Some great posts in this thread.

I think the brothers will be looking at the stats from each game and constantly looking at recent form stats and season-wide. They'll have a graph of performances vs. results, and will be focused on the performances.

Putting my analyst hat on, we're still two wins short of automatic promotion. That's very close to an excellent season, and it will be hard not to see that as 100% validating the strategy in place. This will be especially true if the performance vs. results graph says we've been unlucky by two wins, and especially if the number and severity of injuries we've had has been above average this season and/or disproportionately impacted key players. All of which seems likely to me.

At the same time though, you improve everywhere you can all of the time - they will always have an evolving list of players they're interested in, always be looking at the coaching staff situation, they will always have a list of potential new head coaches (you should be just maintaining that list all the time), and they will be crunching the numbers on whether SM is cutting the mustard or not.

Personally, fan emotions aside, I don't see an issue with him right now. As I say, a few rolls of the dice going our way earlier in the season and we'd be in a promotion spot now. As it stands, we're sitting in a playoff spot and I would never consider removing a head coach while we're in a playoff spot.

I do think he's quiet, and getting him an assistant who is more of a drill-sergeant type could be of great benefit. I hope they're looking into this. I also think if they ever decide to replace him, they won't do it until they have a replacement lined up and ready to go. They just aren't stupid enough to pull the insane move of just sacking the manager without anyone ready to take over.

I do share everyone's frustration with recent results, especially home results though. And I totally get why we've got these emotions. I just don't think acting in response to emotions is ever the answer in business, especially not one like football where emotions are so strong.

What I don't share is any sense of frustration with our progress or perceived lack thereof. We're in our second season in L2 and in a playoff spot. At the start of this season my expectations were that we finish 6th and we're on target. I'm disappointed that we've fallen off from when we looked good for automatic, but I can see several reasons why that's happened that are outside the control of anyone at the club.

As to next season's budget, I suspect after this season they will be willing to spend more than they did this season. It will look like a reasonable investment. But that depends on the players available, and the projected budgets in L1.