You are hallucinating Lenny. The cost of players these days is their salaries not transfer fees. Findlay was reputed to be one of the highest paid players in the championship and we have had Vincelot and Wright on loan from the championship as well. Four man months of that lot has been expensive before factoring in the immense cost of MacDonald. All nice to have but very pricey. Burton could have gone to MK Dons but Gills offered more, similarly Nelson, Weston, Barrett and Legge had League 1 options available but were enticed by Gills genorosity. And MA has so many backroom helpers this year that there is no room on the bench for them. Compare this with last year when loanees were kids from the higher division and a couple of unwanteds from league 2. Signings, in the main came from non league (Fish, Flitney, Birchall and Kedwell) with only Lee and Whelpdale having any seniority. Going shopping at Brentford was strictly out of bounds and when asst manager Hendon resigned he was not replaced so that Nouble could be funded. You are right that there was a bit more to the squad but they were leftovers from the days of Dimson on league 1 contracts and were rarely even fit to play (King, Weston, Oli, Fuller, Richards, MacCammon etc) and what a wonderful stroke of good fortune MA had when this sad gang were cleared out at the first opportunity. As for attendances, I am sure you know that in recent weeks they have indeed crept ahead of last year but we have seen incredible discounting of tickets since October the likes of which we have never had in previous years. It would not surprise me if cash takings have fallen. Of course despite the threadbare resources available last year, not every comparison is unfavourable and three less home defeats had occurred at this stage.
Some players MA has brought in have had the old "undisclosed fee" but even so called "free agents" cost money as they can command a large signing on fee as well as agents fee's.
We have far more points now than we did this time last season, irrespective of home form. How many away games had we won by this time last season? There isn't a shred of evidence to suggest MA has a bigger budget than Hessy. Hessy's signing have been mainly shocking and the good ones he couldn't get the best out of them so MA has had a job on his hands picking up the pieces. Whelp dale, Lee and Fish have come on massively under MA.
Sorry, but if we've got a manager that pampers to the calls of the fans rather than his own priciples then we've got a weak manager. I have no counter-explanation, but cannot accept that MA would alter his tactics depending on what the fans want. If he did I really don't think we'd be without the services of Jackman and Payne at the moment, and don't think that he'd be persisting with his rotation policy.
H You've taken just a small part of my reply and completely taken it out of context. I go on to say that the players are effected by the moans and groans from the crowd. Nothing at all that the manager has changed his tactics.
I can admire anyone who stands by their principles - if those principles are succeeding - but - clearly (as I said earlier) Martin Allen (and his principles) have been failing for too long at home. If he continues to allow the team to perform in the same way as they have over the last 7 home games ( presumably following his guidelines ) we will be going nowhere. If it's not broken - don't fix it.( as per the first dozen or so games ) If your windscreen has a chip in it - get it fixed before it cracks up ! <analogy> ps if MA won't listen to fans comments - does it mean that we can expect to see nothing but hoofball for the rest of the season ?
Always, in my experience we have started games at home by trying to knock the ball around only the floor but as the game goes go on we do tend to hit the longer balls. I am unclear of how the fits into your assumption that Allen has adopted the tactic as the primary one... to me it suggests that the hoofball is plan B. Albeit it we are seeming to require a plan B sooner and sooner these days.
BSG I don't particularly like hoofball but as I've said before if that is Plan A,B or Z you need deploy the tactic properly. What I mean is that with hoofball there must be a need to use 3 or 4 forwards - ready to receive /compete for the ball. I fail to see the merits of hoofball football if all you've got up front is one diminutive striker - who hasn't got a chance against the uncompromising centre backs that rule L2. Hoofball is 'desperate' football - and I don't think it will win anything ( wether it is Plan A, B or Z )
