1-0 to the railwaymen

[gazan]

Has there been any news about Offord? He was routinely kicked last night with little protection from the referee and really seemed to be suffering. He is really the one player we cannot afford to be without for any period of time.

[MeForCrewe]

Ditto, he would be a massive miss. Didn't look good last night but I'm sure we'll know more in the next few days. One of two players that we have got who is "hard as nails" and would "run through a brick wall" for us and had been outstanding for us this season.

[whosbrianwilson]

He didn't help himself by trying to take a free kick immediately after limping away from the tackle. Not the best move!!

[RedandWhiteSpartan]

What is it with the Main Stand? It has to be the worst support in the football league. Whenever things are going well, they never make any noise. As soon as things go wrong, out with the booing! it certainly wasn't just at the end of the game, do you think it helps the team, to get them on edge...what about a little encouragement! Poor Zac Williams took a load of stick...he's just a lad FFS.
Makes me ashamed to be an Alex fan.

[MeForCrewe]

Everybody around me weren't deriding Zak they were yelling at the bench to take him off. It was patently obvious that throughout the second half he was struggling massively, a lot more than some of the others. It's very frustrating when we had Rio on the bench to replace him. A perfectly natural reaction in my view.

[Freddie Creweger]

Everybody around me weren't deriding Zak they were yelling at the bench to take him off. It was patently obvious that throughout the second half he was struggling massively, a lot more than some of the others. It's very frustrating when we had Rio on the bench to replace him. A perfectly natural reaction in my view.

says a lot about the competency of the management. They are naive, and short of experience, managing a youth team is a completely different kettle of fish to that of ''professionals'' and I say that with tongue in cheek

[gazan]

What is this strange idea that has recently been spouted about 'managing a youth team'. As if working through the whole system at the Alex meant working with a different species. Steve Holland was a coach at the Alex and is now the assistant at national level, dealing with international players. Dario worked with many age-levels but is still our most successful manager. There are endless examples of coaches who have worked through the system to become relatively successful in management (and of course examples of those who haven't). This 'youth manager' trope is just a simplistic way of avoiding meaningful analysis for those who are used to instant reaction rather than thought.
Either Bell is good enough or not as an individual not because of some lazy generalisation.
Life is not dependent on 90 minutes of football or 20 seconds of social media rant. Time to look away from the screens and look outward at the real world. Maybe if people took time out and counted to 10 and then thought about things, the world would be a better place to live in.

[MikeSB]

What is this strange idea that has recently been spouted about 'managing a youth team'. As if working through the whole system at the Alex meant working with a different species. Steve Holland was a coach at the Alex and is now the assistant at national level, dealing with international players. Dario worked with many age-levels but is still our most successful manager. There are endless examples of coaches who have worked through the system to become relatively successful in management (and of course examples of those who haven't). This 'youth manager' trope is just a simplistic way of avoiding meaningful analysis for those who are used to instant reaction rather than thought.
Either Bell is good enough or not as an individual not because of some lazy generalisation.
Life is not dependent on 90 minutes of football or 20 seconds of social media rant. Time to look away from the screens and look outward at the real world. Maybe if people took time out and counted to 10 and then thought about things, the world would be a better place to live in.

With respect that is way over simplification of the posts on here where fans do try and take time to explain things. The world is not a great place to live for many people in oppressed regimes and great for some others. Life seems always to be like this...ie the have's and have nots etc. Neil Baker was a great assistant and almost unknown as a first team one except maybe at non league? Youth football is a completely different thing to adult football and why the academy system fails at all levels and especially at PL and look at how many PL academy under 23/21 teams get beat by poorish lower league clubs IF the academy system worked. Look at how many world cup teams have beat the so called top ones. Academies? No, its the natural ability of the players that get them in the team and not a host of past players generally earning a good living. I played football and was a far better player in my early twenties than younger as I was stronger and more wise about the game. Dario was never a youth coach and look at his earlier teams that had a great mix of senior Pro's and we only coach 6 year olds as they are the rules of the FA to get their subsidy. There is no way anyone can judge any kid at that age or even under 16 but that is my personal opinion and I saw some great football players at local league level but not good enough for Pro level. I would suggest that most academy graduates are no better ie actually worse than many in the National Leagues. And seems most of the latter are better paid than ours. Why is that? I want to know the detail of the costs of doing A,B and C of running a football club and no reason why the club cannot tell the fans so we can all get a better understanding of it all. They are reasonable people to be on the BoD where they have to cough up money to run the club and as we know its money, money, money that runs this game. 20 year olds are not fully developed either physically or mentally and so the coaches are used to that category and not the senior Pro's. Of course we all hope LB succeeds but it is a closetted, appointment based wholly on cost and maybe of all the short list he wanted the least salary, we don't know and the more seasoned managers would not apply or want the job at a salary we pay.

Academy coaches need time re the academy players succeeding in the first team but generally they do need a few seasons to get there.. Some loan players ie even at Championship clubs but their errors are glaring and they are what 19 or 20 and so are most players at that age. Time and games will solve that and absolutely coaching and academy time will not. All in my opinion of course and if we can use most of our academy costs to buy more seasoned Pro's even at our level would be preferred. We can always go back to an academy but difficult if the status we have now has not been working for many years now. But the PL/FA may be paying most of the money but its still failing and always will. Some kids can make the grade after 10 years and even I could...Maybe?

[gazan]

Sorry, but you are wrong MSB. Dario was a coach at all levels of the club (but particularly at U14s ) as well 1st team manager. You can't change history to suit your argument. He also coached younger players at Chelsea.
I don't care about your ideas that there is some kind of genetic determinant (implicit in your denial of ability to learn from coaches) in playing football. As a former teacher, I believe that people can learn from others and that we are not all isolated individuals doing our own thing. You may react against this definition of your views but I repeat, it is implicit in your claims against coaching/learning.
By all means have an opinion (so don't flounce off again claiming people are trying to stop you having one!) but an opinion shouldn't simply be a rigid piece of dogma repeated ad nauseum with no qualification and respecting no fact that may force you to adjust it.
You have a right to an opinion but it is disrespectful to others when you close your ears.
I look forward to a reasoned response rather than a cut and paste post of recycled messages, tropes and over-generalisations.
To other readers: I apologise for losing patience but I've struggled hard, alongside others, to steer this site away from pure slanging matches to some kind of forum for reasoned discussion. Some will object to the tone of that previous sentence but I make no apologies for wanting to be involved in a troll-free environment where we can talk about the team we love/support.

[MeForCrewe]

I'll just add one thing MSB, in your last post you admitted to Dario having an Assistant and called him great. We had more than one in the dugout even back then hey, (the exception being when Dario was up in his birdsnest in the stand roof). Happy days, on the field atleast.