Forget Spurs... relegated Barrow are kings of chaos

Image source, Getty Images/Shutterstock

• Published1 April 2026

The 2025-26 season will surely be remembered for the clubs that have lurched from one crisis to another, chopping and changing managers and head coaches at the drop of a hat.

Four different bosses at Nottingham Forest. Roberto de Zerbi the third man in at Tottenham Hotspur as they try to avoid an unheard-of relegation from the Premier League.

North of the border, Old Firm pair Celtic and Rangers have both changed bosses mid-season for the first time ever. The Hoops have even performed the hokey-cokey with Martin O'Neill, bringing the 74-year-old in, not once but twice, to perform interim spells either side of the disastrous reign of Frenchman Wilfried Nancy.

Meanwhile, in the Championship, West Bromwich Albion burned through Ryan Mason and Eric Ramsay before handing over to James Morrison to steer them to safety. And Watford have had three bosses - sacking the third of those, Ed Still, less than 24 hours after their final game of the season - but nothing new there.

All very chaotic and all worthy of consideration for the prize of the most disruptive season award.

But the winner is League Two Barrow.

Relegation to the National League was finally confirmed on the final day following a home defeat by Newport County after a season in which the Bluebirds have had five different head coaches - three permanent and two interim.

So how did it come to this for Barrow?

The Barrow managerial merry-go-round

Tucked away in the south west corner of Cumbria, Barrow are a long way from the beating heartlands of English football.

But keeping up with events at Holker Street this season has created a soap opera all of its own with the main characters changing so frequently.

They have gone through the managerial playbook at alarming speed.

The man coming up through the ranks from non-league.

A grizzled veteran with experience across the divisions and abroad.

A rookie moving up from high-level academy football.

The lower-league survival specialist.

And last of all, the most senior player in the squad handed the role of interim player-head coach as the boat finally capsized under the water.

This has not been played out over five years but fewer than five months as Barrow ended the season 92nd out of 92, propping up the EFL.

Whing sacked before Christmas

Andy Whing was at the helm when the season began in August. He had some credit in the bank after arriving from National League Solihull Moors in January 2025 with the Bluebirds on a downward spiral.

They eventually finished 16th and ended the campaign with just one loss in the last 13 games across the final two months.

However, that was followed by an enormous summer overhaul with 16 players arriving, offset by the departure of 17 others.

Not surprisingly perhaps, Barrow did not make a great start, losing six of their first eight games.

It was felt that Whing needed help in his first EFL role and Rob Kelly, twice a caretaker at the club, came in as assistant head coach in September.

That coincided with their best spell of the season as they put together a seven-match unbeaten run that moved them up towards mid-table.

But Kelly's stay was brief as he went south to Reading to resume a partnership with Leam Richardson.

Without Kelly, Whing did not win another game, with his tenure ending after a 3-0 home loss to Tranmere Rovers on a miserable Tuesday night at Holker Street in early December in front of the club's lowest league crowd since their EFL return in 2020.

At that stage, Barrow were on a seven-game winless run but they were still 18th, four points clear of the bottom two.

Image source, Getty Images

Neil McDonald had returned to Barrow to provide that bit of experience to Whing in the light of Kelly's departure and less than a fortnight later he was stepping up as interim head coach.

There was an impressive comeback from two goals down in McDonald's first game at Gillingham, but the club were unimpressed at the 60-year-old publicly declaring his interest in taking the job permanently.

They looked at Steve Evans, before Bristol Rovers beat them to it in appointing the Scot for their own salvage job.

And yet 23 days after Whing's departure, the surprise name of Paul Gallagher emerged as the Bluebirds' new head coach.

Barrow had dropped a place to 19th, but the cushion to the relegation zone had increased to seven points.

No time for a novice

Gallagher had been brought in to assist McDonald during his spell in interim charge and impressed the hierarchy, who believed that the Scot had a big hand in what they saw as an upturn in performances.

A former assistant in the Championship at Preston North End and Stoke City, this was a step into the unknown, dropping down into a relegation scrap in the League Two basement.

As it was, the 41-year-old was in charge for only 40 days and lost all five of his matches.

But crucially, his brief reign covered almost the entirety of the transfer window in which seven new players came in and seven others departed, while David Worrall went from a player-coach role to a permanent role in the backroom staff.

