The Blame Game

[arcadia]

Excellent post.

[Gloomy Gull]

I refer you to an ancient Arabian proverb which says "An army of sheep led by a lion would defeat an army of lions led by a sheep".

What we need is a LION !!! Didn't CH used to have a mane ??!! :}

[DevonYellow]

Hector is right. Attendances go up when the team is winning - and they stay up when they continue to win. The bottom line is that hardly any money was spent on players. A question (or scenario) that hasn't been address is this. Why weren't Olejnik and O'Kane offered higher wages so that they would stay? Why sell? Why not keep? The team prospers, the crowds - such as they are - return, and we get what all supporters want : promotion.

Didn't they both have release clauses though?

[Neal]

I've said pretty much everything I want to day on other threads but thought I would say this here as it's as good a place as any.

How, in the name of all that is good and holy, is anybody defending Alan Knill.

Those interested in stats would probably be interested to note that his win rate at our club for his entire time was, wait for it, a whole 18.52%!!!!

Yep, 18.52% - yet people are still finding ways to defend him.

He signed strikers that can't score, pacy wingers that can't cross, made substitutions when all was already lost, put out a team against our two neighbours and allowed us to be rogered senseless and made us worse off than we were when we took over.

He was/is a terrible manager - one can forgive him last season as it wasn't "his" team, but this season it is and we are worse off.

Nope, no defending from me - he was worse than useless and is, almost, wholly to blame for us going down this season.

Excellent post.

Knill was useless and has screwed this club up big time in that we have players contacted to us for next season who are not conference level even, thanks Alan. Enjoy your big payoff, and you landed another job straight away. Football really sucks sometimes, no it sucks most of the time for us fans.

[Fonda]

Yes, he 'landed another job straight away'. Weird that, with so many in the industry out of work for so long. Absolutely useless though, obviously.

[Scott Brehaut]

Yes, he 'landed another job straight away'. Weird that, with so many in the industry out of work for so long. Absolutely useless though, obviously.

As a manager, yes.

[hector]

As a manager, yes.

Totally, it's noticeable that Northampton weren't rushing to appoint this footballing genius as manager - especially after the wonderful job he did at Torquay and instead went for, you know, a manager who actually wins games.

[royalgull]

Knill
The people that hired Knill on a long term basis meaning its cost us to get rid of someone ridiculously incompetent
Knills signings and length of contracts dished out
Knill wasting most of our budget on said players leaving us top heavy with no defensive cover for a month where we lost just about every game
The loan signings have been generally dreadful
Waiting too long to dispense of Knill
Senior players not performing at all this year
Players attitudes.

There's an overview of why we're going down. I don't blame Hargreaves at all inherited a sinking ship with no leaders and no confidence who unlike him don't give a toss about the club.

He's managing Knills collection of losers, journeymen and kids and trying to turn them into winners, good luck mate.

We're stuck with these pricks for next year as well sucking the club dry as we get rolled by Woking and the like. Can't wait.

Somehow we need to find a leader to play next to Pearce who isn't just going to have 1 good game in 5, get us a left back who isn't immobile and can do a steady job, a midfield that always contains Chapell plus with a leader like Greavsie was and then a couple of forwards who actually score the odd goal. Like I said good luck Greavsie.

[Fonda]

Someone pointed out earlier that Hargreaves has actually made a few signings of his own too. But no, not his fault at all. Not a bad job that - a manager that has no responsibility for the team he manages. Does it follow that the wins at Wimbledon and Portsmouth were Knill's too? Because if he's still responsible for the defeats...

[Dave]

said it before and I'll keep saying it, the club was steered on a head long course towards the conference long before Alan Knill arrived , yes, ok, he may not have done the best job as our manager, but the blame is right here in this article, if the club had no money for players, where did this money come from.

http://www.torquayheraldexpress.co.uk/G ... story.html

[Sunnysideup]

said it before and I'll keep saying it, the club was steered on a head long course towards the conference long before Alan Knill arrived , yes, ok, he may not have done the best job as our manager, but the blame is right here in this article, if the club had no money for players, where did this money come from.

http://www.torquayheraldexpress.co.uk/G ... story.html

Maybe its something to do with the wage cap limiting what can be spent on the playing side?

[chippygull]

This doesn't help either...http://www.torquayheraldexpress.co.uk/T ... story.html

[Dave]

No it quite clearly doesn't, but why have the club posted £250k loss, take away the £200k spent on the white elephant (training ground)and the pay offs for ML + ST which to be honest I did agree with them leaving the club so cant be a hypocrite on that one, but take all those away and the £250k loss doesn't exist, and some more money to spend on the team would have been available.

Sunnyside, yep aware of wage caps but it still doesn't add up, as of March the 1st Rochdale's average home gate bearing in mind they have played more home games than us stands at 2,724, Torquay United's stands at 2,734 add in Rochdale's current form to their remaining games, they will secure a top 3 finish and gain promotion.

Then compare Dagenham's average gate March 1st which stands at 1,857 nearly 1000 less than ours, on their current form, they are looking at a final points total somewhere around 57-60 football league survival, as attendances are the main income driver for league 2 clubs , theirs one club working off a budget equal to ours and another working off some way less, one could be going up the other is staying up.

Difference, they've made better use of their small budgets than we have by some distance.

[ferrarilover]

Oh, Dave, please give up with this one. Any fool can see that your 'why don't we just blow a wad on the playing staff' line is not the answer, and ignoring it is taking more effort than I am able to muster.

Matt.

[Dave]

Matt, take the time to read what I did say, not what you think I did, what I said and have been saying is, if the club hadn't wasted so much money on the training ground , yes vital training, and looked at cheaper more viable options, the club could have spent more money on players.

You cant argue with hard facts, maybe your going to become a defence lawyer and using this for practise who knows, Rochdale have a lower average gate than us, simple, fact. They can only be in their position through knowing when to cut back and what on, and knowing when to spend and what on, something we as a club don't seem to know how to.