That Liam Rosenior is under the microscope like never before will not have surprised the under-pressure Chelsea boss.
But withering and personal takedowns from ex-pros he used to call friends and team-mates may have come as a shock.
The 41-year-old has found himself cast as a comic figure, taunted online as a ‘David Brent character’ and ‘LinkedIn Liam’, with a number of his interviews going viral.
Last month, Rosenior defended a bizarre pre-match huddle with the referee caught in the middle as his side wanting to ‘respect the ball’.
He’s also joked about his children sending him viral memes of him from social media, mostly centred on his ‘management-speak’ and what some fans think is a performative earnestness.
And while Chelsea’s indisputably poor form – they’ve lost four of their last five Premier League games – has piled on the pressure and put Champions League football almost out of reach, the perception of the young boss has been further damaged by some who knew him well.
Liam Rosenior has come under fire from former team-mates of his since taking over at Chelsea
Sean Davis, who shared a dressing room with Rosenior for a season at Fulham in the 2003-04 season, is the latest to take a swipe.
He told the Under the Cosh podcast: ‘I don’t even recognise him, I don’t know who that guy is. He talks like he’s swallowed a dictionary of long words.’
Davis then went on to admit that Rosenior is swimming against the tide as a young black manager but then opted to criticise him again, saying he’s ‘coming out with ‘b****cks’.
He went on: ‘Listen, good luck to him at the end of the day, a lot of people might criticise but he’s done the hard yards in coaching and it’s going to be tough for him, especially being a black coach it is tough getting jobs.
‘I know a lot of black guys, ex-players who go “it’s too hard, I’m not going to get a chance”.
‘Even Ashley Cole has had to go to Italy to get a job. So I respect him (Rosenior) and the fact that he’s done the job but some of the words and stuff he’s coming out with… it’s a bit b*****ks isn’t it?
‘I honestly think people overcomplicate football just to get a job these days. Football isn’t rocket science, it’s not hard but it’s a totally different game now to what it was.’
Davis’ brutal comments come after Kevin Kilbane, who played with Rosenior at Hull City, was the first former team-mate to fire shots across the bow.
Kilbane said on Off the Ball: ‘I played with Liam at Hull, and I got on well with Liam; he used to tell some great stories of Roy Keane when he was his manager at Ipswich.
Kevin Kilbane (right) pictured in a tackle with Rosenior during Wigan’s game against Fulham in 2007, also played with him and said he is ‘unrecognisable’ now
‘And you see the way he is now, to me, he’s unrecognisable to the player and the person I knew. It’s like he’s swallowed a psychologist’s manual or a sporting mentor’s memoir. To me, everything he says is waffle, drivel, nothing.
‘It’s like he tries to write as many quotes down as possible and tries to get them into a pre-match talk or post-match whenever addressing the media. If I’m a player being asked to do that huddle, I wouldn’t feel comfortable if I was a Chelsea player.’
The takedown made waves and even ruffled feathers on The Overlap, with Jamie Carragher arguing: ‘That was out of order. I didn’t like that.’
Ian Wright branded the attack ‘needless’, while Roy Keane delivered a retort of his own to Kilbane, joking: ‘That’s Kevin who did Dancing on Ice, wasn’t it?’
Former Fulham team-mate Michael Brown has also weighed in with a more measured take, insisting Rosenior is the same man he knew during their playing days but has ‘done too much’.
Brown told FootyAccumulators: ‘Liam Rosenior tested himself as a manager, left England and did really well with the same beliefs and ideas as he has now. He’s tried new systems to be creative, and Chelsea obviously like what he’s brought to the club.
‘He initially had a good start, so what has changed? Has he overcomplicated it and tried to get the players to do too many different things?’
‘He’s done a lot of media work, he’ll front anything up and he’s the same person that came into the Fulham dressing room when I was there with him. He tried to handle the pressure in the media and he tried really hard with everybody, but he’s done too much.’
Brown then suggested Rosenior may not have the ‘aura’ to win players over.
Wayne Rooney (left) was full of praise for Rosenior (centre) having worked with him at Derby
He added: ‘Michael Carrick is another young manager, similar to Liam going into a big club.
‘Is it because he’s played at the top level that he has a different aura which players don’t challenge? Liam is not winning games now and the players might be thinking, “we’re not winning now, who are you to tell me what’s next?”.
‘Chelsea have some top players like Moises Caicedo; he’s right up there and could play anywhere. You can understand, if they haven’t won a game for a while, that they’ll be wanting to go to Real Madrid or another big club. They want to win something.’
Despite the criticism, others who have worked with Rosenior were full of praise, none more so than Wayne Rooney, who had him as assistant coach when he was Derby boss.
When Rosenior took the Chelsea job, the England and Man United legend said on the BBC’s Wayne Rooney Show: ‘He’s taken chances, and hopefully that pays off because I think Liam is as good a coach as I’ve ever worked with.
‘His detail, how he approaches the day to day, he’s as good as I’ve worked with.
‘Liam was so important for me. He was incredible in his coaching ability. I was more of the manager and dealing with players and everything.
‘So I learned a lot from him from that point of view and then I think he’s done a great job as a whole.’
Whether Rosenior has been stung by the personal criticism from his former team-mates remains to be seen, but he will know full well the perception of his style and personality will only be changed by arresting Chelsea’s slump, the biggest test of his managerial career so far.
