League one forever

18 minutes ago, JoeP said:

 

Not sure he's lost interest, but he certainly looks knackered by it all.

 

I think it's a much bigger challenge than he was expecting and isn't sure what his next move is, if he's pretty much dealing with the same players next season.  I'm not sure any manager could solve that issue, though..

Yeah, he just looks beaten with it . . which is disturbing given he’s only been here 6 months. There’s more and more little digs coming out- I wonder whether there’s some friction between him and the board about how many are tied down and how much movement he has. 
 

All just feels, ‘it’s shit and we can’t change it.’ 

Does anyone think Mellon has lost interest and is going through the motions? 

18 minutes ago, deyres42 said:

He could shit in your hands and some of you lot would be thanking him for dinner...

New idea for the sign.

You may think you can shit on our fans, but you’ll never shit on me! 

17 minutes ago, deyres42 said:

He could shit in your hands and some of you lot would be thanking him for dinner...

Some of your best work. 

1 hour ago, deyres42 said:

He's already failed given his job was to finish in the top 7...

Have you made a sign yet?

Maybe something like - 

5PM- you’re having a laugh. 
 

Or 

3 months of failure and still they back him! 
 

Or Simply

Mellon out. 

3 minutes ago, deyres42 said:

I'm just going off what people said.

Your desperation for him to fail is palpable. 

28 minutes ago, deyres42 said:

The only reason people seem to have for keeping him is based on what he did elsewhere some time ago.

 

Open your eyes to the here and now and the absolute dogs dinner he has made of it.

19 minutes ago, Frankly Mr Shankly said:

 

Personally if being in the play-offs in Feb doesn't excite you, it explains our slight difference in expectation levels.

Aye, probably. 
 

I didn’t expect to get promoted this season, but playoffs was the absolute minimum to call it a good season and tangible progress. 
 

Over the course of last season - we did ok. 
 

Over the course of this season - we’ve done ok.

Ok isn’t progress to me- but that’s only my opinion. 
 

Oh- and I was buzzing with being 5th, I sang eieieo every chance I could. Just want it to last a little longer than a few weeks. 

1 minute ago, nzlatic said:

Chesterfield pretty much had that exact run last season which took them out of the automatic promotion race. Probably at a similar time of the season too. 
 

Cook also had a very average first 20 games in charge the season before when he took over a team at the top and clung onto 7th by the end. 
 

They kicked on this season though and didn’t have those sort of runs. That’s what we need to do next season. 

Yeah, I think we underestimate how good/consistent you have to be to get out of this league- especially with only two up. 
 

Your point above illustrates that- very good/very bad/average for parts of the season will get you in the playoffs but ultimately isn’t enough. (I know they’re exceptions on occasion) 

It’s the mentality of the grind and churning wins that sees you promoted. 

1 minute ago, Frankly Mr Shankly said:

Being 5th in Feb was the fault of Unsworth, not Mellon, surely?

If we’re going down that road, ST contributed to being 5th as well as Mellon. 
 

It’s all semantics though. 
 

To my mind being excited for a couple of weeks in Feb is nowhere near to getting promoted.
 

Dave- a caller on the phone inn last night, made a great point. Sides that can sustain a playoff push throughout the whole season are serious contenders. This season that’s Bromley and Barnet. They don’t have runs of 1 win in 10, and they definitely don’t have two runs like that in a season. We are pretenders at the minute, not contenders. 

31 minutes ago, oafc1955 said:

If we could get back most of our outlay by selling Norwood in the summer would that be worth consideration?

We didn’t pay a fee, so we’d be reliant on someone paying fee to claw back his wages and I don’t see anyone paying a fee for him at this stage of his career. 

3 minutes ago, Frankly Mr Shankly said:

 

Nowhere near it?

Aye.

It’s better than last season, but being 5th in Feb isn’t close to promotion. 

1 hour ago, simplythemostimportantkick said:

Dead rubber. 

Yep, we need 4 wins, we won’t get 4 wins. So it’s a bit meh now. 
 

Just want the season over, so we can start again. 

14 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Did the current ownership bring him in or was he here before?

He was there before, which shows the youth team was producing players before Frank and co and they didn’t have to start again or wait years for the youth team to bear fruit. 
 

17 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Right. And? They've played against kids. I trust YT manager, Murray, Brabin and MM over BP

It’s not a competition and I wasn’t comparing BP to Mellon and Co, I just know he watches a lot of youth team football and has spoken highly of a couple- it would be nice if we could develop a couple. We’ll never know, if we never give them a go. 
 

19 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Found who?

