Why we are where we are

To me, the biggest and most crucial factor in why we're on the precipice and staring non-league in the face (again) is because of our summer strategy.

Whether Fenty, Day, Holloway or anyone else involved in the decision-making wants to admit it to themselves or not, it's clear to me — and most other fans — that this football club was banking on the 2020/21 season not completing because of covid.

And if it did, there would likely be clubs going bust, like Macclesfield and Bury, and so securing our EFL status without really having to earn enough points.

Hence why we recruited like we did. You read back at some of Holloway's quotes from the time (not that you'd want to) — it was all about how ridiculous it was that we were being made to play football; Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday; starting with the League Cup, and that silly Trophy competition...

There was no appetite or desire from the custodians of this (once) great club to actually get us playing football.

As soon as it became apparent we would indeed need to play, one friendly was arranged and we treated the first two cup games (and probably the first two league games) as pre-season kick-abouts, and we recruited seven players on season-long loans.

We've done the minimum possible while spending the minimum possible.

Serious errors of judgment were made. The board's frugality was hidden behind the convenient narrative of covid, when really they committed to an idea that hasn't come to fruition and will likely cost us our place in the Football League.

I'm sure those involved will get over it; Holloway will continue with his media career and Fenty will walk away with his richly undeserved millions — his political career in tatters, obviously, but I'm sure the leather upholstery of his £80k car will soak up any tears.

It may seem like the damage is being done now, but really our fate was sewn back in the summer of 2020 due to the arrogance of just a few bad men.

Quoted from RichMariner

As soon as it became apparent we would indeed need to play, one friendly was arranged

Precisely this! I've never known a season where we've had such a huge number of unfit players. We have been behind everybody else, fitness-wise, since the first game and have never caught up. Then it has just snowballed... we needed to bring in players to replace IH's squad but could only bring in free agents and those who haven't been starters at their old teams, which has meant we are waiting - again - on players to become fully fighting fit for League football. Hust even described Bunney has not being quite there yet.

Regardless of whether we have been technically good enough to compete, we've not been fit enough to start with.

Yet on the day Holloway resigned we were 6 points clear of relegation and averaging a point a game. Since then we've got less than half a point a game and are rock bottom. Seems very much like the damage is being done now and not before.

I just don't see this whole doomed all season thing making sense. We weren't very good, but something has happened towards the end of Holloway's reign and the squad appear to not give a excrement what happens.

Talking of unfit players, this in todays Tellywag

".........while Sean Scannell has been told he needs to improve his fitness before coming back into contention"

He hasnt been in contention since Hurst returned.

The question needs asking why his fitness has dropped if he is training as often as all the other players? If he isnt picked in the squad then he should still be working on his fitness, but it seems he is sat at home with a beer, feet up, watching Soccer AM on a Saturday, thinking of days past when he was a half decent player.

I am guessing he is being lined up to be released at the end of the season anyway.

Makes you wonder exactly what our fitness coach does, or doesnt, for so many to be less than match fit, and several only fit enough for a 20 minute cameo. I remember Ollie waxing lyrical about how good he was at his job. Says it all really!

Quoted from RichMariner

To me, the biggest and most crucial factor in why we're on the precipice and staring non-league in the face (again) is because of our summer strategy.

Whether Fenty, Day, Holloway or anyone else involved in the decision-making wants to admit it to themselves or not, it's clear to me — and most other fans — that this football club was banking on the 2020/21 season not completing because of covid.

And if it did, there would likely be clubs going bust, like Macclesfield and Bury, and so securing our EFL status without really having to earn enough points.

Hence why we recruited like we did. You read back at some of Holloway's quotes from the time (not that you'd want to) — it was all about how ridiculous it was that we were being made to play football; Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday; starting with the League Cup, and that silly Trophy competition...

There was no appetite or desire from the custodians of this (once) great club to actually get us playing football.

As soon as it became apparent we would indeed need to play, one friendly was arranged and we treated the first two cup games (and probably the first two league games) as pre-season kick-abouts, and we recruited seven players on season-long loans.

We've done the minimum possible while spending the minimum possible.

