Jonny Drury and Ollie Westbury bring you all the latest from Michael Appleton's unveiling as the new Shrewsbury Town boss.
After a hectic week at Salop that saw Gareth Ainsworth walk out of the club to take over at Gillingham, Appleton was unveiled as the new Salop boss for the remainder of the season.
Ollie and Jonny look at what the new boss has said, why he took the job and what his goals are for the last nine games of the campaign.
After a hectic week at Salop that saw Gareth Ainsworth walk out of the club to take over at Gillingham, Appleton was unveiled as the new Salop boss for the remainder of the season.
Ollie and Jonny look at what the new boss has said, why he took the job and what his goals are for the last nine games of the campaign.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00Salop fans, welcome to ShropshireStar.com, my name is Jonny Durie, I'm here with Oli
00:11Westbury at Shrewsbury's Sundawn training ground. Oli, feels like deja vu times, I don't
00:19know how much really because the latest Shrewsbury Town Manager has been unveiled after what
00:24has been a week of turmoil for Salop with Gareth Ainsworth departing the club, Michael
00:29Appleton has just been unveiled as the club's new, what do you call him, interim manager
00:34until the end of the season to try and, against all odds, steer Shrewsbury away from the NHL
00:40which is probably not going to happen. Oli, we've just had a chance to speak to him, manager
00:44with good records at certain clubs, maybe not so good at other clubs but what have you
00:50made of him, what have you made of the appointment, I know you've written about it and we've got
00:53a Shrewsbury News coming out this afternoon about the goings on of this week but what
00:58did you make of that and Appleton and your first impressions of the new Salop manager?
01:02I think he had a pretty decent interview yesterday with the club and a pretty good interview
01:07now with ourselves and BBC Radio Shropshire, he's in a pretty difficult position isn't
01:12he, Shrewsbury are in a pretty dire situation, 14 points from safety, bottom of league one,
01:16it's not looking particularly positive, their prospects this season, he was asked about
01:21survival and he didn't say they were going to finish above the line and that they were
01:25going to have a party when they got above it, so obviously more circumspect, different
01:31approach clearly than the previous head coach who's obviously just departed, who was obviously
01:37full of optimism and energy, just optimism? Don't, don't. So yeah, a different dynamic,
01:47something slightly different, he was cool, calm, very articulate, I noticed that, he
01:51doesn't mince his words, he says exactly what he means to and it's very easy to understand.
01:57And yeah, so he was pretty good, it was very similar to the interview that he had yesterday
02:01with the club, there's not a great deal that you can really ask the man really, he's come
02:07in, he's got a short period of time to kind of get some results for Shrewsbury and we'll
02:12need to wait and see, a few games are going to need to go by, he's already answered the
02:16question of whether he sees it as a long-term appointment or not, he did that yesterday
02:21in the club, so we're just going to have to wait and see how it all plays out. Yeah, maybe
02:26an audition for players in the last nine games of the season, we know the previous manager
02:29talked about playing for contracts next season and all that, you can put as much weight behind
02:33that as you want because he's not here any more, but almost a bit of an audition for
02:37Appleton really, coming in, from his perspective not a great deal to lose, Shrewsbury are effectively
02:45barring a miracle, already down, if he steers them away from safety he'll certainly have
02:50the job next season, the freedom of Shrewsbury probably, but like you say, a chance for him
02:54to stake a claim, get back into football and potentially land the job for next season,
03:00that was my take away from what he said. Yeah, and similar to what he said yesterday, we
03:06didn't learn a great deal more than what we didn't know yesterday, I asked him a few questions
03:09about the style of play and the fact that he likes to play through the thirds, which
03:12may be something a bit different but he's probably not going to go into doing that straight
03:16away, Shrewsbury have been playing in a particular way in the Gareth Haynesworth haven't they,
03:18they've been quite direct and they move the ball forward and whatever and set pieces and
03:23throw-ins and what have you, but are we going to see a distinct change straight away, probably
03:27not, and yeah he sees it as a chance, this is an opportunity for him, it's an opportunity
03:33to show what he's capable of, that's the line from this press conference, that's what he's
03:38effectively said, whether that be in this dugout or another one, he wants to be in there,
03:43there's 72 jobs available in the EFL and he's got his eyes on one of those, so yeah for
03:49him it's a bit of a, it's something that's kind of came out of the blue, we spoke a little
03:52bit about the coaching role that he's had over the last few weeks, but yeah, it's been
04:01a long week, it's been a long week for everybody involved and now we just kind of need some
04:07football action to kind of take our minds off the off-field shenanigans that have gone on.
04:13Yeah, you'll read a lot more about what Appleton said, he talked to me about, he's got a great
04:19following going with him to Birmingham tomorrow in the circumstances, he talks about the fans
04:22kind of feeling let down this week, which they obviously are and you'll hear more about
04:25that on our episode of Shrewsviews, he said the players are probably hurting a little
04:30bit and are disappointed, but have responded well to him, he's not naive to know the task
04:35he's got ahead of him, but it is about maybe going down with a little bit of pride, now
04:41that's what he wants to see.
04:42Absolutely, he wants to see him stay up, he doesn't want to see him go down, but he realizes
04:47that that's not probably going to happen is it, so you know, he did say didn't he, there's
04:51a lot of disappointment on the faces of those players, you know, after what's happened in
04:56the last week, I imagine there's a lot of them that feel quite unhappy about what's
05:00happened, so yeah, he spoke as well as he could do in this situation, it's the same
05:08as the appointment, it's a decent appointment isn't it, given the circumstances that Shrewsbury
05:12find themselves in, they've acted swiftly, got a man in, soon they go to Birmingham with
05:18somebody in charge who's a capable, experienced EFL League One operator, so we've just got
05:24to wait and see what happens there.
05:26If he does get a few results between now and the end of the season, he'll ultimately go
05:29down, surely given his record, I don't know if he's done really well in League Two, he's
05:34obviously had jobs in the championship, he did well in League Two, I think Lincoln and
05:38Oxford, if Shrewsbury go down, he's got pretty shrewd appointments, we're having a dugout
05:43if they do make him full-time at the end of the season.
05:45Yeah, I think so, I don't think there's an awful lot of negativity about...
05:49I think Shrewsbury could have ended this week a lot worse.
05:51Yeah, they could have done, yeah, they could have done, you know, I think they've done
05:56okay.
05:57You can't wax lyrical about it, ultimately, the situation as a whole, you can't go absolutely
06:04crazy about it, but given the circumstances, you know, they've done okay.
06:13There you go Salad fans, as we said, short video today, we've got a Shrewsbury podcast
06:17coming out as well this afternoon, so you can listen to Ollie's review of what has been
06:20a pretty hectic week for all involved at Shrewsbury, but for all the rest of the reaction from
06:26today's press conference, and for coverage of tomorrow's game against Birmingham, head
06:30to shotsrestart.com