League 2 General Chat Thread

[GTFCfish]

Seems to be the same era I grew up watching football in. Bodin is probably most famous for that penalty miss for Wales against Romania, but for us, he scored the penalty that got us, for 1 season only, into the Premier League. He was a regular scorer as a roving left sided defender.

Unfortunately off the field we've just gone from one set of poor owners to another. The Andrew Black/Di Canio era was a lot of fun, but completely unsuitable and it's been a struggle since then. Oddly Lee Power, despite being an absolute crook knew what he was doing on the pitch and we had relative success under him. Since then it's been a race to the bottom.

There is a new supporters group been setup called 'spirit of 69' which is trying to get some support for protest to try and oust the current ownership. I can't see anything changing for a while so we have to hope we can stay up this season and work on getting new owners in that can take us forward. One thing is, it's never dull!

I can remember watching that Swindon - Leicester play off game

Nuts.

 

[leedsvaliant]

Seems to be the same era I grew up watching football in. Bodin is probably most famous for that penalty miss for Wales against Romania, but for us, he scored the penalty that got us, for 1 season only, into the Premier League. He was a regular scorer as a roving left sided defender.

Unfortunately off the field we've just gone from one set of poor owners to another. The Andrew Black/Di Canio era was a lot of fun, but completely unsuitable and it's been a struggle since then. Oddly Lee Power, despite being an absolute crook knew what he was doing on the pitch and we had relative success under him. Since then it's been a race to the bottom.

There is a new supporters group been setup called 'spirit of 69' which is trying to get some support for protest to try and oust the current ownership. I can't see anything changing for a while so we have to hope we can stay up this season and work on getting new owners in that can take us forward. One thing is, it's never dull!

What's happened to you since the playoff defeat? I was concerned about those games, because on paper you had a better squad and I thought you'd push on the following season. At the time, the fans seemed relatively happy with the owner (is it Clem?) and there was a feeling that with a couple of additional signings, you'd actually get promoted the following season.

Is it the same old story of owners unwilling (or unable) to give a sufficient budget? Or is it an owner who likes the status (like Smurthwaite) but actually doesn't give a stuff and will hold on until they make a profit out of a sale?

 

[valefan16]

What's happened to you since the playoff defeat? I was concerned about those games, because on paper you had a better squad and I thought you'd push on the following season. At the time, the fans seemed relatively happy with the owner (is it Clem?) and there was a feeling that with a couple of additional signings, you'd actually get promoted the following season.

Is it the same old story of owners unwilling (or unable) to give a sufficient budget? Or is it an owner who likes the status (like Smurthwaite) but actually doesn't give a stuff and will hold on until they make a profit out of a sale?

We had 4 really good games with them, lost 2 won 2 that season but they played some good stuff in the league game at VP before Mad Cov pretty much threw any chance we had away!

I expected them to really push on after that play off night and was surprised to see they'd struggled since.

 

[Agombar stool]

I can remember watching that Swindon - Leicester play off game

Nuts.

IIRC it was on a bank Holiday (in England) but we lived in Scotland so I was at school. I sprinted home at 4 o clock, whacked on Ceefax and was horrified to see we had thrown away a 3-0 lead. I listened to extra time on my radio I had in my room but the signal for Radio 5 was shockingly bad so ended up refreshing ceefax again!

Kids nowadays don't know they are born!

 

[Si Robin]

I watched our first promotion to the Football League on Ceefax in 1999. We were at home, but I lived just outside Gloucester and was only 14, so wasn't allowed to go to an evening game on my own. I can't recall if it was on Radio Gloucestershire or not, so I just sat there refreshing Ceefax on the telly in my aunt and uncle's room (I was raised by my aunt and uncle). It was gone 10 when it refreshed to show we'd scored the winner.

 

[valefan16]

IIRC it was on a bank Holiday (in England) but we lived in Scotland so I was at school. I sprinted home at 4 o clock, whacked on Ceefax and was horrified to see we had thrown away a 3-0 lead. I listened to extra time on my radio I had in my room but the signal for Radio 5 was shockingly bad so ended up refreshing ceefax again!

Kids nowadays don't know they are born!

Yeah it was always Whitsun Bank Holiday end of May, with most of my family and mates being Leicester at that time they generally used to seem to be in that final every season! (4 in 5) with a relegation from the top flight in between! Proper yo-yo side at the time under Brian Little and Mark McGhee.

 

[Agombar stool]

What's happened to you since the playoff defeat? I was concerned about those games, because on paper you had a better squad and I thought you'd push on the following season. At the time, the fans seemed relatively happy with the owner (is it Clem?) and there was a feeling that with a couple of additional signings, you'd actually get promoted the following season.

Is it the same old story of owners unwilling (or unable) to give a sufficient budget? Or is it an owner who likes the status (like Smurthwaite) but actually doesn't give a stuff and will hold on until they make a profit out of a sale?

Way too long to go into really, but that play-off season was magical. The season began with the takeover and we had 6 players registered. We brought in the liked of Jonny Williams, McKirdy etc and whilst many Town fans expected us to struggle, we hit the ground running and we were a penalty kick away from Wembley.

Even since then it's been down down deeper and down. Garner and Chorley, who were an excellent team left (i think Chorley was probably the real brains behind the operation) and its been piss and panic ever since. Seemingly nothing the owner does has any real footballing merit to it. The managerial appointments (who knew Scott Lindsay was actually a good football manager) haven't worked, the footballing operation seems to be based on guesswork (although oddly our youth team is very good) and we just don't have the proper footballing people in place and the business appears to be run, badly.

There are rumours of shady people involved in the background skimming money out of the business, for example we applied for Zav Austin to be our Vice-Chairman but he failed the fit and proper test because he's a convicted criminal yet still appears regularly as a matchday guest. He is not alone. You could probably write a book about it, but hopefully you get the gist.