Would Barnsley be able to hold onto Duff?

Michael Duff could have himself already been a Championship manager now if it wasn’t for a late Josh Windass goal at Wembley last month.   That meant last minute heartache for the Tykes and another season at least in League One.

Of course it is hard to have too much sympathy for Barnsley when they lose a play off final (yes, I am that bitter and never get me started on John Frain) but it did mean that their highly rated manager was going to attract some interest.

The first of that interest seemed to be coming from just up the road in Huddersfield – interest that first surfaced before the end of the season.   As we now know that interest never moved to anything and the Terriers stuck with Neil Warnock who had steered them to safety at the end of last season.

At the time of the interest, Duff was clear that his priority was sticking with Barnsley and bouncing back from that Wembley heartache  “My focus has been fully on Barnsley.  “I will take stock from a personal point of view. I am not thinking of anything other than licking our wounds and going again.”

The question will be whether Duff really fancies the challenge of getting out of League One again or would the pull of a Championship club be too much for him to turn down.   He has earned his Spurs over recent seasons in the lower two divisions and people close to him have said that he wants to mange at the highest level possible which is where Swansea City could come in.

Duff will be able to see both sides of what happens after play off heartache.   A semi final defeat when in charge at Cheltenham in 2020 saw them bounce back the following season to be crowned League Two champions.   But he will also know that Barnsley’s last play off defat – against us in 2021 – saw them relegated the following season.   It is always difficult to predict how a team bounces from play off heartache.

Will Duff see Swansea as a lucrative move?   He will look at a side that has now spent 15 straight seasons in the top two divisions and a side that many believe could compete for promotion next season.  On the flip side he will look at the financial position of the club although the full picture of that remains to be seen as we await full confirmation of the Brett Cravatt investment.

What is clear though is that the Swans interest in Duff is real and there seems little doubt that some level of talks have already taken place.  The hope from these talks is clearly that both sides like what they see and hear and that we can advance those further.

The things that are starting to stand out though in the management hunt is the influence of Paul Watson.   Looking at managers successful in the lower divisions is exactly the kind of appointment that we should be looking at and we know what happened when Luton did just that last season (albeit they picked up Rob Edwards after the Watford managerial merry go round clicked another turn)

Let’s see how this pans out although we also know that the name of Duff is not the only name on the shortlist at the moment – we may have not yet managed to agree terms on the Martin departure but we are working hard at his replacement.   As it should be!