Gary Bowyer appointed as Salford City’s new manager just a day after Richie Wellens’ sacking

Salford City has wasted no time in replacing Richie Wellens as less than 24 hours later, they have announced the appointment of former Blackburn Rovers manager Gary Bowyer. 

Bowyer will leave his role as a coach for Derby’s u23s and join up with his new club ahead of a busy end to the season.

It will also be an uphill battle for Bowyer as Salford have a lot of work to do to even make the play offs and from there promotion is far from secure.

Although the pressure will be on, It’s unlikely Gary Neville would have made this controversial call at the business end of the season if promotion wasn’t very much still the goal.

The Ammies welcomed Bowyer to the club in a statement this morning, saying: “Salford City is pleased to confirm Gary Bowyer as the new Manager until the end of the season.

“The 49-year-old has been working with Derby County after a spell as Bradford City manager. Previously he has been in charge at Blackburn Rovers, and in 2017 he won promotion from League Two with Blackpool via the play-offs.

“As a player the Manchester-born full-back played for Hereford United and Rotherham United before having to retire early due to injury.”

Salford City is pleased to confirm the appointment of Gary Bowyer as Manager until the end of the season 🤝

Welcome to The Peninsula Stadium, Gary!#WeAreSalford 🦁🔴

— Salford City FC (@SalfordCityFC) March 23, 2021

Bowyer made his first comment as the Salford City manager too, saying: “I’m delighted to be here, I’ve got to first and foremost thank Wayne Rooney, Darren Wassall at Derby County for being so helpful to allow me to come here.

“Obviously today is a case of meeting the players and setting the expectations of what we expect of them from now until the end of the season.”

He continued to say that making the play offs is still very much achievable: “We want them to be playing aggressive football both with and without the ball, and have a right good go at these remaining 11 games. We have an opportunity like everybody else in this league to try and force our way into the reckoning to try and get into the play offs and see if we can do that.”

Salford ended their statement by saying that Darron Gibson (who remains a player too) will join Warren Joyce as Bowyer’s two assistant managers.