Alex Neil: Stoke City sack manager after 16 months in charge
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Alex Neil has left Stoke after 16 months and with the club 20th in the Championship
Stoke City have sacked Alex Neil as manager following Saturday's home defeat by Championship bottom club Sheffield Wednesday.
The 42-year-old Scot spent 16 months in charge in the Potteries after leaving fellow Championship side Sunderland to join Stoke in August 2022.
He led Stoke to 16th last season, a fall from the previous two campaigns, when they had each time finished 14th.
But they have struggled this term and currently sit 20th in the table.
Despite an expensive 18-man summer overhaul, the Potters have won just six of their 20 league matches.
Assistant Martin Canning has also left the club and first-team coach Paul Gallagher will take charge of the team for Tuesday's home game against Swansea.
Chairman John Coates told the club website, external: "Alex is a man of absolute integrity who has given his all for Stoke City and we would like to thank him for his hard work during his time with the club.
"We are grateful for the building blocks he has helped put in place in bringing together a group of players in whom we have a huge amount of faith regarding their ability to turn things around this season, and who can help us achieve longer-term success.
"However, with the way the results have been so far, we have made the difficult decision to seek a new direction for the team at this time.
"Nothing matters to me more than the success of our club and we are now working towards the appointment of Alex's successor."
Neil said after Saturday's 1-0 defeat by the Owls: "When people describe it as a lonely place being a manager, that game probably epitomised it.
"When you're doing well and you're winning games - and I've been fortunate enough to experience that in my career - everybody is with you.
"Everybody's part of it, everybody feels as if they've put something towards it.
"When it's like that, and it has been like that in the last three matches, you're on your own."
Neil's spell at Stoke was his fourth as a Championship manager, following previous jobs with Norwich City, who he led to promotion via the play-offs in 2015, Preston North End and Sunderland,
His first post was in his native Scotland as player-manager with Hamilton Academical from 2013, until joining the Canaries in January 2015.
Potters mission to get back in the Prem
The Potters spent 10 seasons in the top flight from 2008 to 2018, first under Tony Pulis, then Mark Hughes.
But since Hughes' departure in January 2018 when Stoke were already on course for relegation, after Paul Lambert, Gary Rowett, Nathan Jones, Michael O'Neill and Neil, they are now looking for a sixth manager in as many years.
In their time back in the Championship, other than at the start of the 2021-22 season under O'Neill, when they made a flying start to climb to third in the table in early October, their final placings have been an almost symmetrically-perfect modicum of mediocrity - 16th, 15th, 14th, 14th, 16th.