League 2 Relegation Thread 2018/2019

[TrinidadsNumberOne]

That was one mental season. Ironically we pretty much sentenced Lincoln to relegation with one of the most pathetic last day efforts at Barnet... Grew blew his nut at the lack of professionalism and wanted to force them to train the following week as punishment... as for us that was one odd season...

Under Micky Adams we were flying up until December we were swapping top spot with Chesterfield and had a crazily good defensive record... then got beat by Morecambe despite battering them and Micky went to the Blades at Xmas with a horror Xmas seeing us lose 3-0 at Gills and 5-0 at Rotherham... in steps Jim Gannon... even by Vale terms that was one weird spell.

Played his first league game at Gresty Road, ditches some of the squad who’d got us top end and randomly played one of the youth teamers... can’t for the life of me remember his name and he never featured again, don’t even think he ever played professionally again! Lost and of course that didn’t really get the fans on side.

Then after patchy form leaks come out that he’d lost the dressing room and stories of them watching DVDs rather than training of tactics etc. Before the infamous Aldershot away trip... Horsfield and Gannon had a scrap the players allegedly cheering on The Horse, Gannon gets off and goes home!

A horror show at Accrington finally ended his time with fans fighting with Exodus Geoghagon with racist claims from Exodus.

Eventually we just missed out on the play offs, randomly once we couldn’t make them absolutely dick Morecambe 7-2 and soon after Micky gets sacked at the Blunts and comes back to Vale to eventually complete the job two years later than it arguably should have been done!

A book was even written about that Vale season!

Was truly nuts. I mainly recall Lincoln from that season as playing against us in the England 2008 away kit with a Lincoln badge on it mind! These being the days when they had about 100 fans in the away end of course.

The Vale's season that year was spectacularly funny and topped off our own weird season that's for sure. 2007-2013 genuinely was one giant soap opera for you lot. I suppose Radio Stoke needed someone else to take up the mantle after the Stoke City banter years came to an end around 2007 and then we took the mantle off you lot for a couple of years from 2013!

Our season was also strange but for very different reasons. We lost to two relegation candidates in Hereford and Cheltenham immediately before going on a strange 10 match unbeaten run. We had to play an away game at Stevenage in Stevenage's away kit because we didn't create a third kit. We turned over Barnet 7-0, humiliated a Bury side who'd later be promoted 3-0, drew a bonkers game with Torquay 3-3 and drew 5-5 with Chesterfield despite being 3-0 up after 12 minutes, 4-1 up at half time and 5-3 up when the fourth officials board went up! Naturally we'd lose two local games against Vale and Shrewsbury in 3 days but we'd get both back in January and we were 3rd in the league after a win against Bradford in late January.

That Bradford game however was the game our hopes of promotion well and truly died. Clayton Donaldson got a 3 match ban after being wound up by one of their lads that he lashed out and Shaun Miller would then get injured for a month at Northampton in a bonkers game we lost 6-2. With Dario not wanting to use the loan market we persisted with a goal shy Byron Moore, a disinterested Joel Grant and an unfit Ajay Leitch-Smith as our strikers, with Ajay being the only natural centre forward. Even worse, Dario would refuse to drop Lee Bell which caused the similarly defensively minded Ashley Westwood to regress and Luke Murphy to be ineffective on the wing. Add to the fact we had a dodgy keeper in Rhys Taylor who cost us points and we suddenly found ourselves in the shit when we lost 11 straight away games. Despite tonking Cheltenham 8-1 and Bradford 5-1 in the run in, and despite beating all the top 3 to nil quite comfortably at home that season, and despite scoring 87 league goals that season, we finished 10th, and one win would've got us into the playoffs. I genuinely think had we gone up that season, we may have been a lot better off as a club than we are today, as the likes of Powell, Clayton, Westwood and Murphy would've all developed at League One level and been sold for bigger fees than they all went for.

