But manager's do also have little quirks and favourites that they respond to. Just because they've got coaching badges doesn't mean they're immune to making mistakes. Mourinho failed to play Lukaku, De Bruyne AND Salah at Chelsea because of his opinion of what he thought they offered. Looks very silly now. Obviously I'm not comparing our players to that, just using it as an example of the fact that managers can make a wrong call about someone.
Look back to Pressley, and his decision to play Wilson. I think all of us questioned that, given Wilson's lack of experience and he'd hardly pulled up trees on loan. But he got thrown in and never looked back. That could very easily have gone the other way. Bayliss was also brought in way before the manager wanted to because of necessity and again took his chance better than we could have hoped. Meanwhile others with great fanfare, like Giddings, Thomas, Thornton and Ponticelli, have, for various reasons, been unsuccessful. But would it be better if we were here, years later, saying 'imagine what might've been had we given so-and-so a chance"?