AFCB and Forest - something in common

You can look up and down the leagues and see clubs that have appointed managers who frankly have no great connection with the club or the local people what so ever. No matter how hard they try, many of those managers just never quite fit in and are not taken to the hearts of the fans. But every now and again you can look at a club from the outside and see that the manager has not only played for the club but is part of it and knows everything about it from the boot room to the person who orders staples and the programme seller who stands out in the rain. 

Forest and AFCB both have managers who not only symbolise their club spirit but actually breathe it in and are often the first thing fans will think about when they think of when their thoughts turn to their club. I know it's a good thing too. Whether Stuart Pearce does well or fails at Forest in his current term as manage,r the fans up there will always love their physco just as Bournemouth fans will always hold Eddie Howe in the highest esteem. But why does it work out well at some clubs and not at others when former players take up the manager's robes? Some are definitely better fits than others. Even when some mangers know the problems at a club it is not always so easy as to be able to sort them all out.

Stuart Pearce has already had a bit of a spat with Forest chairman Fawaz Al Hasawi over player sales and there is no guarantee that any chairman and manager are not going to fall out over such things. Yet, Pearce was quick to move on and heal any wounds. The new era for Forest has not really taken hold yet and even last spring when they might have made the play-offs, Stuart Pearce felt family commitments meant he could not take up his post until this season. Is the Forest record still broken or is it about to find its song again? If the reception that Pearce received at the City ground is anything to go by on the first day of the season against Blackpool we know that Pearce will have all the backing singers he needs from Forest's huge fan base to mount a challenge. He has had a good start with four points from six, but now it gets difficult.

Both Stuart Pearce and Eddie Howe have the words to rouse football fans and make sense of what is in all honestly a mad pursuit that we all love. But isn't it best to share that mad world every match day with a manger who cares just like you? I think it is, and for that we can at least say to Forest fans we have something in common with them.