One was Forshaw I think, and I can’t remember the other lads name. 
 

In your opinion- Do you think a profitable youth team is important for the club. Or do you think it’s just a nice to have? 
 

Personally I’d love to see some of our own come through and sold for profit- that hopefully would be re- invested in the first team. We can’t just rely on Frank pouring money in, the club needs to look at every avenue to make money. 

29 minutes ago, nzlatic said:

With the stats thing, it just boils down to how it's used. It doesn't mean it's wrong to have it. Royle introduced it which should in theory be a good thing, if it's not being used correctly then that's a human problem. Which is the recruitment team, whoever that is.

 

If you filled the gym with all the best equipment then had a trainer telling people the wrong way to use it, it's not the equipment that's at fault.

Yep- I’m not wedded to stats bomb either way. 
 

What’s important - (and it’s what I said earlier in the thread) is it a club thing where the manager has to work with it. Is it causing friction between DR and the manager? 
 

Everyone from top to bottom has to buy into the same process- as far as I can see we’ve got different ideas and objectives which is leading to muddled decision making with the squad. 

17 minutes ago, Ackey said:

All the best teams in the world are heavily stats based these days? There's no elite team winning a top-tier league in Europe without a sizable data department used for all kinds of things...?

Brad made a very interesting observation on the phone inn last night- only us and York use stats bomb and both clubs have seen big budgets blown on bloated underperforming squads. . . 
 

Matt speculated that he thought Mellon might be talking to the board- with ‘I know what a good player looks like’ 

Everything about the club barring the actual team performance is great, but it’s obvious with the size of the squad and its under performance that something isn’t right, and it’s a collective responsibility. 

1 minute ago, mcfluff1985 said:

People complaining not enough youth come through, conveniently forgetting how long it takes to bring the level of quality in an academy up

 

New ownership been here how long

How can you can state something as fact, when you have no idea how long it takes?  

We had a one player who got sold in the owners first season- where did he come from? Oh- the youth set up. 
 

According to BP we have at least one or two who at the very least could be in and around the first team and given some minutes. (In a side desperate for some pace and energy) 
 

How on earth have we found them in so little time under the owners. . ?? 
 

21 minutes ago, Worcester Owl said:

I don’t feel overwhelmingly impressed by Darren Royle’s tenure as CEO so far, as opposed to the magnificent support given by the Rothwells. Just on the subject of the youth team though, pathways into the first team and the fact that only Vaughan has come through recently, and then with only a few games in the first XI at that: I don’t see that Darren Royle is in any way to blame, unless we are suddenly going to start saying that the non-football guys should have influence over who is selected for the first team - in which case we’re back to the bad old days of the Chuckle Brothers. If Unsworth and Mellon don’t think youth team players are good enough for the first team, then by all means disagree but it’s their right to take that view and nobody on the board has any right to influence that. As for whether we got enough money for selling Vaughan, again, we’re a small club and in the end have to accept what another club is willing to pay.

It depends what he club is set up as or what it wants to be. 
 

When DR came in - he, in my opinion set up a vision, he talked about the youth set up, stats bomb, it gave the impression of a very detailed top to bottom analysis of what the club needed on the football side.

It felt like a Swansea/Brentford/Brighton/

Peterborough type- where the incumbent manager would be required to work within the parameters of what the club want. 
 

All good. 
 

In reality it has just become- back the manager with whatever he feels is necessary. That’s isn’t made up or guesswork that’s what has happened,  and we are left we an awfully imbalanced squad. The panacea being- two managers haven’t felt it necessary to sign a right back for a side aiming for promotion. (Freeman and Sav are stop gaps) Shouldn’t that alarm the club? Should they be sanctioning another midfielder or striker?? When we leave everything to the manager. . what are we left with??? 
 

In my opinion there is nothing wrong in saying to a manager please will you include one or two youth players in the set up on a regular basis, and try to blood them in lesser games so we can have a look. Kofi Moore has had a few minutes . . . that’s it. Not very good for a club who needs to maximise their youth set up. 
 

54 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

He does this. States stuff as absolute fact, when he can't know for sure it is. 

Still haven’t moved on. . .

6 minutes ago, nzlatic said:

So far, the weight of evidence is that those running the club are doing really well (infrastructure, plans for future development, paying the fucking bills! etc) and have the right intentions. Based on that, I’m happy to give more time and benefit of the doubt when it comes to that filtering through to what’s happening on the pitch.

Never in doubt. 
 

I said - the football operation alone. 
 

8 minutes ago, nzlatic said:

I’m not going to pull your post apart because you’ve just done the same again, made assumptions to fit your position and tried to pass it off as evidence you’re right. 

