How Far Have We Come..........

Lets sit in judgement when the season is over.Town's season is far from over!W e are not where we would like to be at the moment and one or two things have happened of late which may seem confusing looking in without the full facts but I do believe PH and his staff are doing their best and that our season will have a satisfactory conclusion.So its BP on Saturday  and Bromley on Tuesday for me.UTM.

Read all the posts some good some bad, I just don't like the bloke,already he seems to be playing the card that the squad is thin ect ect, whose fault is that Paul.
Good man management not at all, as someone said, podge was left out because he felt he needed a partner for Omar who came I suppose with a big fee and a huge reputation, Az, Neilson, Cook, Brown ...............
Then his in match tactics, has anybody seen him make a change that was tactically good?
Always falls short for me, where did the fund raising go by the way ?

Podge was left out and came back a better player. This line of "ruining forwards" is so so repetitive and completely untrue

Quoted from Fan

Read all the posts some good some bad, I just don't like the bloke,already he seems to be playing the card that the squad is thin ect ect, whose fault is that Paul.
Good man management not at all, as someone said, podge was left out because he felt he needed a partner for Omar who came I suppose with a big fee and a huge reputation, Az, Neilson, Cook, Brown ...............
Then his in match tactics, has anybody seen him make a change that was tactically good?
Always falls short for me, where did the fund raising go by the way ?

I wouldn't want any of them back.

Wish we were playing a league match instead of the FA Trophy. We need to get back in the grove fast the momentum was good up to the Gateshead match.

Quoted from LookBackInAngers

Lets sit in judgement when the season is over.Town's season is far from over!W e are not where we would like to be at the moment and one or two things have happened of late which may seem confusing looking in without the full facts but I do believe PH and his staff are doing their best and that our season will have a satisfactory conclusion.So its BP on Saturday  and Bromley on Tuesday for me.UTM.

What should we do then? Say nowt and just carry on?

Not the way I work I'm afraid, I'm entitled to say my piece on a forum, just as you have done.

You look at the players we have in each position and it looks like a very strong squad for this league. Is it the strongest? The current table suggests it isn't but I believe it should be a lot closer to the top if not top.

When I look back to all the positivity at the start of the season, the way the fans got behind the team after the play-off final defeat, operation promotion, the season ticket sales, the signing of Bogle. It looked like our best chance for years. We had kept most of the team that so narrowly missed out the previous season and added some quality additions to the squad.

The fixture list was kind to us at the beginning of the season. We had the perfect opportunity to start fast and put down a statement of intent. We could easily have had FGR's start to the season given our early fixtures. But we messed it up. By the time we were defeated at home by Cheltenham and looking at who we had dropped points to, it always looked like automatic promotion was a big ask.

Is this is down to the manager? He is manager of one of the biggest clubs in this league with one of the biggest budgets, play-offs should be the minimum, our title ambitions shouldn't be, realistically, over in January.

It's one of the few clubs in this league that can attract players who've had offers from League clubs. People say PH has an eye for a good player, which is a fair point but it will be easier for him to entice a player to come here than most in this league. So he gets good players for this standard and he gets them to play in the way he believes we should play.

That is fine but the problem comes when his way is not working. This is what separates the good managers from the average. Too often when his way is not working he does very little to change things IMO and on the few occasions he does, he does it far too late. Take the Cheltenham game, IMO we were in charge of the first 30-40 minutes of that match. Gary Johnson realised this and altered his team set up. Cheltenham then stopped our attacks down the flanks, took control of the middle of the park and ran out deserved winners. Hurst didn't react at all. This is where the good managers earn their pay, how they win those tight games they really had no right to. FGR have done that recently too but far, far too often in a tight game, we drop points.

Look at our season to date. 5-0's, 4-0's 4-1's even a 7-0. When Hurst's way works it all looks good but he has to learn to be adaptable in his tactics when they aren't going so well.

So have we progressed under him? The players we have are better than previous seasons IMO but that isn't being reflected in the League table.

For me, under PH, the only way we will go up is by having by far the best squad of players, for this League, that we'll probably win it comfortably. While we only have 'one of the best' I don't think PH has that ability the better managers have to win a tight title fight. At least, he hasn't shown he has, so far.

^^^^ great post imo ^^^^

I think it's quite widely debated that even with the Operation Promotion money our budget still isn't even close to the top 3 of this league.    You only have to look at the sheer scale of losses that FGR are absorbing to be aware of that.  Then also look at the names Eastleigh were trying to sign last month to further realise what we're competing against.

This idea that we should be champions just because we're Grimsby, we were top of the Championship for a day in 2001 and we raised £100,000 in the summer - where exactly has it come from?  

Like it not, we're one of the bigger clubs in this league with a better history than anyone else.  That's it.   We're not the big fish.  We're not the dominant force, we're not the money bags side and we definitely don't have any god given right to be top of the table.  Our history counts for nothing.

I'm not keen to get involved in this Hurst in/Hurst out argument but Hurst has made us consistently competitive over the last 3/4 seasons despite us not having the biggest budget in the league.  I know this won't please a lot of people but if Fenty has at any point said to Hurst 'your target is promotion, nothing else will do' then it's an unfair target.  Yes, that hurts me too to see my proud club settling for a play-off place in the fifth flipping tier of English football.  But that's the reality of it.  If we've got the fifth best budget in the league then anything other than fifth is a major achievement.  You can also add to the situation the hindrance of our location.  Hurst does very well to attract players here in an economy of one-year deals and no guaranteed renewals.  

How far have we come?  Year on year I think we've improved under Hurst, maybe not as much as we would have liked but this side would beat the side from 3 years ago comfortably.  Will that be enough to keep Hurst in a job if we're still a Conference side next season?  I don't know.  Personally I like the work he's doing here and wouldn't be jumping up and down for him to go, but I can understand the growing frustration.  

You are misinterpreting most post diehard.

I never said we had the biggest budget. Yes, FGR & Eastleigh seem to have heavy investor's and may have the most money because of that in this League. But we have a comparable budget with the best of the rest. My statement that we have one of the biggest budgets in the league is correct.

I don't think we should be Champions because we are Grimsby either but we should be putting up more of a challenge  than we are because we ARE one of the biggest clubs in this League.

Neither did I call for PH's head, it was just a balanced view on his achievements which I don't believe are better than average. We should be finishing in the top 5 consistently because we are one of the biggest 5 clubs in this league. That should also be your minimum expectation as a Grimsby Town FC fan. I couldn't understand a fan who's expectations were less.