Really never knew a season like that one though. Us being top scorers and not getting promoted. Accrington, Stevenage and Gillingham seemingly coming out of nowhere to threaten the playoffs. There were some absolutely ridiculous results that season where defending went out of the window. Cheltenham, Lincoln and Northampton absolutely nosedived from playoff contenders to relegation candidates with the Imps going down. The Vale soap opera. Ronnie Moore getting sacked for saying if he had a gun he'd shoot his players after losing 5-0 to Chesterfield on Sky. Burton having 8 games in hand at one point. Wycombe securing a tainted promotion after Ainsworth's ghost goal against promotion rivals Shrewsbury. Shrewsbury failing to add a clause in Jake Robinson's loan which meant Torquay played him against them and he ran riot against them in an act which would cost the Shrews automatic promotion as well as Torquay beating them in the playoffs and of course Barnet's late rally to survive. It truly was a ridiculous season and I don't think we'll ever have another one like it again!

 

[LondonOrn]

Yes, looking back at it 2010/11 was an amazing season, not just in League 2 but in all five divisions from the Premier League down to the Conference. As you say TrinidadsNumberOne, it was a season where teams either went on incredible runs or collapses, or spectacularly over (Norwich, Exeter, Rochdale, Accrington) or under-achieved (both Sheffield teams, Swindon, Stockport). You have that epic Premier League end-of-season relegation tussle, with drama and twists and turns only rivalled in subsequent years by the Championship final day relegation showdown two years later, long-time top flight absentees QPR and Swansea getting promoted to the first tier, newly promoted Norwich pipping favourites Cardiff for automatic promotion to achieve their second successive promotion to the PL, Huddersfield going on an incredible long beaten run but not quite being able to catch Southampton before folding like a pack of cards in the play-off final to a Peterborough side that scored a massive 106 goals but had a defence second in leakiness only to relegated Bristol Rovers, Swindon's bizarre season-long collapse from League 1 play-off finalists to rock bottom, Dagenham & Redbridge bottling a colossal opportunity to secure the biggest achievement in their history in being relegated from League 1 from a seemingly unassailable position, to name but a few.

It was a season also where there were goals galore at either end, especially in the Championship and League 1. Even Watford, enjoying their usual lower midtable season in the Championship, were more entertaining than in most of its kind, with only Norwich and Leeds scoring more goals, but with the worst defence outside the bottom 4, only Leeds had more goals in their games than us. At times we looked like possible promotion contenders, beating Norwich at their place on the opening day, winning six league games in a row during the first half of the winter of 2010/11, including smashing promotion candidates QPR and Cardiff in close succession, to leave us 6th and just 4 points from the automatics in mid-January, but we just didn't have the consistency and depth to keep it up. Only the top end of the PL and the play-off finals disappointed, but at least we had one cracker in Swansea beating 4-2 in the Championship final and most neutrals had the pleasure of seeing AFC Wimbledon continue their fairytale rise up the pyramid (and us Watford fans the amusement of seeing our beloved rivals bottle yet another play-off campaign) when they beat Luton on penalties to get promoted to the League. Amazing we had that season after one of the drabbest World Cups and most disappointing England performances in a major tournament I can remember.

 

[Devon_Lad]

Notts C aren't going down now, I'm fairly confident.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

I hope you’re right DL, alas the bookies don’t share your confidence and have us as firm favourites for relegation..... 1/2 in fact.

If you are going to have a bet I’d suggest you wait till after Saturday’s likely defeat

 

[MrGloverLover]

Even with our superior goal difference we've got to be favourites for the drop. If there is no change to the current management set-up we have no chance of surviving.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

Not even close , 4th favourites and a healthy 4/1 odds

 

[MrGloverLover]

Not even close , 4th favourites and a healthy 4/1 odds

That's ridiculous, lump your money on us.

 

[Devon_Lad]

I hope you’re right DL, alas the bookies don’t share your confidence and have us as firm favourites for relegation..... 1/2 in fact.

If you are going to have a bet I’d suggest you wait till after Saturday’s likely defeat

You were 1/5 last time I looked a couple weeks ago so not too bad...

 

[valefan16]

That's ridiculous, lump your money on us.

We are best money for the drop... as much as 16/1 down to as low as 9/1 but worth a tenner that!

 

[Devon_Lad]

We are best money for the drop... as much as 16/1 down to as low as 9/1 but worth a tenner that!

Wasted tenner. Macc and Morecambe are going down

 

[Enzo Scifo's Right Foot]

Vale will be absolutely fine . Only need a dozen points from now on in

 

[SVH]

So what is the magic points for this season? 42, 45 or 50?

I would say 45 points will see survival this season as all the teams at the bottom seem to be playing each over in the next 6 weeks.

