Fan's View Fan's View 22/23 - Morecambe at home

[Essexyellows]

Its the hope that kills you..................

 

[NottsYellow]

Very interesting, especially those stats on percentage of goals conceded. Might nick some of that if I may (will give credit obvs)

Hi Paul, yes you are welcome to use the stats.

 

[Chippy]

This is what I mean when I comment on a fan base losing its ability to dream or believe it could be their club’s year. If a mentality that it can’t or won’t happen takes hold, whether that means missing out by one point or 20 points, it’s a death spiral. There has to be belief. What is there without it?

The mention of Morecambe’s board stating its ambition for 20/21 was to merely stay in the division, and yet they ended up winning promotion, is what I’m talking about. I bet any money that plenty of their fans would have still gone into that season daring to dream, even though on paper that would seem daft and almost none of them would have genuinely expected it. You have to believe that however unlikely, it might happen. A 10% chance? 5%? Doesn’t matter - there’s something. It’s enough.

I’m worried. I don’t think we’re in any genuine danger of going down or anything like that (oh God…) but I do worry that things have gone stale and that more and more people are starting to resign themselves to the fact that we just can’t or won’t take the next step. We spent some really big money in January when we were in the top six, and tried to spend even more than we did while turning down bids for some of our best players, and even then I saw plenty of people already playing down our odds of promotion and saying it was about building for “next season”, despite the fact that we were firmly in the pack and had strengthened the squad. A few people were already making their excuses for missing out and trying to spin it as a positive thing, and I had to listen to people on Radio Oxford saying they would rather stay in League One under Karl Robinson indefinitely than get promoted with someone who might not be as ‘fun’. So if that’s the case then why would anyone bother having any hope, and why would anybody be surprised that the whole thing feels a bit… meh?

Sorry to bang on - I’m just really bemused as to why so many people have decided that this is as good as it could ever be. I’m not saying people should be negative or have unreasonable expectations, but they should have expectations.

Shouldn’t they?

If we’d have started pre season with some exciting early signings through the door, to start replacing those we lost from last season, added a few more before the league season kicked off, plus strengthened the full backs, then I think people would have been much more up for it from the off. Instead we started the season with plenty of not unexpected pre-season injuries, not replacing the key positions, and the risk of many players with long or serious injury histories breaking down. Plus no new fit signings for anyone to be in the slightest bit enthused about or who they could come and watch play!

I think many of the loyal fan base could see the likely problems ahead before we even went on pre-season tour, and certainly before we kicked off at Derby (just look at the bench for our opening game!) and simply just aren’t excited by our crazy transfer dealings, so there is that apathy from early on that this isn’t going to be our season. The squad is nothing like good enough, we haven‘t got early targets in over the summer to set the pulses racing, and had one or two crazy trialists that actually angered many people as they were simply ridiculous.

If we‘d got some top talent from the league below, some proven quality league one players and one or two Championship guys, who all had played regularly last season and before and never had serious injury problems, then I think many would have had some belief and real optimism that we’d actually added proper quality and stability to the squad. If there was some power, height and pace amongst them, all the things everyone can see we need, then again people would be up for it thinking we’ve finally got what we need to get to the next level. We haven’t got any of that And the fans know it.

Instead we’ve weakened the squad and not replaced the glaringly obvious problem areas. Plus we’ve now got less than a handful of players who could actually mix it in the Championship. Very few of our current squad would be good enough for that level. Most people can see it except the ones who run the show or the most optimistic of the fan base. So add all this together and you do end up with the mind set of what’s the point! People are disinterested, disappointed and quite honestly despondent and it’s still August!

 

[ZeroTheHero]

I'm not so much disappointed as I am bloody furious. From the outside the club is a disorganised mess, with the off season being an unholy mixture of poor PR, badly thought out 'offers' for some of our longest serving supporters and late ticketing options, being followed by a complete failure to even attempt to strengthen the playing side in some of the glaringly obvious areas, the signing of fragile (to be kind) players, resigning and registering of other players who looked past their sell by date and weren't even getting in the team last season and a complete inability of the manager to even be bloody honest about what we have all watched and a club spokesman criticising the support for daring to show their dissatisfaction.

I don't know enough about the internal workings of the club to be sure where to apportion blame, whether that's KR for signing the crocks and the unbalanced squad, the board for not keeping a close eye on him, the MD for not seeming to to able to run an efficient ship and perhaps being more preoccupied with stadium issues, the 'recruitment department' for not doing their job, the medical staff for not being rigorous enough when checking players, the training staff and regime for the fact that the players are both sluggish and prone to muscle injuries after the traditionally daft pre-season. Maybe it is a combination of all of them.

