Ince Would Be Wise To Patient..

Roy Keane may be grabbing all the headlines at the moment but he isn't the only former Manchester United player-turned-manager who has found the going tough lately. While the former Sunderland boss has now resigned after his club's poor start to the season, Paul Ince's Blackburn are a place below the Black Cats in the Premiership table having lost five of their last six league games.Rovers take on top-of-the-table Liverpool on Saturday and are 5/2 to go down in the football betting. They last won against Newcastle in September, coincidentally the last game in which Roque Santa Cruz scored, and are now in something of a crisis. Blackburn haven't had any realistic title ambitions for a number of years but are an established Premiership club and it would be a disaster for them to be relegated.

Ince deserves more time though. He's learnt his trade in the lower leagues and impressed at the clubs he's coached so far. He managed to save Macclesfield from relegation and won the Football League Trophy and League Two title with MK Dons. The Blackburn board deserve praise for giving him a chance at the highest level but it is a huge transition moving from League Two to the Premiership. Ince's experience of playing at that level is not a guarantee of success, as many other former great players have found, including of course his former midfield partner Keane.
Ince is refusing to panic however, insisting his side have been playing well enough to win but haven't been taking their chances and have made some bad defensive mistakes. They could have done without the League Cup game at Old Trafford, with the Premiership being such a priority. A win could have lifted the whole club and provided an impetus to start climbing the league, but conceding five goals, despite scoring three, just compounds the negativity around Ewood Park. Ince isn't being helped by injury and illness in his squad, but is determined to prove he can cut it at this level, and should be given the time to do so.