 

[Semi-skimmed Silk]

Up until Boxing Day I was still confident Notts County would sort themselves out and be space with the quality they had, and were capable of bringing in. Then got convinced by their results and own fans' postings that they might actually be doomed, but seems like they have recruited (and replaced) well over January and now might be capable of going on runs of win to see them safe based on their performance at the weekend.

We've just got to hope that the teams above us keep losing over the next few games so we can stay in touch.

 

[valefan16]

So what is the magic points for this season? 42, 45 or 50?

I would say 45 points will see survival this season as all the teams at the bottom seem to be playing each over in the next 6 weeks.

Hard to say, 46 didn't look like being required last season until Barnet had a mad dog inspired run at the end so you never know.

I can't imagine it being as high as 50 for example though. Morecambe getting six/seven wins or Yeovil getting 6 wins seems unlikely in 15/16 games, Macclesfield need to win half their 14 games to achieve 49 and add a draw in. Notts County may fancy 50 points but still a big ask.

45-46 should do it... I am targeting 4 wins for Vale to be safe (45 points plus the odd draw here and there) but even 3 wins and 4 draws would probably do it.

 

[Buxton Vale]

So what is the magic points for this season? 42, 45 or 50?

I would say 45 points will see survival this season as all the teams at the bottom seem to be playing each over in the next 6 weeks.

Im aiming for 48 which is 4 more wins and three draws in our case. If we cant manage that then we deserve to drop.

 

[Buxton Vale]

We are best money for the drop... as much as 16/1 down to as low as 9/1 but worth a tenner that!

agreed. We have no goals in us.

 

[EricSabin]

4 points from Tranmere away and Lincoln away has kept us away from real involvement in this thread thank fuck. Crawley at home Satdee

 

[Enzo Scifo's Right Foot]

Trust me Notts fans do not fancy 50 points !!! We’re on 25 after 31 games !!!

 

[Devon_Lad]

Trust me Notts fans do not fancy 50 points !!! We’re on 25 after 31 games !!!

You'll get a 3-4 run win streak and it'll look a doddle soon.

 

[Enzo Scifo's Right Foot]

You'll get a 3-4 run win streak and it'll look a doddle soon.

I don’t know who you are or what you know but I hope you are right . We can’t have any more awful runs from now on in or the gap to safety will never close . Bad times

 

[ShrimpsMeltdown]

Vale will find their goals again on Saturday, trust me.

 

[King Kev]

That was one mental season. Ironically we pretty much sentenced Lincoln to relegation with one of the most pathetic last day efforts at Barnet... Grew blew his nut at the lack of professionalism and wanted to force them to train the following week as punishment... as for us that was one odd season...

Under Micky Adams we were flying up until December we were swapping top spot with Chesterfield and had a crazily good defensive record... then got beat by Morecambe despite battering them and Micky went to the Blades at Xmas with a horror Xmas seeing us lose 3-0 at Gills and 5-0 at Rotherham... in steps Jim Gannon... even by Vale terms that was one weird spell.

Played his first league game at Gresty Road, ditches some of the squad who’d got us top end and randomly played one of the youth teamers... can’t for the life of me remember his name and he never featured again, don’t even think he ever played professionally again! Lost and of course that didn’t really get the fans on side.

Then after patchy form leaks come out that he’d lost the dressing room and stories of them watching DVDs rather than training of tactics etc. Before the infamous Aldershot away trip... Horsfield and Gannon had a scrap the players allegedly cheering on The Horse, Gannon gets off and goes home!

A horror show at Accrington finally ended his time with fans fighting with Exodus Geoghagon with racist claims from Exodus.

Eventually we just missed out on the play offs, randomly once we couldn’t make them absolutely dick Morecambe 7-2 and soon after Micky gets sacked at the Blunts and comes back to Vale to eventually complete the job two years later than it arguably should have been done!

A book was even written about that Vale season!

Was truly nuts. I mainly recall Lincoln from that season as playing against us in the England 2008 away kit with a Lincoln badge on it mind! These being the days when they had about 100 fans in the away end of course.

Awaits a Stockport fan to appear and tell you that Gannon was not to blame and is in fact the world's greatest manager.

