Ranking the 6 EFL Championship managers with the least room for excuses | OneFootball

Which second tier bosses need to get results this season based on their squads and transfer spend?

The Championship is heading towards the first international break of the 2026-27 season, and it's going to be an unusually longer one, with a three-week gap until the October fixtures begin.

It means that all clubs bar Portsmouth and Wolves will have played eight times, and it gives a potential indication of what lies ahead in the months to follow, although there's plenty of time for the strugglers to turn things around.

But which SIX Championship managers have absolutely no excuses to meet their expectations, or even surpass them when it comes to the 2026-27 season based on their squads? FLW takes a look and ranks them...

6 ? ? Michael Skubala - Bristol City

Bristol City went into the second half of the 2025-26 season as a Championship play-off contender once more, but come the end of the mid-season transfer window, with Zak Vyner and Anis Mehmeti both sold to divisional rivals without being replaced, the writing may have been on the wall for Gerhard Struber.

The Austrian coach was sacked in March after the Robins' results nosedived, with Roy Hodgson returning as interim manager, but things changed at Ashton Gate over the summer - James Ellis was brought in as sporting director and the ambition was clear for all to see when the club were able to snag Michael Skubala away from League One champions Lincoln City as their new head coach.

Skubala is untested at Championship level, but he's been backed to the hilt over the summer - League One's best forwards, Dom Ballard and Lorent Tolaj arrived, proven Championship creativity was added in the form of Jed Wallace and Sam Greenwood, a new number one goalkeeper in highly-rated Wigan Athletic stopper Sam Tickle was acquired, and even the loan market has been dipped into with the promise of Crystal Palace full-back Rio Cardines, who is proving to be somewhat of an assist machine.

Struber will be wondering where this kind of backing was for him last season when he needed it, but their summer spend gives Skubala no excuses for not having City in the play-off mix come May 2027.

5 ? ? Cesar Peixoto - Wolves

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Eyebrows were raised in early June when speculation started to begin around Rob Edwards' future at Wolves, with the lesser-known Cesar Peixoto reportedly eyed to take the Molineux job that was already occupied.

And as it happened, the speculation was correct, as Edwards was surprisingly sacked in favour of hiring the Gil Vicente boss, and it had the fingerprints of super agent Jorge Mendes all over them - he's had a lot of influence at Molineux over the years, and this appeared to be his latest move.

On the face of it, Edwards was hired last November by Wolves knowing that relegation to the Championship was likely coming, swapping his relatively new job at Middlesbrough for a return to the club he played for and was a first-team coach at in the past, but despite valiantly battling to try and keep the West Midlands outfit in the top flight, it wasn't to be.

It still should have been enough to keep his job going into 2026-27, and he managed to bring experienced heads such as Raul Jimenez and Kieran Trippier to the club, but Fosun went in a different direction, and Peixoto is now in charge of a squad that on paper should be in the top two come the end of the season.

Keeping players like André, Ladislav Krejčí, Fer Lopez and Jean-Ricner Bellegarde, as well as adding Wales international midfielder Jordan James to the squad on loan from Stade Rennais, Wolves look really strong in most areas of the pitch, so Peixoto cannot have any complaints if he doesn't keep his job should he not win promotion.

4 ? ? Mark Robins - Stoke City

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The bet365 Stadium has been a revolving door for managers since the 2018 return of Stoke City to the Championship, but can Mark Robins buck the trend?

The Potters have had seven different permanent managers since then, including three in one season in 2024-25, starting with Steven Schumacher and ending with Robins after the short in-between stint of Narcis Pelach, but there has been times since his appointment where the ex-Coventry City boss has been under-fire.

It's not like Robins hasn't been backed either. Stoke took a few gambles in their recruitment last summer, and it didn't really pay off, but money has been spent this summer by the Coates Family that suggests they'll want a play-off challenge.

Signing Ethan Galbraith from Swansea City in a £10 million swoop was the first eye-catching bit of business that suggested the Potters meant business, and the midfield has been completely overhauled with moves for Djibril Soumare, Jack McGlynn and Justin Devenny - all for seven-figure sums.

