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Thread: Yates and Grant for £100k - says AH

  1. #21
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    Mar 2017
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    Quote Originally Posted by Old_pie View Post
    He hasn't stopped, he hasn't changed. He's always right and everyone else is wrong and doesn't know what they are doing - except his golf club of course.

    I use Twitter very occasionally but have his page bookmarked - what else is there to do at the moment?
    'Character is fate'. I believe it was Thomas Hardy who first said that.

  2. #22
    Quote Originally Posted by sidders View Post
    'Character is fate'. I believe it was Thomas Hardy who first said that.
    Heraclitus I think coined it. But no doubt thinking of Michael Henchard, it would be apt by Thomas Hardy.

  3. #23
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    Jun 2003
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    Just looking at the stats for when we were last in the top 3 of the 4th tier......

    Still in an automatic promotion place with 9 games to play on 10th March 2018. The two sides directly below us - Mansfield and Wycombe - were our next two opponents at Meadow Lane with 2nd bottom Chesterfield in-between. We took 2 points from 9 in those three games. Doomed Chesterfield - who beat us - had 9 more games after playing us, they won 1 and lost 7 including home defeats to the aforementioned Mansfield and Wycombe.

    Chesterfield away was probably the turning point in terms of Alan Hardy being a potentially successful chairman. He must have known then that the most likely closing chapter for that season would end with play off defeat and he must have known that he wouldn't be able to sustain another challenge without putting the club at huge risk. The average attendance for the following season was only 600 fewer (7.9k down to 7.6k) so unless he was expecting another big increase (to say 9k), a financial crisis was inevitable regardless of results.

    His biggest mistake was probably not being honest with himself and the fans. He could have took the pressure off Nolan, made mid-table the goal and put the club up for sale summer 2018. He MUST have known we were in trouble then. To carry on as if we were dead certs to go up after the way we collapsed in the latter half of 2017/18 and that the fan-base would continue to grow at the same rate was madness.
    Last edited by upthemaggies; 12-01-2021 at 04:05 PM.

  4. #24
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    Aug 2009
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    Most of the football world thinks Nolan was sacked prematurely...
    What was it, 6 games? Obviously a mistake in hindsight, his squad would've started to gather points (for no better than mid-table probably)....but at least half of us fans were with Hardy. It was very disappointing that he didn't have his players ready to go for the start of the season...and this was connected with the poor end to the 2017/18 season and a poor brand of football, plus the apparent cliques. So yes, a mistake in hindsight but I still understand why it happened.

  5. #25
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
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    11,041
    Quote Originally Posted by the_anticlough View Post
    Most of the football world thinks Nolan was sacked prematurely...
    What was it, 6 games? Obviously a mistake in hindsight, his squad would've started to gather points (for no better than mid-table probably)....but at least half of us fans were with Hardy. It was very disappointing that he didn't have his players ready to go for the start of the season...and this was connected with the poor end to the 2017/18 season and a poor brand of football, plus the apparent cliques. So yes, a mistake in hindsight but I still understand why it happened.
    It is impossible to say it was a mistake in hindsight? We could have lost the next six games, we will never know only guess.

  6. #26
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    Jun 2003
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    Quote Originally Posted by i961pie View Post
    It is impossible to say it was a mistake in hindsight? We could have lost the next six games, we will never know only guess.
    Lost the next two, then drew the two after that, so we probably can say that we wouldn't have been any worse off had Hardy hung on four games longer.

    FWIW Nolan did oversee a credible 3-3 draw at Middleborough during that opening month which went to pens and it was three days later on the Friday night he had the one really bad defeat (0-4 to Yeovil at home). Of the other three defeats (all away), two were lost in injury time by the odd goal and the other was to the eventual champions Lincoln City whilst the one other home game was drawn to Colchester who finished 8th.

    At the time Nolan was sacked, all of the teams we'd played apart from Cambridge were in a play off position (the points they took from us being a very big reason for that but none apart from Cambridge made a bad start otherwise).
    It's still 1 point from 15 though. Even if you're only looking to stay up, that's going to set the alarm bells ringing and we were automatic hopefuls at that stage. Weren't we favourites for the title with the bookies?

  7. #27
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    Mar 2009
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    When Mick Walker was sacked by Pavis early into the season, he said he also took the backend of the previous season into consideration.
    Pavis's favourite saying was "hindsight is a wonderful thing"

  8. #28
    Join Date
    May 2005
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    2,565
    The start to that season aside he still deserved to lose his job.

    The second half of the season before , coupled with his own (supposed) poor conduct and poor discipline of the players....and the terrible football...were all very good reasons to see the back of him.

    He, along with hardy, sewed the seeds for what transpired later on. If we’re talking about mistakes then sacking Harry Kewell should get a mention.

  9. #29
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    Oct 2008
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    Its very clear that there was an extremely poor culture under Hardy at Notts especially after he got arrogant and thought he would walk the division. I know a few people who have worked with Hardy and for him, and they all say that one thing he was good at was putting quality 'Yes men' around him. In his later years he was apparently surrounded by very manipulative people such as the CEO he employed at Paragon who took the company under. His biggest mistake list is funny and to me he's the Donald Trump of Nottinghamshire.

  10. #30
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    Jun 2003
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    Quote Originally Posted by queenslandpie View Post
    Its very clear that there was an extremely poor culture under Hardy at Notts especially after he got arrogant and thought he would walk the division. I know a few people who have worked with Hardy and for him, and they all say that one thing he was good at was putting quality 'Yes men' around him. In his later years he was apparently surrounded by very manipulative people such as the CEO he employed at Paragon who took the company under. His biggest mistake list is funny and to me he's the Donald Trump of Nottinghamshire.
    The basic question Hardy needs to be asked is "How would sticking with Nolan have saved Paragon from going under and impacting on your ability to fund Notts?"

    The only semi-sensible answer he could give was that he was anticipating an increase in gate receipts on the back of another promotion challenge. The problem with that though is, I believe we had a big increase in season ticket sales which were frozen or on offer, which explains the extraordinary loyalty shown throughout that doomed campaign, so how many extra pay on the day fans would we have needed? The 7,3k average was not enough to avoid a meltdown, how many would it have taken just to stabilize for another year?

    I distinctly remember him at the time Kewell was manager being interviewed by Clem from the BBC for Football Focus and Hardy was making very strong hints then that he needed help "There's no money in Leagues One of Two, we need financial support" was how he phrased it I think.

    Almost every club in L2 had lower gates than us though, some less than half including the team that went up as champions the season we lost in the play offs. and they are now 6th in League One. Smaller clubs have not been in the mess we've been in, those of comparable size are practically all at least one division above us, quite a number of them higher.

    I would put it to him that he was out of his depth and that he left it too late to put the club up for sale. He could have departed being pretty well thought of if he'd been honest about the situation summer 2018. He did do good things but completely ruined it. The staff going unpaid and the ex-cons being entertained as potential buyers was a disgrace.

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