Serious errors of judgment were made. The board's frugality was hidden behind the convenient narrative of covid, when really they committed to an idea that hasn't come to fruition and will likely cost us our place in the Football League.

I'm sure those involved will get over it; Holloway will continue with his media career and Fenty will walk away with his richly undeserved millions — his political career in tatters, obviously, but I'm sure the leather upholstery of his £80k car will soak up any tears.

It may seem like the damage is being done now, but really our fate was sewn back in the summer of 2020 due to the arrogance of just a few bad men.

Post of the season RichMariner! 👏👏

Quoted from RichMariner

To me, the biggest and most crucial factor in why we're on the precipice and staring non-league in the face (again) is because of our summer strategy.

Whether Fenty, Day, Holloway or anyone else involved in the decision-making wants to admit it to themselves or not, it's clear to me — and most other fans — that this football club was banking on the 2020/21 season not completing because of covid.

And if it did, there would likely be clubs going bust, like Macclesfield and Bury, and so securing our EFL status without really having to earn enough points.

Hence why we recruited like we did. You read back at some of Holloway's quotes from the time (not that you'd want to) — it was all about how ridiculous it was that we were being made to play football; Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday; starting with the League Cup, and that silly Trophy competition...

There was no appetite or desire from the custodians of this (once) great club to actually get us playing football.

As soon as it became apparent we would indeed need to play, one friendly was arranged and we treated the first two cup games (and probably the first two league games) as pre-season kick-abouts, and we recruited seven players on season-long loans.

We've done the minimum possible while spending the minimum possible.

Serious errors of judgment were made. The board's frugality was hidden behind the convenient narrative of covid, when really they committed to an idea that hasn't come to fruition and will likely cost us our place in the Football League.

I'm sure those involved will get over it; Holloway will continue with his media career and Fenty will walk away with his richly undeserved millions — his political career in tatters, obviously, but I'm sure the leather upholstery of his £80k car will soak up any tears.

It may seem like the damage is being done now, but really our fate was sewn back in the summer of 2020 due to the arrogance of just a few bad men.

Clearly the start of the season was a joke as well as the recruitment of some players and we were playing crap when he left and could well have ended up in relegation if he had stayed but you cannot escape the single fact that Paul Hurst coming in has speeded up the race to the bottom so he must take his share of the blame if we go down.

Quoted from pen penfras

Yet on the day Holloway resigned we were 6 points clear of relegation and averaging a point a game. Since then we've got less than half a point a game and are rock bottom. Seems very much like the damage is being done now and not before.

I just don't see this whole doomed all season thing making sense. We weren't very good, but something has happened towards the end of Holloway's reign and the squad appear to not give a excrement what happens.

You're writing as if being six points clear of the relegation zone and attaining one point per game is good. It's not. It's rubbish. One point per game - 46 points - and we would have been fighting it out at the bottom. Barnet were relegated with 46 points in 2017/18.

Quoted from kafunanapar140909

You're writing as if being six points clear of the relegation zone and attaining one point per game is good. It's not. It's rubbish. One point per game - 46 points - and we would have been fighting it out at the bottom. Barnet were relegated with 46 points in 2017/18.

Bloody hell, if we could only dream of getting 46 points now.

  Yes, Barnet were relegated with 46 points 2 years ago, and if you take a quick look at the National League table you will see they are in serious danger of being relegated again. If the worst happens, we have to hope that with new owners we can forget this dreadful season, make sure the manager ( whether it's Paul Hurst or someone else ) has a budget to build a promotion team, and look to emulate what Bristol Rovers did with two straight promotions. It seems ridiculously optimistic now, but it's far from impossible. Now I'm off to take my meds!  

My biggest fear is what state the league we seem to be dropping into will be in

100% agree Rich. And it all has a knock on effect...you might say "well this is Hursts team now" but if recruitment in the summer hadn't have been so bad, we wouldn't have been in the position where we basically had to try and sign a whole new team in January and rely on signing unfit players. Not saying Hurst is completely blameless, but I do believe it was a poisoned chalice of a job.

Now look at the size of the squad...it's an absolute joke.

