Gary Rowett: Oxford United appoint former Birmingham and Millwall boss as head coach
By Jerome Sale, commentator for BBC Radio Oxford United
Gary Rowett is a tournament manager.
He is still hundreds of games behind in the second tier and joins a club that has only played 20 second division games in the past 25 years.
If the owners, executives and most of the players don’t have championship knowledge… then he does.
In all games he has played as head coach, his teams have averaged at least 1.3 points per game. Duplicate his worst form for any Championship club and he would make Oxford safe, which is exactly what he was recruited for.
Gary Rowett is no Des Buckingham. It’s not his fault.
United faced a more brutal backlash than they expected when they sacked Buckingham, a local lad who performed brilliantly, brought promotion and created a fairy tale.
At least in this appointment, they weren’t attracted by star names or people without more experience than Buckingham.
I’m not sure they’ll be forgiven for that. Still, they were decisive and the appointment was as pragmatic as Rowett’s team usually is.
Many will see this as Oxford recruiting firefighters. They think it’s long term – not usually that long in a tournament.
Rightly or wrongly, the fairy tale is over and now comes the harsh reality.
We spent five months honing the key points to ensure that what Buckingham Palace achieved during the warm spell of last May was not wasted come spring 2025.
