Last 10 league games

[Campsall rover]

I don’t think I’ve seen such a predictably bad team in many a long year. Weak, lightweight, totally ineffective in attack, invisible in midfield and amateur hour in defence.

Controversial view perhaps - lots of injuries, lot of players likely told no deals with us next season, and season over so even retained players are unlikely to be fully committed. We’re certainly not going up and I think now impossible to go down. Every game we lose is depressing and embarrassing but in scheme of things not crucial. Impact on fans less so. But we put this fire season to bed, allow a summer of recruitment and maybe things look better come August?

This seemed to be the conclusion in Jan with the lack of business. If we are in and around the playoffs, great. If we aren't, we focus on a big summer. It's why barring something mega bad, Schofield isn't going anywhere IMO

Let's be hard headed for a moment.

The situation is that the owners are clearly not going to plunge into their pockets to fund our fantasies of where we, the fans, would like the club to be.

Accept that and follow the logic.

We have recruited so badly over the past 2 years that it is scarcely believable. Next year, we will still have the ball and chain of contracts we gave to players who are not good enough for this league, nevermind the one above.

If we'd spent more in January, made the playoffs and got promoted, we'd still have those players in L1. And without a very significant additional investment in the squad, we'd have been slaughtered.

I've been saying for 6 months that we don't turn this round quickly. The recruitment has been so bad for so long that we simply have to be patient and let the shocking decisions work their way off the books.

In that sense, I do have a certain sympathy for Schofield. He inherited a shockingly poor squad. He's not had money thrown at him to improve it instantaneously. But he's brought in players such as Lavery and Laykin who improved the overall quality.

The current collapse can't be judged outside the context of the injuries that we've suffered. We currently have 11 players missing who would be first choice or subs (Miller, Olowu, Lavery, Biggins, Laykin, Long, Younger, Taylor, Maxwell, Williams, Brown) while others have been in and out due to injuries (Anderson) or seem to be still struggling at 80% fitness (Rowe).

No club in this division could deal with an injury list like that, and I'm prepared to cut Schofield some slack for that.

But whatever we do with the manager, until we get fundamentally better players than we've signed these past 2 years we are not going to be any better.

BST how many good performances and wins have we had when most of  those players have been fit?
Only Taylor & Younger have missed the whole season bar was it 2/3 appearances by Taylor.

Anderson and Olowu have been a miss agreed when they haven’t played but Williams has been awful apart from the first 6/7 games. Long simply is not good enough, Lavery is hardly a 15/20 goalscorer in this league. Lavery, Lakin & Brown have only been with us since late January anyway.

Biggins and Maxwell we have missed over the last few weeks but both players blow hot and cold and are not consistent. That leaves only Miller & he has hardly been missed imo no fault of his own but because he receives so little quality service he isn’t going to be prolific. DS style has killed Miller’s self belief and his confidence, when presented with a chance has dissipated.
I think he has managed only 4 goals since DS took over the reigns in October. 2 in one game.

So for me BST you’re trying to find excuses for the abysmal performances DS has presided over since he became head coach.

Sorry you or me could have got this lot playing a more entertaining brand of football and got probably another 15 points on the board.
This is a pretty average league and i am being very polite with the word average.

A good experienced manager would have got this team in to the top 5/6/7 without a shadow of doubt imo.
Paul Simpson would have done. You’re not telling me Carlisle have better individual players than we do.
They are playing better as a team unit because they have a manger who knows how to get the best from what he has. Play a system that works. It is not rocket science.

DS has to go if he is with us next season we are in massive trouble.

[Pliskin]

The injury list is large at the moment but its only very recently that it become significant. Go back to the Harrogate game less than a month ago see that Schofield had his strongest XI to choose from.

Poor performances go back a lot further than that.

And injuries happen, what matters it's how you adapt to mitigate the impact. That's what good managers do. What happens if Schofield gets injuries next season and refuses to adapt to the situation at hand? Shrug our shoulders and bemoan how "unlucky" we were again as another season gets pissed away?

He's lost the fans as well. That matters, even if the board think that he doesn't objectively deserve to be sacked. If the board are looking at the finances and crowds are forecast to be below 5000 as things stand, then sometimes you have to swim with the tide and give people what they want.

[sedwardsdrfc]

Didn’t Copps build the squad? It’s supposed to take the excuse of managers doing a full rebuild out of the equation. Are we still using this excuse because if we are then the HoF role is a waste of time

[BillyStubbsTears]

The injury list is large at the moment but its only very recently that it become significant. Go back to the Harrogate game less than a month ago see that Schofield had his strongest XI to choose from.

Poor performances go back a lot further than that.

And injuries happen, what matters it's how you adapt to mitigate the impact. That's what good managers do. What happens if Schofield gets injuries next season and refuses to adapt to the situation at hand? Shrug our shoulders and bemoan how "unlucky" we were again as another season gets pissed away?

He's lost the fans as well. That matters, even if the board think that he doesn't objectively deserve to be sacked. If the board are looking at the finances and crowds are forecast to be below 5000 as things stand, then sometimes you have to swim with the tide and give people what they want.

I entirely agree that a manager has to cope with what fortune chucks at him over a season.

But as I keep saying...context.

Part of the problem we have at the monent, in fact I'd say THE major part of the problem, is that our recruitment has been so f**king dreadful for 2 years that we have little back up in key areas.

So, we lose two strikers to injury, and literally the only alternative we have is a kid just turned 18. Because we are spending wages on long term contracts for two strikers who aren't remotely of the standard required.

We lose our only dedicated left back and we have no alternatives but to play a hopelessly out of form Rowe there, or play a right winger there.

We lose two central midfielders and we have no alternative but to play Ravenhill, who is considered good enough for loan spells at National League North clubs.

As I keep saying, if we don't deal with the core problem of how utterly awful our recruitment has been for 2 years, the manager's position is nigh on irrelevant. 

[ncRover]

There hasn’t been an injury crisis in defence, where a lot of goals have come from attempts to play out from the back.

We had near first choice XIs for Bradford, Stockport and HARROGATE TOWN. We didn’t lay a glove on any.

Let’s not forget Mansfield where “the performance was there”.

BST you are very correct on recruitment though. Taking a more pragmatic approach to playing style makes recruitment safer. We will only be able to afford gambles and punts for them to be good enough for this system. That means more dossers like Reo Griffiths.