With season 20 coming to an end and the end of season manager merry go round now complete, a statement was made in the Whatsapp group recently that posed an interesting debate and difference of opinion. - "Are the managers who stay in their clubs the longest more successful?"

Below is a list containing all the managers who have been at their current club continuously for at least 250 games. ('Continuously' means that they have not finished in the bottom 3 and have not been automatically sacked). I thought this would add an interesting element to the study.

  1. James Mckenzie - Chelsea - Division 1 - 911
  2. Andre Guerra - Porto - Division 1 - 872
  3. Heath Brown - Arsenal - Division 1- 430
  4. Bojan H - Bayern Munich - Division 1- 425
  5. Joao Alves - Sporting Lisbon - Division 2 - 415
  6. Andre Libras-Boas - Hellas Verona - Division 1 - 402
  7. Gav Harmer - Atletico Madrid - Division 1 - 369
  8. Dario Saviano - Borussia Dortmund - Division 1 - 348
  9. David Marsden - Hamburg - Division 2 - 340
  10. Dan Wallace - Barcelona - Division 1 - 338
  11. Stephen Beddows - Sampdoria - Division 3 - 301
  12. Joao Rocha - West Ham United - Division 3 - 292
  13. Regan Thompson - Hertha Berlin - Division 2 - 290
  14. Doug Earle - Leicester City - Division 1 - 265
  15. Ross Falconer - Lille - Division 4 - 260
  16. Scott Mckenzie - Sao Paulo - Division 2 - 253

As we can see from the above list, 100% of the top 4 managers and 80% of the top 10 managers all manage clubs in Division 1. 56% of the total managers currently manage in Division 1. Only 25% in Division 2 and 13% in Division 3. Interestingly only 6% of managers manage a club in Division 4. Not a single manager manages a club in Division 5.

Which leads to the obvious question "Is the key to success............variety?" A staggering 84% of Top 100 have managed their clubs for less than 250 'continuous' games. Is the only way to be successful to move clubs?