I'd normally jump at the chance of watching us play a Prem club in a cup at home. I'd have bought my ticket almost as soon as they were available. Now I am finding it very easy to find reasons not to - which I myself find both surprising and rather worrying.

Who ever is control of the club (and I mean higher up than the manager and not the irrelevant Tiger) needs to get a grip of this on both the playing and operational sides. And soon.

 

[TailsWeWin]

I'm not so much disappointed as I am bloody furious. From the outside the club is a disorganised mess, with the off season being an unholy mixture of poor PR, badly thought out 'offers' for some of our longest serving supporters and late ticketing options, being followed by a complete failure to even attempt to strengthen the playing side in some of the glaringly obvious areas, the signing of fragile (to be kind) players, resigning and registering of other players who looked past their sell by date and weren't even getting in the team last season and a complete inability of the manager to even be bloody honest about what we have all watched and a club spokesman criticising the support for daring to show their dissatisfaction.

I don't know enough about the internal workings of the club to be sure where to apportion blame, whether that's KR for signing the crocks and the unbalanced squad, the board for not keeping a close eye on him, the MD for not seeming to to able to run an efficient ship and perhaps being more preoccupied with stadium issues, the 'recruitment department' for not doing their job, the medical staff for not being rigorous enough when checking players, the training staff and regime for the fact that the players are both sluggish and prone to muscle injuries after the traditionally daft pre-season. Maybe it is a combination of all of them.

I'd normally jump at the chance of watching us play a Prem club in a cup at home. I'd have bought my ticket almost as soon as they were available. Now I am finding it very easy to find reasons not to - which I myself find both surprising and rather worrying.

Who ever is control of the club (and I mean higher up than the manager and not the irrelevant Tiger) needs to get a grip of this on both the playing and operational sides. And soon.

Great post …. but don’t hold your breath.

 

[Hackney Jack]

not beating Morecambe at home, is indicative of where we're at on and off the field.

 

[Paul B]

I'm not so much disappointed as I am bloody furious. From the outside the club is a disorganised mess, with the off season being an unholy mixture of poor PR, badly thought out 'offers' for some of our longest serving supporters and late ticketing options, being followed by a complete failure to even attempt to strengthen the playing side in some of the glaringly obvious areas, the signing of fragile (to be kind) players, resigning and registering of other players who looked past their sell by date and weren't even getting in the team last season and a complete inability of the manager to even be bloody honest about what we have all watched and a club spokesman criticising the support for daring to show their dissatisfaction.

I don't know enough about the internal workings of the club to be sure where to apportion blame, whether that's KR for signing the crocks and the unbalanced squad, the board for not keeping a close eye on him, the MD for not seeming to to able to run an efficient ship and perhaps being more preoccupied with stadium issues, the 'recruitment department' for not doing their job, the medical staff for not being rigorous enough when checking players, the training staff and regime for the fact that the players are both sluggish and prone to muscle injuries after the traditionally daft pre-season. Maybe it is a combination of all of them.

I'd normally jump at the chance of watching us play a Prem club in a cup at home. I'd have bought my ticket almost as soon as they were available. Now I am finding it very easy to find reasons not to - which I myself find both surprising and rather worrying.

Who ever is control of the club (and I mean higher up than the manager and not the irrelevant Tiger) needs to get a grip of this on both the playing and operational sides. And soon.

Before I read this I'd already written the first bit of the Palace FV and I've said this, "I don’t think I’ve ever had less enthusiasm for a cup game against a top flight side."

 

[Cass63]

Actually now I come to think of it you are probably right. Just goes to show that I'd had it up to here with us not scoring and was doing the lad a disservice. But it happened time and again and whether or not a defender got a touch the outcome was the same.

A defender did get a touch on it, we were right behind it.

 

[RyanioBirdio]

Who ever is control of the club (and I mean higher up than the manager and not the irrelevant Tiger) needs to get a grip of this on both the playing and operational sides. And soon.

I think the problem is that there isn’t one person in charge. It’s a “collective” without a defined, singular front person.

Grant Ferguson might assume a more hands-on role on their behalf as he will be around the club fairly regularly moving forward, but not for another month or so and even then he will be back and forth between England and Asia.

 

[m]

On general malaise and atmosphere:

Surely few would argue it was very flat last year. I've wondered for some time whether this is due to a very deep-rooted lack of belief in the current team following on from the Wycombe defeat and the humbling at Blackpool's hands. Whether there just wasn't the belief in the crowd which leads to expectation and excitement.

I've held off from posting this before as I don't like to be unduly negative.