Stats bomb.
 

One youth player sold- without really playing for the first team- despite his performances being good enough. 
 

No other youth player in the first team- despite big proclamations. 
 

B team with Unsworth

No B team with Mellon. 

6 centre half’s 

12 midfielders 

8 strikers 

No right back.

One left back. 

None of that is made up. It’s either what DR has said, or what has happened. 
 

If you don’t think two years is enough time to asses someone’s suitably to the role- then fine, but I disagree. 
 

It won’t happen because he so intwined into the club, but Id like him to keep doing what he’s doing on everything bar the football decisions. 

2 hours ago, nzlatic said:

 

There's quite a bit of speculation in here. Comments above.

 

I'm not saying he's done a great job. But I'm not saying he's done a bad job. For starters I don't know for sure exactly what his remit is and on what criteria to judge him. But also, he's been in the role for less than 2 seasons.

 

Recruitment should have been better, particularly last summer. But it might be that this summer is where a lot of it will be addressed. Again, too early and not enough info to judge that he "shouldn't be anywhere near important footballing decisions".

1 hour ago, nzlatic said:

 

There's quite a bit of speculation in here. Comments above.

 

I'm not saying he's done a great job. But I'm not saying he's done a bad job. For starters I don't know for sure exactly what his remit is and on what criteria to judge him. But also, he's been in the role for less than 2 seasons.

 

Recruitment should have been better, particularly last summer. But it might be that this summer is where a lot of it will be addressed. Again, too early and not enough info to judge that he "shouldn't be anywhere near important footballing decisions".

You asked for examples- I gave you some. You can pull everything apart if that suits your narrative. (Not a dig) 

You come across online as someone who always, always wants to defend the club, by finding any multitude of reason for failure and/or mistakes. Which is fine when there is grey area. 
 

Places there isn’t grey area. 
 

The family are on record saying they won’t get involved with football decisions. I believe them- so if they aren’t doing it, who is?? Both Unsy and Mellon have said in interviews they are constantly on the phone to DR, so while I wasn’t in the room listening everything suggest from the family and managers that he is heavily involved in the football side. 
 

DR is on record as staying stats Bomb is highly effective tool for recruitment and we were one of only a few clubs to have it. If it’s been used - it’s been woeful. If it’s not been used, why have it in the first place. 
 

DR is on record as saying a B team is important (because Unsworth said it was) then it disappeared when Mellon arrived. Where is the oversight from the man making the footballing decisions or does he just go with what the manager says. . . 
 

DR is on record as saying the youth is vital to the health the club. Our only player to come through got sold cheaply, when it’s obvious that had he played more we would have potentially got a higher fee. If we did or not is irrelevant- are we giving them a pathway or not?? One player in two years, who hardly played is not what he said is vital to the club, and at interview I would fully expect him to tell the manager how important that is to the club. Instead, he folds and we just sign more strikers and more midfielders on long contacts. 
 

We haven’t had an established right back for two seasons- that is at best a mystery and at worse negligent. He can’t tell the manager who to sign but for someone who is in charge of footballing decisions- the facts tells us- he lets the managers sign who they want. 
 

What does in charge of football decisions mean? It means leaving the manager to do his job under the remit of which you agreed at the time of appointment. On both occasions it looks like DR and the board have said do what you like and we’ll back you. The facts not guesswork tell you that. Two years later and we extremely lopsided squad and our return for a fantastic budget is 12th and 9th. 
 

DR - (on the football side alone) has done a poor job. 

I know you’ll pull my post apart, so I’ll leave it there. 

5 minutes ago, Lee Sinnott said:

Been some very disappointing ones. Your best friend Pete G sums it up for me by pointing out the expensive recruitment over the last 18 months or so and us still calling on Gardner, Sheron, Fondop and McGahey to be key players...

Good to know. 
 

Maybe we could your best mate Curle in as sporting director? I know how much you love him- and he’s available. . 

3 minutes ago, LightDN123 said:

Whatever we have been doing for recruitment for the last 18 months, we need to be doing the complete opposite. 
 

If that means DR or whoever has to step away from recruitment, then do exactly that. 

Mellon should create the plan of how he wants his team to look and we should recruit to that. Just work to a pissing plan. Oh and buy a right back. 

 

Aye.
 

We were told 18 months ago there was a proper recruitment plan/strategy. . . It’s culminated in 56 strikers, 36 midfielders, and one left back

1 minute ago, Lee Sinnott said:

Pete G & League One Forever sitting in a tree...

Are you pleased with the footballing decisions?