Time to be bold.

[gazan]

Although a long-term fan and season ticket holder, I have to admit that I'm close to losing the faith. People will point at a'near miss' at the play offs and to a number of high(ISH) scoring games through the season but I will persist with my assertion that Bell has to go. I sincerely believe that, nice man as he is, he is not good enough to turn the Alex into the 70+ points team they need to be to be promoted. And, importantly, the financial situation dictates that the Alex must be promoted. Alas, I believe this was our best chance and we blew it. Including Tezgel and O'Reilly the Alex had a talented squad. League 2 was at a low ebb, containing no outstanding teams so it was an ideal time to shine. As it happened, the Alex didn't take advantage. Was this because, as a young side, it was prone to inconsistency? No doubt that was a factor. However, it is clear to me that management was more crucial to this outcome. The team was off to a flier in the first 4 games, imposing itself for the first 60 minutes of a game then playing out the remainder. There was a hiccup at Gillingham as the players forgot their shooting boots but created a lot of scoring opportunities. Noone thought the run could last and most appreciated a good performance let down by inefficient finishing. However, the management panicked and changed the set-up. This was the pattern for the season. A lack of faith in the press which had been successful at the beginning. There was also a lot of bemusing substitutions, playing people out of position, moving things around unnecessarily and weird tactics. Despite a number of 4 goal results, there were many games where the team only had one or no shots on goal. It was so frustrating to see long balls hoofed up the pitch for a lone forward who had been expected to cover all the oppositions half of the pitch on there own. Also frustrating was the endless little passing games at the back that inevitably ended with a hoof up pitch. There was often a sense of no plan and no way to really change things.
The managers response was often that the players had worked hard or, conversely, had not carried out their instructions
I realise that this is becoming a long post so will stop soon.
The board have to decide if they do detect improvement and implement no change and risk another season of failure in an increasingly dire financial outlook or be bold, break the pattern and go for someone new (or Mickey Demetriou).

[MikeSB]

Although a long-term fan and season ticket holder, I have to admit that I'm close to losing the faith. People will point at a'near miss' at the play offs and to a number of high(ISH) scoring games through the season but I will persist with my assertion that Bell has to go. I sincerely believe that, nice man as he is, he is not good enough to turn the Alex into the 70+ points team they need to be to be promoted. And, importantly, the financial situation dictates that the Alex must be promoted. Alas, I believe this was our best chance and we blew it. Including Tezgel and O'Reilly the Alex had a talented squad. League 2 was at a low ebb, containing no outstanding teams so it was an ideal time to shine. As it happened, the Alex didn't take advantage. Was this because, as a young side, it was prone to inconsistency? No doubt that was a factor. However, it is clear to me that management was more crucial to this outcome. The team was off to a flier in the first 4 games, imposing itself for the first 60 minutes of a game then playing out the remainder. There was a hiccup at Gillingham as the players forgot their shooting boots but created a lot of scoring opportunities. Noone thought the run could last and most appreciated a good performance let down by inefficient finishing. However, the management panicked and changed the set-up. This was the pattern for the season. A lack of faith in the press which had been successful at the beginning. There was also a lot of bemusing substitutions, playing people out of position, moving things around unnecessarily and weird tactics. Despite a number of 4 goal results, there were many games where the team only had one or no shots on goal. It was so frustrating to see long balls hoofed up the pitch for a lone forward who had been expected to cover all the oppositions half of the pitch on there own. Also frustrating was the endless little passing games at the back that inevitably ended with a hoof up pitch. There was often a sense of no plan and no way to really change things.
The managers response was often that the players had worked hard or, conversely, had not carried out their instructions
I realise that this is becoming a long post so will stop soon.
The board have to decide if they do detect improvement and implement no change and risk another season of failure in an increasingly dire financial outlook or be bold, break the pattern and go for someone new (or Mickey Demetriou).

Its obvious that this site has had its day and the absence of posts and the very few posts show that to be the case for a very long time. You should be congratulated gazan for your persistence in keeping the site going for so long and best probably if you said goodbye to it now. I mean look at how many 'fans' have read your message so far and not one reply? Do me a favour!

Now, in respect of your post gazan. Fans have been waiting decades and decades for the big promotion and got it on occasion but the club then ditched or we should say, sold the best players asap and down we went ie relegated. Some clubs our size had far more faith and are playing in the PL and championship as we can see.

Lee Bell is a very nice man as you said but he should have been sacked at Christmas last when we lost our away match to Newport who had not won a match for nine months and that would have shown that the club was serious about promotion. The Chairman said the academy was in our DNA and he was talking BS as that has never been in our DNA but he and the Board are obviously content for us to remain a fourt division club or even National League.

Supporting CAFC as I have done for 70 odd years was in essence a waste of time and money, despite their being one or two good seasons in between.

ie Time to move on an support a team who really I mean REALLY wants to play in a higher league regularly. Some clubs higher than us have a far lower fan base and that is a fact. It could be the Board resigns and a new Board comes in with greater ambition.

Good luck to all!