Gallagher's last match was a 2-1 loss at Shrewsbury Town, which saw Salop leapfrog them in the table. This came less than a week after the club's chairman Paul Hornby had called for everyone to "stay calm".

Suddenly, Barrow were now 22nd in League Two, only three points above the bottom two.

The stats don't lie

Andy Whing: Played 19, won 5; 1.05 points per game

Neil McDonald: Played 5, won 1; 0.8 pts per game

Paul Gallagher: Played 5, won 0; 0 pts per game

Dino Maamria: Played 6, won 1; 0.67 pts per game

Sam Foley: Played 11, won 2; 0.73 pts per game

Maamria's magic deserts him

Six minutes after the club announced Gallagher's departure, white smoke was emerging to signal the appointment of Dino Maamria.

Out of work since leaving Burton Albion in December 2023, the 54-year-old Tunisian was parachuted in and heralded for his ability in helping teams avoid relegation against the odds.

He had the magic touch in his first match on 14 February as a late winner from captain Niall Canavan against Colchester secured a first victory at home since September.

That turned out to be the high point. Five more matches produced only one more point which included costly home defeats by relegation rivals Harrogate Town and Bristol Rovers.

The 2-0 reverse by Rovers was greeted by boos after a limp performance and one day later, Maamria's time was up after only 28 days, which he described as "abrupt".

He departed with Barrow still outside the bottom two, but this time with no wiggle room as only goal difference was keeping them out of the danger zone.

No salvation with Sam

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With 11 games to save the season, veteran midfielder Sam Foley was asked to step up to be the interim player-head coach.

At 39, Foley was the senior member in the squad, but he had only just returned to action after more than six months out with a serious thigh injury.

There was a point from a draw at home to Accrington Stanley, but successive away defeats by Salford City and Grimsby Town plunged the Bluebirds to the bottom of the table, with the 5-0 hammering at Blundell Park the low point of a season to forget.

Canavan said that the "penny had to drop" for the struggling squad and then out of nowhere, they came from behind to defeat then league leaders Bromley and end the Ravens' 21-match unbeaten run.

That proved to be a false dawn. There was a dramatic comeback win over Oldham Athletic a couple of weeks later, but Barrow could not produce back-to-back victories that would have heaped pressure on the teams around them.

Instead limp defeats by Walsall and Cambridge United left them all but down, which was rubber-stamped by the 2-1 loss to Newport.

As the Exiles celebrated survival, Barrow have to face up to a return to non-league after six years.

The last time they went down, the Bluebirds remained in the wilderness for 48 years. They will hope their exile is much, much shorter this time.

'Tough decisions now required' - analysis

A season of never-ending mistakes contributed to this result.

Let's start with the recruitment policy, where a lot of risks were taken on signing players with a record of injuries - resulting in them spending more time off the pitch than on it.

Then persisting with tactics that were clearly not working, but because the club were only recruiting for one specific formation, they didn't have the players in place to change things around.

They pulled the trigger on head coach Andy Whing, who at the time had averaged a point per game, with the team not fully in the relegation picture.

A panic dismissal maybe too early, perhaps, but the biggest problem was the lack of a plan for who would replace him. It looked more like they were hoping something would fall into place rather than actively seeking someone.

Paul Gallagher - who was originally brought in as a number two to interim coach Neil McDonald - was appointed at the start of the transfer window. Seven further signings (including young and inexperienced players) were made, with the club again only recruiting for one system, which hadn't been working, before eventually dismissing Gallagher shortly after the window was shut.

Dino Maamria was the right appointment but he should have been brought in before Gallagher and given the window to bring in the required tools. Sadly, he was left with a squad of players with no fight in them to change results.

The decision to give Sam Foley the job after was the final mistake. A great player for the club but he was in no way ready to be thrust into a managerial position during a relegation battle - he tried but the damage had already been done.

What the future holds for the club remains to be seen. With a lot of players still under contract it means they either need to stick by them, release them at a cost to the club, or hope that someone will come in and take them away.

Then there is the fact that a new manager or head coach is required.

Speaking to BBC Radio Cumbria in February, chairman Paul Hornby indicated that there would be a review into the club's football operations.

This is needed now more than ever, and some tough decisions are needed as the club makes a step very much into the unknown. A year which was supposed to be of celebration, as the club marks its 125th anniversary, will sadly be out of the EFL.

An initial version of this story was first published on 1 April.

Related topics

• League Two
• Football
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