8 years on from Burton Away

The team that day...


Colgan, Widdowson, Lancashire. Atkinson, Sinclair, Bore, Devitt, Hudson, Coulson, Akpa Akpro, Peacock.

Subs - Overton, Linwood, Sweeney, Leary, Wood, Chambers, Wright


Ask yourself this, 8 years on, is today’s squad any better? Arguably worse? Full of loanees and journeymen. It took us 6 years to get out of non league and there is now a very real possibility we could be heading back there within just 2 years.

Fundamental lessons haven’t been learnt off the pitch. The moment we returned to the league the Board thought the hard work had ended. Their reckless decision making and woeful PR returned. The hard work should have only been starting...

They insisted stability was required during our Conference days, hence giving Hurst 5 years. But the minute we return to the league we have 4 managers in 18 months and all stabilty goes out of the window? Where is the sense in that?

In recent history I can only think of York City who were promoted back to the football league after an exile and returned back to non league shortly after. Every other club have learnt from their heartache and built on firmer foundations and consolidation to propel themselves further up the leagues. Look what has happened to York, relegated again to the Conf north and up for the sale.

If we go down again I think it’s clear it would be a lot more difficult for us to return, if at all. Or perhaps it’s what’s required to sort the hieracy out and sell the club etc?

**Pedant alert** - it was 8 years ago (2010)

On a serious note, the team that year rallied a bit once we got that first win again against Shewsbury. And ended up winning 4 of the last 7, which obviously wasn't enough to get out of it.

I suppose this time we have the advantage of not being in the bottom 2 before the last 7 games, but we're still on our winless run later in the year than the 2010 team, who beat Shrewsbury on March 6th.

*8 years.

Edit: Beaten!

Wonder what the average age of that side was versus today’s match day squad.

At Crawley a bloke turned round to me and said “the national league is just like the 5th division” I’d prefer not to find out again but I reckon we will. This squad do look like they care, something that I felt was missing when we went down before.

They both lack leaders on the pitch TBH.

The sad fact is that side is much better than this shower of shite.

Apologies, amended the dates! My bad.

But agree, severe lack of leadership in both squads. And do any of us really think we’re going to win 4 of our last 7 games? Getting a little tired of people and pundits saying we “fought hard” or “stayed in the game”. It’s not enough anymore.