 

[King Kev]

The Vale's season that year was spectacularly funny and topped off our own weird season that's for sure. 2007-2013 genuinely was one giant soap opera for you lot. I suppose Radio Stoke needed someone else to take up the mantle after the Stoke City banter years came to an end around 2007 and then we took the mantle off you lot for a couple of years from 2013!

Our season was also strange but for very different reasons. We lost to two relegation candidates in Hereford and Cheltenham immediately before going on a strange 10 match unbeaten run. We had to play an away game at Stevenage in Stevenage's away kit because we didn't create a third kit. We turned over Barnet 7-0, humiliated a Bury side who'd later be promoted 3-0, drew a bonkers game with Torquay 3-3 and drew 5-5 with Chesterfield despite being 3-0 up after 12 minutes, 4-1 up at half time and 5-3 up when the fourth officials board went up! Naturally we'd lose two local games against Vale and Shrewsbury in 3 days but we'd get both back in January and we were 3rd in the league after a win against Bradford in late January.

That Bradford game however was the game our hopes of promotion well and truly died. Clayton Donaldson got a 3 match ban after being wound up by one of their lads that he lashed out and Shaun Miller would then get injured for a month at Northampton in a bonkers game we lost 6-2. With Dario not wanting to use the loan market we persisted with a goal shy Byron Moore, a disinterested Joel Grant and an unfit Ajay Leitch-Smith as our strikers, with Ajay being the only natural centre forward. Even worse, Dario would refuse to drop Lee Bell which caused the similarly defensively minded Ashley Westwood to regress and Luke Murphy to be ineffective on the wing. Add to the fact we had a dodgy keeper in Rhys Taylor who cost us points and we suddenly found ourselves in the shit when we lost 11 straight away games. Despite tonking Cheltenham 8-1 and Bradford 5-1 in the run in, and despite beating all the top 3 to nil quite comfortably at home that season, and despite scoring 87 league goals that season, we finished 10th, and one win would've got us into the playoffs. I genuinely think had we gone up that season, we may have been a lot better off as a club than we are today, as the likes of Powell, Clayton, Westwood and Murphy would've all developed at League One level and been sold for bigger fees than they all went for.

Really never knew a season like that one though. Us being top scorers and not getting promoted. Accrington, Stevenage and Gillingham seemingly coming out of nowhere to threaten the playoffs. There were some absolutely ridiculous results that season where defending went out of the window. Cheltenham, Lincoln and Northampton absolutely nosedived from playoff contenders to relegation candidates with the Imps going down. The Vale soap opera. Ronnie Moore getting sacked for saying if he had a gun he'd shoot his players after losing 5-0 to Chesterfield on Sky. Burton having 8 games in hand at one point. Wycombe securing a tainted promotion after Ainsworth's ghost goal against promotion rivals Shrewsbury. Shrewsbury failing to add a clause in Jake Robinson's loan which meant Torquay played him against them and he ran riot against them in an act which would cost the Shrews automatic promotion as well as Torquay beating them in the playoffs and of course Barnet's late rally to survive. It truly was a ridiculous season and I don't think we'll ever have another one like it again!

We were quite strong that season, but Alan Knill had no bottle whatsoever and had he not left with eight games left to take over at Scunthorpe we'd have not gone up. Shortly before he left we lost 2-1 at home to Torquay then 3-2 at home to Cheltenham, a team 15 games without a win. After beating us Cheltenham won one more game that season. Stockport also some how did the double over us. They came into the fixture at Gigg Lane on the back of two 0-5 defeats and we barely mustered a shot on goal against them. The game at EP they had no manager and were ten games without a win, they beat us 2-1, they followed that win up with a 4-1 defeat at home to Macc. Crazy! But games like that were always our achilles heel under Knill.

To add to the oddness of that season the playoff final was at Old Trafford and Buckle, if memory serves, made absolutely no attempt to win the game. Not even making a sub as his Torquay team trailed in the dying minutes. I think he'd already agreed to join Bristol Rovers and evidently he didn't give a stuff about his current employers or the supporters.

 

[Vanni]

Apparently Bryn the police dog was their saviour (google that if you don't know what I'm talking about), but I'm not sure I buy that. It's true that the dog attack caused more injury time than would have otherwise been awarded, but Torquay played exactly the same amount of football that they would have had it not been for the dog (that's what injury time is about), so I'm not sure it made any difference.

