Parker's 25-days-in sacking is early but not the earliest the Premier League has seen
While Parker's early-season firing was a surprise it was not without precedent. Paul Sturrock was sacked by Southampton just nine days into the 2004/05 campaign while Peter Reid lasted only 12 days of the 1993/94 season before parting company with Manchester City.
Newcastle have also been quick to smash the eject button on several occasions with Kenny Dalglish (1998), Bobby Robson (2004) and Ruud Gullit (1999) all departing in August.
There have been a slew of September managerial removals over the years as well. And many of these happened earlier in the season than Parker due to the fact that this season’s starting date was brought forward to accommodate the World Cup window in November/December.
Newcastle, again, got rid of Kevin Keegan in early September 2008 after just 19 days of the season. What’s more, Alan Curbishley was asked to leave the day before Keegan by West Ham, only 18 days into their campaign.
Christian Gross (Tottenham, 1998), Howard Wilkinson (Leeds, 1996), Graeme Souness (Blackburn, 2004) and Gianluca Vialli (Chelsea 2000) were all also September departures that occurred less than Parker’s 25 days into the season.
As it turns out, Parker's termination is just the 12th earliest into a Premier League season, which seems mad considering it's still August.
Bournemouth have broken some relatively new ground, however, by acting quicker than any club has in the past 18 years. Parker’s represents the quickest sacking since August 2004.
Of the more recent early-season sack stories, Bournemouth have beaten Watford who let Javi Gracia go after 29 days (2019/20) and Crystal Palace, who fired Frank de Boer just 31 days into the 2017/18 season.
Who could forget Jose Mourinho labelling Frank de Boer the “worst manager in the history of the Premier League.” In hindsight, that was perhaps a bit harsh by the prickly Portuguese on De Boer, considering he only had five games in charge.
The Dutchman did bear the uncomfortable honour of leading the first team in 93 years to lose their first four league matches of the season without scoring a single goal, however.
And speaking of the first four league matches, Bournemouth currently have the worst goal difference after that many games of any side in English top-flight history (-14). However, it may be a little early in the season to start looking at record books.
Another thing that sets Parker’s reign apart is that of all the managers discussed above and, in fact, of all the Premier League managers to lose their jobs 40 days or less into a season, Parker is the only one to have been managing a newly promoted side.
Given this, and given the fact that Bournemouth have had to face three of the traditional "top six" sides already in Manchester City, Arsenal and Liverpool, it does seem like Parker is slightly unlucky to have been given his marching orders already.
Perhaps there’s more to this story than just the numbers, though. Parker was quite vocal after the 9-0 loss to Liverpool about his side’s chances in the league going forward, hinting not so subtly to the fact that he would have liked to bring in further reinforcements.
These murmurings of discontent around the club's transfer policy are perhaps more indicative of the true reasons why he has been asked to leave so early than just the results of the first four league games.