Burnley academy manager David Longwell has been forced to resign after sending out a damning assessment of Scott Parker’s side to the wrong WhatsApp group.
Longwell, who joined Burnley last November after previous roles at Shrewsbury Town, New York Red Bulls, Orlando City, and St. Mirren, has seen his tenure at Turf Moor come to an abrupt end. The Scot mistakenly sent a critical report about the first-team squad to the club’s Under-21 players instead of an agent, leading to his swift departure.
In his report, the 50-year-old not only slammed various players, but also previous manager Vincent Kompany. Despite the report not being sent to the first team, it found its way to the hierarchy, who called Longwell in for a meeting, with the outcome pretty much a given.
“There are so many players as well as Vinny signed a lot in the Championship, then more when promoted to the Prem, and then struggling more again in January and then more again in the summer,” wrote Longwell, who was highly regarded when he departed Shrewsbury Town. “Big issue they can’t get players out for the finance they spent and it’s been left a mess with that many players and Vinny who signed them left.”
He went into much deeper detail, labelling certain players a ‘big waste of money’ or ‘rubbish’ while also identifying one star as ‘miles off it in the Premier League and too weak for England’. It is unclear who that may be, with few of the Burnley squad considered close to the England setup.
It’s believed that Burnley’s director of football development, Paul Jenkins, has now written to the parents of the academy players to confirm Longwell’s departure and explain the reasons why, which is how a red-top got hold of the news.
“It looks like it was written for an agent because there was a lot of detail about how much he thought each player was worth,” a source told The Sun. “He sent it on WhatsApp but sent it to the Under-21 players so the first-team and the manager found out. It is a pretty indiscreet document so I believe he was hauled in and the only available outcome was that he would leave the club.”
Burnley opened their Championship account with big wins against Luton Town (4-1) and Cardiff City (5-0), but were beaten by ten-man Sunderland this weekend. Since the opening day, they’ve sold Wilson Odobert, Scott Twine, Sander Berge, Anass Zaroury, Jóhann Berg Guðmundsson, Dara O’Shea and Ameen Al-Dakhil, meaning they have a lot of business to do over the next 48 hours or so.
Now, part of that business may be looking for a new academy lead.
Writer’s View
We’ve all done it – sent the wrong message to the wrong chat. I wager very few of us have done it to such epic proportions, though. Imagine the moment Longwell realised what he had done!
This feels like a light-hearted story, but it will have a big effect at Burnley. Having a member of staff talk about the squad in such a way won’t help team spirit, and many of those young players coached by Longwell will have their development disrupted. This really isn’t what the Clarets wanted after so many departures.
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