When people complain about modern art they often say, "a child could have done that!" That's exactly how I felt reading the apparent Dagenham match preview on our website. A St Mary's U-13 with access to the internet could have come up with that in 20 minutes max'!
We get a potted history of Peter Taylor's long and often distinguished career in the game and quick piece on Elliott Romain, who has scored them four goals this season. We only feature ourselves with a warning that we won't know whether Zavon Hines is injured until Saturday morning.
Peter Taylor - well if you'd never seen a football match in your life you could have written that history from Wikipedia. The man himself is totally absent from it. As to Dagenham's playing strength, apparently if Romain dies overnight, they're finished.
Perhaps it could have been mentioned that last season they were still challenging when financial problems forced them to sell their best players extremely cheap, that meant they lost John Still their manager and have been forced to re-build on a much-reduced budget which has caused them to struggle for points so far, but the light at the end of their tunnel is that they have now apparently been sold. Perhaps the preview could mention their ground, how to get there, the way the team play, what others say about them ....... Something.
Players - well last week their keeper Elliot Justham was in the Non-League Paper's team of the week from our league having pulled off several saves. Somebody might just have been interested to read about Gavin Hoyte their defender, whose mum Wendy was a champion sprinter and whose dad Les was a bit of a speedster too. Gavin started at Arsenal, got England age-group caps to U-20, but didn't break through and has since got full international caps for Trinidad and Tobago, like his brother Justin! And he pretty much turns up wherever Peter Taylor is manager.
Come on mate, if you're previewing a match with a 6' 7" newcomer likely to start for us, you might just find out whether Dagenham are any good in the air, have they got any big lads, what areas of the field are they strong in! How long would it take to do your job properly? I assume Chesterfield actually pay for this level of garbage!
We get a potted history of Peter Taylor's long and often distinguished career in the game and quick piece on Elliott Romain, who has scored them four goals this season. We only feature ourselves with a warning that we won't know whether Zavon Hines is injured until Saturday morning.
Peter Taylor - well if you'd never seen a football match in your life you could have written that history from Wikipedia. The man himself is totally absent from it. As to Dagenham's playing strength, apparently if Romain dies overnight, they're finished.
Perhaps it could have been mentioned that last season they were still challenging when financial problems forced them to sell their best players extremely cheap, that meant they lost John Still their manager and have been forced to re-build on a much-reduced budget which has caused them to struggle for points so far, but the light at the end of their tunnel is that they have now apparently been sold. Perhaps the preview could mention their ground, how to get there, the way the team play, what others say about them ....... Something.
Players - well last week their keeper Elliot Justham was in the Non-League Paper's team of the week from our league having pulled off several saves. Somebody might just have been interested to read about Gavin Hoyte their defender, whose mum Wendy was a champion sprinter and whose dad Les was a bit of a speedster too. Gavin started at Arsenal, got England age-group caps to U-20, but didn't break through and has since got full international caps for Trinidad and Tobago, like his brother Justin! And he pretty much turns up wherever Peter Taylor is manager.
Come on mate, if you're previewing a match with a 6' 7" newcomer likely to start for us, you might just find out whether Dagenham are any good in the air, have they got any big lads, what areas of the field are they strong in! How long would it take to do your job properly? I assume Chesterfield actually pay for this level of garbage!