How Times Have Changed,

Problem with the Codalmighty article is the statement that it isn't difficult to get out of this division using Luton as a reference if:

Quoted Text

As well as players with mental strength, you need a manager with the mental strength to both lead and inspire them.

This conveniently ignores the fact that firstly, just one automatic promotion space makes it extremely difficult to win promotion (compare to League 2 with three automatic promotion places) and secondly, Luton were spending lots and lots of money so they could sign lots of players with both ability and mental strength. No criticism of Still who did a very good job there, but you can't ignore the fact that money played a major part in their success as they could sign some very capable players at this level (and the one above).

So, who else has been promoted automatically since we entered the Conference?

Crawley - spent a fortune on players (though the manager did a good job).
Fleetwood - spent a fortune on players (though again, the manager did a good job).
Mansfield Town - spent a good amount on players (possibly not the highest amount?), but somehow managed to go on an unbelievable winning run even though they didn't look overly impressive most of the time.

Lots of money to spend is the major factor in most of those promotions. We have one of the highest budgets in the division, but nothing compared to the amount that Crawley, Fleetwood and Luton were spending. Our only real chance of automatic promotion would seem to be to do a Mansfield and go on a surprisingly long winning run. Probably unlikely.

Therefore, battling through the play-offs seems to be the most likely way we could win promotion. We've not been all that far off this the past couple of seasons. I wasn't convinced we'd be able to do it either of those years and, to tell the truth, I'm not convinced we'll be able to do it this season, either.

It's not just how some of us Town fans feel either :-

"Thoroughly deserved win, Grimsby offered nothing in my opinion"

Better team on night won. Can't see Grimsby being anywhere near play offs

A couple of comments from the Southport forum.

So, yes, the Southport fans agree with everyone else on this board and everyone else who went to the game that we were simply bloody awful on the night.

Not exactly surprising as I'm pretty sure we can all agree that was by far our worst performance of the season. It was dismal. But so what? One swallow does not make a summer.

Remember Mansfield's result against us at BP during their promotion season? Or against Gateshead or Cambridge, for that matter? They had lost 4-1 away from home on 3 occasions by mid-October yet still went on that incredible winning streak to win promotion.

I'm not claiming we will do the same as Mansfield, by the way, just pointing out that one bad performance and result following three good ones doesn't instantly indicate you're doomed.

Quoted from Maringer

So, yes, the Southport fans agree with everyone else on this board and everyone else who went to the game that we were simply bloody awful on the night.

Not exactly surprising as I'm pretty sure we can all agree that was by far our worst performance of the season. It was dismal. But so what? One swallow does not make a summer.

Remember Mansfield's result against us at BP during their promotion season? Or against Gateshead or Cambridge, for that matter? They had lost 4-1 away from home on 3 occasions by mid-October yet still went on that incredible winning streak to win promotion.

I'm not claiming we will do the same as Mansfield, by the way, just pointing out that one bad performance and result following three good ones doesn't instantly indicate you're doomed.

Oh come on do please try to keep up, Nuneaton, Dover, Aldershot, Lincoln, Torquay, Southport.

Quoted from arryarryarry

Oh come on do please try to keep up, Nuneaton, Dover, Aldershot, Lincoln, Torquay, Southport.

Nice selective quoting. Just pointing out that the awful performance against Southport shouldn't be judged as proof that we will lose every game this season in the same way that the Gateshead and Alfreton games aren't proof that we will hammer everyone this season.

Anyway, off to bed now.

Thing is we are getting are getting use to these hit and miss performances , it's the norm . Name me a player other than Nielson that gets you slightly excited , is there a thrill when we get into the oppositions box , no .

We are now an established conference side , mid table , big crowds for this league up to now .  Only blind faith keeps me turning up . Going to be there on Tuesday though .

What saddened me the most on Tuesday was not our inept performance (I've seen enough of those for it to have been expected) but it was the comment of a young lad sat just to my right.

From what I could gather, it was a Dad who had brought his 2 sons and a friend, all 3 kids could only have been around 8 or 9. One of the boys was saying that if we got promotion this season we'd go back up into the league and that he only ever seen us as a non-league side. His mate then piped up "Wow, did we used to be in the league then?"

I really, really feel for the young kids, some of whom don't even know that we used to be in the league never mind having experienced the highs of Liverpool, Everton, Newcastle, Wembley etc.