Paul Hurst

The interesting thing about the naysayers when it comes to Hurst is that they often fail to provide an actual reason as to why they don’t think he’s very good…

Hurst is one promotion away from being the best town manager ever. Lord Buckley will always be the Lord, all clubs have a manager like that but Hurst has taken Town from the abyss twice. I know some will point to a relegation but anyone with half a brain knee we were down well before Hurst came back.

People often try and say he’s too pragmatic or sometimes negative but then fail to recognise games like last night or Wrexham, Chesterfield etc. all games where we took it to teams and won, deservedly so.

The club is rising again and whilst we may have to settle for consolidation in the league, a great cup run has been something unseen for many a year and financially puts us in a good position…

He has got 2 promotions from the conference for us and now this excellent cup run.

Another promotion to L1 and he will equal Sir Alan get us into the championship and he will be Sir Paul best manager by far when you factor all the trips to Wembley into the equation.

After all the years under Fenty it's just great having the feel good feeling in the club and the fans.

Not only Paul but we have to thank Jason and Anthony for making it happen.

Now Wrexham are out the cup we might get a bit of coverage on TV and in the press saying what a well run club we are.

Hurst has had to operate in the post Bosman era so literally has had to build a new team every season, sometimes more than once. Buckley brought some great players when he first came but had the luxury of being able to keep them for years or sell them for large sums. He kept signing the same set of players all his career and was never very good at bringing in new ones after that first group.

Buckley was able to pluck the best players from non league because he knew about them. You had to travel to games to watch players. Technology was non existent. Now everybody has access to the same information and low hanging fruit are much harder to find.

Finally the standard. League 2/Division 4 used to be the bottom of the professional game. Now 22 out of 24 teams in the National League are full time and many teams in the levels below too. The standard is vastly higher at our level than it was in the 80s and 90s.

Hurst has built multiple great teams. We have been in so many finals and had a few cup runs. He did brilliantly at Shrewsbury as well. True greatness is to be able to repeat and better your great achievements. Every Beethoven symphony was better than the previous one.

He's "us" best ever manager.

I spoke with my mate last night and he made a very very good point. We've not finished higher than 14th since 2006 season. Factor in the playoffs last year, this season's cup run, the feel good factor with new owners. If Hurst finishes 13th that is absolute progress given where we have been for almost 2 decades.

Let's not forget the new squad hes had to put together this season. Like the owners, improve day by day, slowly week by week. We know football is a results business, but I for one am pleased how the board didn't jump to rasu decisions when we went on that terrible run in NL, and this season without an away win in 3 months.

There's plenty to know about Hurst based on last night and his time with us, when you quantify it the passage you could write is quite long winded.

We've just beaten a really good side in the cup and face a difficult league game on Saturday, where all 3 goal scorers from the previous league game can come in alongside a right back who is a level above what we have, that's building a squad which is what really good managers do.

In Hurst we trust, what's more important is that in Hurst the players trust.

In all seriouness, i fully expected a 4-0 defeat at Luton.
We played superb, and got what we deserved.
I fully expected a 3-0 defeat last night.... instead, they all became hero's and will be remembered for a long time, including PH who deserves all the plaudits he's getting.

Let's not forget this when we lose our next league game.

However, it was still a horrible transfer window  

I think Buckley still edges it for me (at the moment) due to the sheer quality of the football we played back in his first two spells at the club. However, I don't think Buckleyball has been possible in the modern era for lower division clubs. The newer generations of players have been getting bigger than their predecessors, sports science improvements have led them to become faster and fitter and there just isn't the space to play the sort of  expansive Buckley-style football we used to enjoy. The top level players are skilful enough to play the game to an incredible standard, the lower divisions play a hard and fast game where time on the ball is at a premium.

I'm encouraged that Hurst wants his teams to play decent football but we have to be pragmatic as well and realise that long throws and set pieces have a big role to play as Maher showed last night.

After two good 3-0 victories in a week, with greatly-changed teams, let's hope we've got the confidence to repeat it at the weekend and try to push our way up the table.

Quoted from aldi_01

Hurst is one promotion away from being the best town manager ever. Lord Buckley will always be the Lord, all clubs have a manager like that but Hurst has taken Town from the abyss twice. I know some will point to a relegation but anyone with half a brain knew we were down well before Hurst came back.

I'm convinced if we'd had another 4 matches that season, Scunny would've gone down instead of us.

At half time in that Exeter match we were safe and sunny down.

Pondering who is the best? Tough choice, but a great dilemma to have!

I am sure other clubs will be looking at Hurst now, and I hope that the new owners, and the new funds, will mean that we can keep him. I firmly believe he can get us into League one within the next couple of years.