I've stood back from the lava of vitriol for a while. It takes us round in circles.

My point is a different one. Once again, Hill, the Rochdale manager, was quoted as saying how much he admired what we had going on here at Crewe, with the Alex in a situation that he clearly envied.

He did not indulge in the facile triumphalism of "Can we play you every week?", but to my mind he might just as well have done. Because he's had to mix and match, and assemble a team of honest, journeymen pros that he has got playing so well that they can put eight goals past us in two games.

You wonder what he could do with the talent at his disposal here.

Is Davis, he of the increasingly tedious blether and the pointless substitutions that occur even later than Dario's used to (Saunders in the 87th minute, I ask you), really up to scratch as a competent coach?

I ask this because among the welter of recriminations about the academy the question seems rarely to be put.

And come to think of it, is he ev