Robins has also pivoted the formation to more of a 3-4-2-1 because of Sorba Thomas' departure to Hull City - a lack of winger options and the recruitment of McGlynn and Devenny as attacking midfielders may end up working out based on early evidence, and with further buys such as Luca Bombino, Luke Graham and George Hirst, there's certainly the nucleus of a squad that has to be lurking in and around the top eight.

3 ? ? Kim Hellberg - Middlesbrough

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After a brief flirtation with Sunderland a few years ago, Kim Hellberg finally arrived in England in 2025 at Middlesbrough, armed with a glowing reputation and an expectation that he'll at some point take Boro back to the Premier League for the first time since 2017.

And how good would it be if Boro broke their top flight duck after 10 years in the form of either an automatic or a Wembley promotion in 2027? Hellberg's certainly been backed to do it, anyway.

Boro may have lost Hayden Hackney to Everton in what was a deserved move to the Premier League, and also Morgan Whittaker to MLS outfit Colorado Rapids in what was more of a surprise, but the amount the squad on Teesside has been strengthened overall with promising young players who have undoubted top Championship ability is abundantly clear.

Deals for Radek Vitek, Ash Phillips and Will Lankshear look expensive, and if all add-ons are met, then Boro will have paid £55 million for that trio, but it would also mean promotion has been achieved, and it'll look like a drop in the ocean - the initial fees of £22 million are much more reasonable, but all three are making strong impacts already.

Three more Americans in Max Arfsten, Sebastian Berhalter and Rokas Pukstas have arrived at the Riverside Stadium, whilst the loan addition of the much sought after Amario Cozier-Duberry of Brighton & Hove Albion to replace Whittaker certainly looks like a coup based on his very early impact.

With the aforementioned Lankshear also proving to be rather prolific in front of goal, Hellberg may have the squad needed to get over the line - something he couldn't do in the play-offs last season despite getting an unexpected second bite of the cherry.

2 ? ? Nuno Espírito Santo - West Ham

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West Ham may have cashed in on three big players over the course of the summer following relegation from the Premier League, but the players they ended up keeping suggests that they aren't planning to stay in the Championship for very long.

Funds were raised from the departures of Mateus Fernandes, Crysencio Summerville and El Hadji Malick Diouf, which brought in £175 million to the London Stadium - but there were only two really significant additions to Nuno's squad in the form of Celtic midfielder Arne Engels and young Norwegian winger Edvin Austbo.

Other additions for less money, like Manor Solomon, Joel Piroe and the loan addition of Divine Mukasa, are all paying dividends so far, but when you're able to keep players like Jarrod Bowen, Konstantinos Mavropanos and Taty Castellanos at the club, then it won't be acceptable if the Hammers are still in the second tier come next August.

A slow start to the season has been overcome by Nuno's squad, and the experience of Tomáš Souček is still yet to return too - as well as the potential reintegration of both Edson Alvarez and Soungoutou Magassa to West Ham's currently young-looking midfield options.

The Hammers have started to look dominant without a full squad to choose from - imagine how they'll perform with EVERYONE available...

1 ? ? Phil Parkinson - Wrexham

Wrexham's rise up the footballing pyramid has been nothing short of extraordinary, but there's never been a secret as to the fact they've spent quite heavily to do so.

Their marketability under Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mac's ownership has really helped their revenues increase ten-fold though, and it allows manager Phil Parkinson big budgets to create a squad in the way he wants to play - which has always been a 3-5-2 or a 3-4-2-1 system whilst manager at the Racecourse Ground.

Their start to the 2026-27 season though has not been thoroughly convincing, and the 6-0 hammering at the hands of West Ham must have been sobering for their supporters to watch.

Wrexham have spent an estimated £75 million on new players since they were promoted to the Championship last year, with little in the way of resale value of the players they've ended up letting go, and many of their big money buys are in the peak of their playing careers too - which allows for little to no profit being made in the future.

Their spending has seemed very much on a needed proven quality basis, although Danny Imray's arrival from Crystal Palace is one that could feasibly go on to make profit further down the line.

Wrexham need a play-offs finish, though to justify the investment made since 2025 by their Hollywood owners, and if Parkinson doesn't start to deliver results soon, then it may be another manager that has to come in and have a go.