell had gone so well. In September, Stoke played them at The Hawthorns. I played 90 minutes, but I got no joy against their back three and the final score of 2-1 didn’t reflect West Brom’s superiority.

They are one of the best teams in the Championship. Yes, there has been some inconsistency in results lately, but no team in that division goes through a campaign without a blip; the odds on automatic promotion may have increased but they are certainties for the play-offs.

This is what I don’t understand. Why would a club make such an extraordinary decision when things are going well? Darren (left), from what I could see, had done little wrong and it is depressing that he has been treated in such a way.

Management these days is an increasingly thankless task and it’s another example of why some people don’t like our industry when they see a good man being treated this way. I really hope there aren’t any longterm implications for him.

You’d think he’d walk into another job. Will that be the case? I hope chairmen in the future look at him and see someone who can help their club. If he finds himself out of the game and unable to get back in, West Brom need to ask themselves why.