Another post this evening got me thinking back to the time when The Gate WAS a fortress, a noisy and intimidating place for opposition teams to visit.
This goes back a long time now, back in fact to the early 2000's when Louis and Scotty were operating down the right wing, Mickey Bell/Jim Brennan down the left with Tinns pulling the strings and Brooker/Lita up front, this was the last truely exciting team we witnessed. Things were noisy because we were up and down out of our seats frequently during the game, the football was exciting AND, quite often winning as well but the problem was with the drinking culture within the club...
However, when Danny Wilson failed at the final hurdle again (possibly as a result of this) Tinns was thrown in, maybe in the hope that his connection would pull the players together but this didn't work leading to his sad demise at Swansea. By the time Gary J arrived in late 2005, there was chaos and anarchy in the dressing room leading to GJ throwing the famous "hand grenade" and disposing of the undesirables and we became a club with discipline and an unquestioned leader.
This is turn gave us total unity in the dressing room for 3 years and we all saw what it achieved HOWEVER, the organisation was at the expense of flair and exciting football and we gradually scored less and less goals as the football became more and more mechanical and all about effort and hard work rather than the love of the game itself....
Some people will say so what, this got us to within 90 minutes of the premier league but everyone knows that we came close to becoming the first team promoted to the PL with a virtually 0 goal difference and if we are all totally honest about it, we probably would have scored less points than Derby had we made it as GJ simply wouldn't have attracted the players that we would have needed to survive...
ANYWAY, here we are again 7 years later, the wheel has come full circle and DM is in a fantastic position to rebuild this club from the bottom up (a process that has already started).
I do believe that there are similarities to GJ's attributes as a firm disciplinarian who won't tolerate disharmony HOWEVER, the one massive difference for me is that he has played football at the top level where he displayed fantastic leadership and subsequently, he has also clearly demonstrated a knack of finding players with ability who can do their job well having already assembled a team that attracted plaudits and were capable of holding their own against much bigger clubs.
The other major difference is that I believe that DM WANTS TO PLAY GOOD, ATTRACTIVE FOOTBALL something that we have been starved of for the last 5 years at The Gate. I am really looking forward to seeing footballers who are comfortable on the ball and don't treat it like a hot potato and I am looking forward to seeing joined up and exciting football with, LOTS OF GOALS.
The difficult thing is going to be getting the balance between being reckless and cavalier and keeping our defence tight but I have every confidence in DM and the team's ability to get this right and if he does, I CAN'T WAIT...!!! Lets make The Gate a fortress again...
COME ON YOU REDS...!!!
This goes back a long time now, back in fact to the early 2000's when Louis and Scotty were operating down the right wing, Mickey Bell/Jim Brennan down the left with Tinns pulling the strings and Brooker/Lita up front, this was the last truely exciting team we witnessed. Things were noisy because we were up and down out of our seats frequently during the game, the football was exciting AND, quite often winning as well but the problem was with the drinking culture within the club...
However, when Danny Wilson failed at the final hurdle again (possibly as a result of this) Tinns was thrown in, maybe in the hope that his connection would pull the players together but this didn't work leading to his sad demise at Swansea. By the time Gary J arrived in late 2005, there was chaos and anarchy in the dressing room leading to GJ throwing the famous "hand grenade" and disposing of the undesirables and we became a club with discipline and an unquestioned leader.
This is turn gave us total unity in the dressing room for 3 years and we all saw what it achieved HOWEVER, the organisation was at the expense of flair and exciting football and we gradually scored less and less goals as the football became more and more mechanical and all about effort and hard work rather than the love of the game itself....
Some people will say so what, this got us to within 90 minutes of the premier league but everyone knows that we came close to becoming the first team promoted to the PL with a virtually 0 goal difference and if we are all totally honest about it, we probably would have scored less points than Derby had we made it as GJ simply wouldn't have attracted the players that we would have needed to survive...
ANYWAY, here we are again 7 years later, the wheel has come full circle and DM is in a fantastic position to rebuild this club from the bottom up (a process that has already started).
I do believe that there are similarities to GJ's attributes as a firm disciplinarian who won't tolerate disharmony HOWEVER, the one massive difference for me is that he has played football at the top level where he displayed fantastic leadership and subsequently, he has also clearly demonstrated a knack of finding players with ability who can do their job well having already assembled a team that attracted plaudits and were capable of holding their own against much bigger clubs.
The other major difference is that I believe that DM WANTS TO PLAY GOOD, ATTRACTIVE FOOTBALL something that we have been starved of for the last 5 years at The Gate. I am really looking forward to seeing footballers who are comfortable on the ball and don't treat it like a hot potato and I am looking forward to seeing joined up and exciting football with, LOTS OF GOALS.
The difficult thing is going to be getting the balance between being reckless and cavalier and keeping our defence tight but I have every confidence in DM and the team's ability to get this right and if he does, I CAN'T WAIT...!!! Lets make The Gate a fortress again...
COME ON YOU REDS...!!!
