The Shrewsbury season continues to have the familiar ring to it from a Notts County perspective. From your boards you all seem in a bit of a whirl about which players should be in, out, what position etc. The reality behind the scenes i'm sure is that GT is frantically trying to find some cohesion and organisation to a side chronically short of confidence at the moment. Unfortunately as in life, you sometimes have to reach rock bottom before you find a way up. I remember Notts having a club record run of 9 straight defeats and going through a number of managers during the period 2010-2011, including Craig Short, Dave Kevan, and Paul Ince before Martin Allen did what he does best and galvanises the troops before starting last season with a great start. However League 1 does not do any teams any favours and Allan was sacked following a poor period of successive defeats and generally poor results, also with an alleged fall-out with the owner. Keith Curle has done a tremendous job but he and Allan both had something in common, also with Ince to a degree. All the above managers were able to work the loan market in the a way the previous manager could not. It seems to be a fact that managers develop networks within the game, Ince was able to bring his son Tom in and Alan Gow also had a positive impact. However Ince did not have a strong enough base and when Ben Davies was sold to Derby, it started to run away. Allan brought Jeff Hughes and Alan Sheehan, both strong left-sided players and all of a sudden Notts looked a different side. Confidence soared and further additions including Krystian Pearce and Julian Kelly started to build further. Since Curle started, the owner has found the confidence to invest and Notts now have the strongest side for over a decade. My view is that GT will be given around another 10 games to turn around the form and bring in loanees (Bennett is a decent player), some loanees with a view to permanent, some not. You will have to get used to regular player change until it falls into place, i'm afraid. As for the January window, this is a test of your Chairmans belief in GTs judgement. Any longer without improvement and GT is gone.
as ever thanks for taking the trouble to compare notes. hopefully things may improve, but it looks a bit hopeless at present. i am sure the chairman and manager are concerned and hope something may turn up. it is always a trademark that our boards go quiet in a crisis. many thanks for your input and good luck in your promo chase. floreat salopia!
At the moment we just need to make ourselves incredibly hard to beat. One of the good things to see is Jonny Taylor finally gaining the ability to attack again - if everyone had his determination and worked as hard as he does then we'd be a solid nut to crack. I still have faith in Turner, and, personally, I don't think relegation would be the end of the world as I think we would have a pretty good chance of coming straight back up.
Well said, Lenny - I also have faith in Turner and I expect him to find a way to get us to safety as it would be an ill-fitting end to such a successful management career for it to end with resignation or relegation.
You're right- relegation would be bad but not a disaster. As the B&A users have been bemoaning, we've not really risked any lucrative players wages(don't think so) that mean we have to stay up, although Parry and Weale can't be doing too badly. The night is darkest before the dawn, as Havey Dent says in The Dark Knight. I think the defence wilp stop making mistakes- you don't get relegated from individual errors, it's if you're not good enough. Then if we can get Proctor and Rogers to get some chemistry up top, dare i even say "bang 'em in" and we'll be home and dry. Well, not really, but we should make it. COYB
You're right- relegation would be bad but not a disaster. As the B&A users have been bemoaning, we've not really risked any lucrative players wages(don't think so) that mean we have to stay up, although Parry and Weale can't be doing too badly. The night is darkest before the dawn, as Havey Dent says in The Dark Knight. I think the defence wilp stop making mistakes- you don't get relegated from individual errors, it's if you're not good enough. Then if we can get Proctor and Rogers to get some chemistry up top, dare i even say "bang 'em in" and we'll be home and dry. Well, not really, but we should make it. COYB
so let us get this right, going down would be bad but not a disaster. if shrews were relegated to L2 we would be in a league with 3 relegation places to the bsl. would that be a disaster? may i remind you gentlemen we have been 15 years attempting promotion and in the successful 15th year we are in november and the r word is already being bandied around. lord know how roland and the board are feeling about towns plight. it was roland that took over a near bankrupt football business centred on a crap stadium where the tide came in 2 or 3 times a year. he and the board completely turned the club round with a new stadium so our club was fit for promo, with a 1 year baptism in the conference on the way. surely now is the time for the management, coaches and squad to repay the boards leadership and start playing for their shirts, wages and very place in our grear club. so from now on let us not mention the r word again but concentrate on the next 2 home games and a clearout and rebuild in january. graham chose not to spend in the summer so he will be inundated with cash in january won't he roland! sorry about the rant but floreat salopia and to the manager, coaches and squad, heads up and fingers out!
i'm with you on this one A J and cant believe what i'm reading!!....whats the point in paying the entrance fee every week to line Rowlands pockets, then say "relegation wouldn't be the end of the world", and to even think we can come up again the next year is pure fantasy, we would have just as much chance of dropping into the conference!!....support would nose dive meaning finances suffer too, then sackings and destabilisation throughout the club, and lets get real, what football fan "wouldn't really mind" if their club was relegated!! ...fifteen bloody years to get here with mostly misery crowds....we have turned the corner, we now need to crank it up!! and get it sorted...IMO you can shuffle a bad team around as much as you like and its going to make very little difference, so if we are not going to invest, then we must defend and try and catch other teams on the break, but with crowds over 6000 like we use to enjoy, that to me stinks of failure and shortsightedness...of a very tired and misguided management team
Perhaps it is just a ploy to get a great escape crowd towards the end of the season... seriously no one wants r to happen and we all need to keep on turning up in force to the match and support our team, boo the opposition and the ref when it appears that he doesn't know what he is doing.
Obviously I want Town to do well - it's human nature. What I mean though, is that if we get relegated, what's so bad? It's more of a deep theological question asking why we actually care, when we could watch football cheaper over the course of the season. However, saying we'd be close to relegation again if we went down is ridiculous. Turner has assembled a squad of players who were excellent in League Two (as is so frequently bemoaned by posters) and has tried to build the team this season the same way he did last year - players who had very good seasons in League Two alongside a handful of loanees. He knows what he's doing at League Two level - nobody can say that's untrue.
No, we have a great League 2 team......but we are in League 1! The players that kept us good in League 2 last year have gone. We leak goals.....we got rid of two great defenders.We can't score goals....we got rid of a forward. Midfield is not productive .....we lost a midfielder better than some we kept. Enough said! Fed up with whinging fans and inept, out of date management so will go back to watching Sunday pub teams.....all passion from old men and boys, right next to a good pub and not giving my money to people who don't care (and that includes the Chancellor who takes my petrol money for a 190 mile round trip to watch Shrews)
Have you calmed down yet? Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad. Hasn't it always been that way? But you're right in one thing - if it hurts too much, stay away. It's not good for you. I'm with the philosophical optimists on here, not the doom and gloomers (and I could have written that before the Crewe game).
I am a realist with a dash of cynicism! Will always love the Shrews......over 55 years a fan, so it would be difficult to stop!!!!! Just love to see passion even when losing.
