Karl Fuller: I’m not getting sucked into a need for change at Portman Road

Andre Dozzell was back on the bench at Birmingham. Picture Pagepix (Image: Pagepix Ltd 07976 935738)

This column was six years-old last week and a look back to the very first headline from the Fuller Flavour dated 24 September 2012 referenced how the patience had run out.

This was in the latter stages of Paul Jewell’s managerial reign and was less than two years after he had taken over from Roy Keane whose tenure had similarly ended in less than two years and again similarly, with our patience at an end.

Patience is a massive virtue in sport.

We all want success for the teams/people that we follow and we all want success to find its way to our favourites as soon as possible or at the very least, we want to see real signs of progress.

The aura that is emanating from many fellow fans on social media, at games or those that contact me, feels as if we are at the same juncture in many aspects of either of those eras of Jewell and Keane.

Andre Dozzell was back on the bench at Birmingham. Picture Pagepix (Image: Pagepix Ltd 07976 935738)

MORE: North Stander: The rumour mill is working overtime

Yet, given that Paul Hurst is only two-months into this new project, I don’t feel that I can personally get sucked into any need for change any time soon as is being demanded.

I do wonder sometimes if Hurst is out of his depth as many claim, I do agree that too many of our new players came without the required Championship experience and I do feel perplexed as to what is going on most of the time these days in respect of team selections, formations and the situation in general.

But I simply wonder what would be gained in making change so soon and in which direction would Marcus Evans go if he chose to dispense of Hurst?

Am I happy with the way things are going?

Andre Dozzell was back on the bench at Birmingham. Picture Pagepix (Image: Pagepix Ltd 07976 935738)

Of course, I am not!

I’m hurting like many Town fans at our failure to win a game yet this season and because of our lowly league position. It was frustrating, annoying, gutting or whatever term that you wish to choose to describe the feeling of throwing a way a two-goal interval lead at Birmingham on Saturday.

MORE: Paul Hurst’s after match thoughts from the Birmingham draw

At present it’s not good enough but I still believe that we must bear with.

Evans is not an owner that pulls the trigger too soon and gives his men time.I’m proud to be associated with a club that does not sack managers every few months and feel that in the main, we have dispensed of our last three managers at exactly the point where change needed to happen.

Andre Dozzell was back on the bench at Birmingham. Picture Pagepix (Image: Pagepix Ltd 07976 935738)

If Hurst was to be released soon, then what?

We’ve done the tried and tested who have got teams out of the Championship, we’ve plumped for a younger manager who has had a degree of success with clubs in the lower leagues which clearly isn’t working at present, would a foreign manager be the next avenue to explore?

I do believe that over the years, especially in January 2014, Evans could have backed Mick McCarthy better financially, but that’s easy for me to say when he is funding the club each year just to keep us going.

So, until either Hurst has run a similar two-year course in which time he would have had appropriate time to prove himself or a fool proof plan guaranteeing us success with a new manager in place comes forward, I will continue to be patient in the hope (which generally extinguishes in the end anyway) that better times really are not too far away.

MORE: Injury blow for Town as striker out for two months

Andre Dozzell was back on the bench at Birmingham. Picture Pagepix (Image: Pagepix Ltd 07976 935738)

The next two fixtures will naturally test the resolve of that patience though as Swansea away on Saturday will be a very stern test and before then, a game at home to high-flying Middlesbrough tomorrow night will test our unbeaten home record.

The Boro have only lost once so far this season and the fact that the game is live on Sky does not bode well given our recent record in front of the cameras.

But I look back on many of the 17 games I’ve seen against Middlesbrough at Portman Road in the hope that we can replicate some of the nine wins in that time and not add to just the three defeats I’ve witnessed.

Andre Dozzell was back on the bench at Birmingham. Picture Pagepix (Image: Pagepix Ltd 07976 935738)