We completely dismantled what was an OK squad in the summer and let a load of good players leave, because we didn't want to pay any of them in the summer. Did any other team do that? We had a good base of a squad that just needed adding to. Now we've signed basically two squads since then.

Quoted from sam gy

100%  Now we've signed basically two squads since then.

As my auntie always used to say...... 'Buy cheap, buy twice.'

I don't deny that Hurst should take some of the blame. His record since taking over is far short of what I was reasonably expecting, and I say that as a Hurst fan who was pleased to see him return.

But it's not quite as simple as 'Hurst's record is worse than Holloway's'. Holloway had all summer to recruit and was part of the board that made the decisions. You can't compare them side-by-side; Holloway had a massive advantage and he basically drunk it up the wall.

We weren't good enough under Holloway, and that was down to investment as well as his incompetence on match day. Yes, points-wise we've been worse since then, but it's not every season you have to basically recruit an entire new squad in January.

Was it wise to do that? Well, it's clear Hurst wasn't getting anything from the squad he inherited.

I don’t think any of us had any confidence in the squad that Hollowords left. The points per game might have been a tad better but that included a couple of good games early on. The trajectory was downwards. We all know it and only regime diehards argue otherwise.

We were dropping like a stone under IH anyway. We would probably have kept going in the same direction had he stayed.

Amazing how absence makes managers and players appear better than they are. He was the biggest pariah going pre Christmas, and now he is "better than Hurst".

Quoted from sam gy

100% agree Rich. And it all has a knock on effect...you might say "well this is Hursts team now" but if recruitment in the summer hadn't have been so bad, we wouldn't have been in the position where we basically had to try and sign a whole new team in January and rely on signing unfit players. Not saying Hurst is completely blameless, but I do believe it was a poisoned chalice of a job.

Now look at the size of the squad...it's an absolute joke.

We completely dismantled what was an OK squad in the summer and let a load of good players leave, because we didn't want to pay any of them in the summer. Did any other team do that? We had a good base of a squad that just needed adding to. Now we've signed basically two squads since then.

Quoted from ginnywings

We were dropping like a stone under IH anyway. We would probably have kept going in the same direction had he stayed.

Amazing how absence makes managers and players appear better than they are. He was the biggest pariah going pre Christmas, and now he is "better than Hurst".

When Hurst starts getting some results, or gets 2 teams promoted to the Premier League, then I'll accept that he's better than Holloway. Right now, they're both excrement. We didn't need all the players that we signed. 4 or 5 good additions would have been much better than overhauling the team with a bunch of players that haven't looked much better.

One answer to that question,16 years of ineptitude

Quoted from friskneymariner

One answer to that question,16 years of ineptitude

Capped by a year of complete negligence by the “hopefully” outgoing board. They say football is a business if that was really true this f****rs would have been booted out ages ago.

“Custodians of the club” my @rse.

*18

We all know why we are where we are. It’s what we’re going to do about it that matters.

I’m not being flippant but the board is being replaced, not a moment too soon, and maybe the damage is done but we need to start looking forward now.

Why we are where we are ...

Simple really

Goals for 22
Goals against 49


Season to date
W6  D6  L18


Season 2009/10
W9  D17  L20
Goals for 45
Goals Against 71

We are already looking like finishing well below the 2009/10 level on all fronts , and we know how poor that team was and what the end result was , what does that say about this seasons "squad".

Season 2009/10 -  42 players used

This season - 41 (? i think ) players used

Massive turnover of players , pretty sure we wont have an ever present in any position, there will be too many players who have played less than 15 games probably less than 10 so no consistency, understanding, partnerships developing...so in effect we havnt had a "team" at all this season.
30 games in and i think we have probably had 5 players played at left back maybe 6 ?

Just like 2009/10 we have also had two managers in a season (so far anyway     ) with completely different approaches.

We are were we are and we will be where we deserve to be come the final whistle of the season.

Quoted from moosey_club

Why we are where we are ...

Simple really

Goals for 22
Goals against 49


Season to date
W6  D6  L18


Season 2009/10
W9  D17  L20
Goals for 45
Goals Against 71

We are already looking like finishing well below the 2009/10 level on all fronts , and we know how poor that team was and what the end result was , what does that say about this seasons "squad".