I did come across something about this once (I think it was on The Guardian website) but I don't think I had watched the match footage before. That injury time Torquay goal sure looks dodgy I reckon. I believe you know what I mean

 

[shoddycollins]

Yes, and at one point well past the halfway season I remember they were actually above Stevenage, who went on a great run to not only reach the play-offs but win them in their first season in the league, and then the next season as pre-season relegation favourites they nearly won a third successive promotion, while Lincoln nearly did a York the same season. Funny how rapidly clubs' fortunes can diverge in football...

Not quite the same, but that kind of thing reminds me of when we were relegated from League One. Our last game was against Wolves, who were promoted as champions. Our very next game, at the beginning of our first season back in League Two was against Luton who had been playing Hyde FC while we were playing Wolves.

Wolves meanwhile played Norwich while we were playing Luton. Norwich's last game of the previous season had been against Arsenal.

 

[darren gregory]

I know stats are sometimes meaningless and Exeter confound this table by being in the play-offs.
But 3 of the worst 6 for shots on target are bottom of their respective divisions.
No surprise to see Vale amongst the shittest.

Fewest shots on-target per-game (EFL):

2.55 Ipswich
2.71 Bolton
3.13 Wimbledon
3.30 Blackpool
3.31 Stevenage
3.45 Notts County
3.48 Wigan
3.52 Stoke
3.53 Millwall
3.58 Exeter
3.66 Grimsby
3.68 Hull
3.68 Port Vale

*per-game averages

 

[Crewelad87]

I know stats are sometimes meaningless and Exeter confound this table by being in the play-offs.
But 3 of the worst 6 for shots on target are bottom of their respective divisions.
No surprise to see Vale amongst the shittest.

Fewest shots on-target per-game (EFL):

2.55 Ipswich
2.71 Bolton
3.13 Wimbledon
3.30 Blackpool
3.31 Stevenage
3.45 Notts County
3.48 Wigan
3.52 Stoke
3.53 Millwall
3.58 Exeter
3.66 Grimsby
3.68 Hull
3.68 Port Vale

*per-game averages

It's bleak in the city of Stoke-on-Trent

 

[darren gregory]

It's bleak in the city of Stoke-on-Trent

You're not wrong.
Whats the saying if you don't buy a ticket etc etc,, so basically if you don't shoot on target you won't score.

I'd of expected us to be the worst in League 2 , to come 5th is brilliant

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

I don’t know who you are or what you know but I hope you are right . We can’t have any more awful runs from now on in or the gap to safety will never close . Bad times

Might be getting ahead of meself, but could be out of the relegation zone in precisely 8 days.

 

[Andy Proctor]

That was one mental season. Ironically we pretty much sentenced Lincoln to relegation with one of the most pathetic last day efforts at Barnet... Grew blew his nut at the lack of professionalism and wanted to force them to train the following week as punishment... as for us that was one odd season...

Under Micky Adams we were flying up until December we were swapping top spot with Chesterfield and had a crazily good defensive record... then got beat by Morecambe despite battering them and Micky went to the Blades at Xmas with a horror Xmas seeing us lose 3-0 at Gills and 5-0 at Rotherham... in steps Jim Gannon... even by Vale terms that was one weird spell.

Played his first league game at Gresty Road, ditches some of the squad who’d got us top end and randomly played one of the youth teamers... can’t for the life of me remember his name and he never featured again, don’t even think he ever played professionally again! Lost and of course that didn’t really get the fans on side.

Then after patchy form leaks come out that he’d lost the dressing room and stories of them watching DVDs rather than training of tactics etc. Before the infamous Aldershot away trip... Horsfield and Gannon had a scrap the players allegedly cheering on The Horse, Gannon gets off and goes home!

A horror show at Accrington finally ended his time with fans fighting with Exodus Geoghagon with racist claims from Exodus.

Eventually we just missed out on the play offs, randomly once we couldn’t make them absolutely dick Morecambe 7-2 and soon after Micky gets sacked at the Blunts and comes back to Vale to eventually complete the job two years later than it arguably should have been done!

A book was even written about that Vale season!

Was truly nuts. I mainly recall Lincoln from that season as playing against us in the England 2008 away kit with a Lincoln badge on it mind! These being the days when they had about 100 fans in the away end of course.

It was Kristian cox