History's a bugger, as Oscar Wilde no doubt said, always wanting to pigeonhole people as either heroes or villains. Both Dunnett and Pavis did heroic things for Notts and gave us the finest days in my 40-plus years supporting the club. But they also did things that one might characterise as "villainous" - both extracting a hefty rent from the club and leaving the club on a downward trajectory.

You could argue that Dunnett left us in a better place because he sold the club to Pavis. But three-quarters of the ground was falling apart when he left and the Meadow Lane end was an embarrassment until the grand redevelopment in the summer of 1992.

Pavis, meanwhile, left us with a great modern stadium but things turned sour in the mid-90s and never recovered. I can't remember which season it was when he came over to the County Road side to talk to protesting Notts fans (I'm guessing during the Murphy era?). How much blame can we pin on him for the club ultimately going into administration and the decade-long drift before the Munto mirage?

Also, I always used to cringe when Pavis' idea of trying to increase crowds was to encourage F***** fans to come along when the disciples of Satan were playing away. Safe to say he wasn't big on marketing. That was the one thing Hardy did get right, but of course we'll never know how much those cheap ticket offers ended up costing us.

Ironically, it was the one thing Albert Scardino got right, too - the "8 Through the Gate" scheme during the Great Escape season was a success, but subsequently showed that it's not easy to sustain an attendance when things are going badly on the pitch (as they invariably were over the past two decades).