Season 2009/10 -  42 players used

This season - 41 (? i think ) players used

Massive turnover of players , pretty sure we wont have an ever present in any position, there will be too many players who have played less than 15 games probably less than 10 so no consistency, understanding, partnerships developing...so in effect we havnt had a "team" at all this season.
30 games in and i think we have probably had 5 players played at left back maybe 6 ?

Just like 2009/10 we have also had two managers in a season (so far anyway     ) with completely different approaches.

We are were we are and we will be where we deserve to be come the final whistle of the season.

Yep.

It's the result of inadequate investment in the playing staff over years and years.

It's not like we have had a solid core of six or seven decent players and just had to bring in a few new faces each year. we seen to have packed the squad out with endless non entities and free transfer journeymen, with wholesale squad replacement each year. Not a basis for building a squad which will progress year on year.

Yet again we are at the stage where we will need a huge clear out at the end of the season.

My hope is that the new owners will adopt a different approach and finance investment in the playing staff that will bring in good footballers.  

To be fair to Hurst the 2016 team had some pretty good players. I just hope it's not going to take four years to do it.

One thing for sure. If performances continue  to be as dire as they have been in the last few weeks, Hurst will not be here next season.    

For me, the reason we are where we are, is because after all the tears, heartaches, struggles and graft of dragging ourselves back into the EFL, the board in their wisdom never learned the lesson, failed to back PH and failed to capitalise on the momentum of getting promoted. They let him walk out the door and go to Shrewsbury for the sake of fulfilling promises that JF made.

Extra coaches don't win football matches apparently.

I can't think of another club ever, that would let a striker who scored 30 goals in a season, walk away to a team in the same league, with Toto following him. Magnay had already gone there saying he wanted to stay but we wouldn't give him any petrol money if I remember rightly.

Then Hurst was lured away by the mighty Shrewsbury. Slade was appointed and it's been downhill ever since.

I’m sure the fentyistas and the likes will jump to the defence or claim that regime can’t be the sole people to blame but in truth, everything Rich says is bang on the money.

From around April time the rhetoric from the club was a thinly veiled ‘lives are more important than football’ nonsense to present as if they cared when in truth it translated to ‘we’re not really interested in investing, we haven’t for a while so why would we now and we hope the season doesn’t start’ type claims.

Holloway has bemoaned the fixtures, fixtures that were the same for everyone else; although everyone prepared and worked on the season being a full season, we chose the opposite, not even arsing ourselves to play more than one pre season game. The same Holloway seemed to use Covid as a default excuse yet we find out that the club broke rules which resulted in a loss of valuable cash from a club so hell bent on penny pinching. Holloway, the same man so worried about Covid he was happy to drive to that there London to get himself on the tv and has done since.

We needn’t go on about the custodians of the club, in truth everyone is now aware that they were never probably in it for anyone but themselves. The same club even seemed to defend the actions of a convicted fraudster. The countless nonsense from Fenty over the years is a thread on its own somewhere.

We can argue about Hurst not picking up many points. We can even argue about Holloway’s side ‘being in a higher position’ but that’s futile, anyone with half an idea of football knew we were doomed from very early on, possibly before a ball was kicked and we banked on teams going bust or seasons not finishing.

Perhaps something has happened, perhaps those players enjoyed the approach under Holloway, may be, as we saw with Newell, they had ‘freedom’ and given they didn’t know if they’d play from one week to the next they felt part time...or May be that is the issue? Regardless of performance, perhaps Hurst, Doig, Davies etc have been drilling them and the culture has needed shifting and it’s taking as long to adapt it as it did for Holloway to screw it up.

We all have our own views and we’ve still got those that will claim they never likes Hurst, they didn’t want him back blah blah. There’s those of us who didn’t want Holloway in the first place and there’s those that don’t think things off of the pitch at BP were or are that bad. That’s football, but if anyone is surprised we’re staring non league in the face after all that has happened then I’d suggest they have a sit down and a long hard think...

Sadly, we’ll all still be there, the causes of it all will be gone, some with their egos still making their decisions and some with a pocket full of cash...