06-03-2017, 13:56
This season every ten games we pick up eight to ten points at best. So after 45 games we might just manage 41 points ........ in that situation winning the 46th and final game would only give us 44 points. After 45 games we need to be on 47 points AND then win our last match AND hope four other teams have put in a worse finish! So that is sixteen points from our next ten games .......
It's not just that mathematically such an improvement is unlikely in the extreme, but also we reached that perilous position with what looked like a better team than we can now field. O'Shea certainly didn't turn up every week, but we might have expected two or three good games out of eleven before the end of the season (including a match-winner!). Ariyibi was perhaps our big hope for the season and disappointed, but would anyone say he wouldn't make this team? And even our much-disliked Liddle, do we look a better side without him? And Ched, who I would never would have signed, meant we at least carried a potential goal threat. Even our manager had succeeded and failed in relegation campaigns .......... and for part of this unsuccessful season we were also a reasonably stable club with an owner who was our Chairman ...... and now, well we're a basket case aren't we?
All of that and maths too, stir in a manager of limited experience and a team made of naive youngsters and men whose better days are well-behind them ....... Against that weigh in a a 93rd minute winner from a lad who hasn't scored all season, a surprise clean sheet, 4 shots in the game, 21 against us. No wonder Swindon are nice about us. We're not even serious rivals in their battle to stay up. Repeat Saturday in our next game and we'll at least be in the race. Lose our next game and we'd have to play like a side chasing automatic promotion for the rest of the season. Does that look likely?
It's not just that mathematically such an improvement is unlikely in the extreme, but also we reached that perilous position with what looked like a better team than we can now field. O'Shea certainly didn't turn up every week, but we might have expected two or three good games out of eleven before the end of the season (including a match-winner!). Ariyibi was perhaps our big hope for the season and disappointed, but would anyone say he wouldn't make this team? And even our much-disliked Liddle, do we look a better side without him? And Ched, who I would never would have signed, meant we at least carried a potential goal threat. Even our manager had succeeded and failed in relegation campaigns .......... and for part of this unsuccessful season we were also a reasonably stable club with an owner who was our Chairman ...... and now, well we're a basket case aren't we?
All of that and maths too, stir in a manager of limited experience and a team made of naive youngsters and men whose better days are well-behind them ....... Against that weigh in a a 93rd minute winner from a lad who hasn't scored all season, a surprise clean sheet, 4 shots in the game, 21 against us. No wonder Swindon are nice about us. We're not even serious rivals in their battle to stay up. Repeat Saturday in our next game and we'll at least be in the race. Lose our next game and we'd have to play like a side chasing automatic promotion for the rest of the season. Does that look likely?