Blarney

Awards and Recognition Golden Boot For those tracking.... that's back-to-back-to-back-to back Golden Boots for Macaulay Langstaff. 4 straight seasons of scoring the most goals in league play.... in 4 different leagues. Unfortunately his streak of being player of the year ended as he didn't win it this season. Best Eleven Mac with the well deserved honor of being selected to the best 11 in the league.

End of Season Final Table 9th place finish is more than acceptable Competition Review It was definitely somewhat of a roller coaster season for us, but after a pretty poor start we played much better ball in the 2nd half. It definitely gives us a great feeling about how next season might go.

Final Month + 1 game Did we make the playoffs? No. We did everything we could, winning 3 straight but we were out of it by the final match. We did beat 2 of the playoff teams in our final month though. Like I said previously, I'm not upset... in fact it says a lot about how far we came this season and the growth of our club. I think we go into next year as a favorite to potentially take the league or at least make the playoffs if we continue our growth from this year.

March in Review Schedule Nice recovery month. 2 wins, 2 draws, 4 matches. Table Only 4 matches left. We're obviously safe so that's job done. But there's still an outside chance that we might still push for the playoffs. Whatever happens I can honestly say it's been a good season. League One Team Stats Possession good. Conversion good. Number of goals..... bad. What does that tell us? We're not getting off enough shots. League One Player Stats Langstaff's 4 goals this month put him back on top. Can he hold on? Financials More losses. We're really doing a horrible job of putting money in the bank except when we sell players. Review We've been safe for awhile so that's not really been a concern. Over the last few months it's really been a roller coaster. We make a push for the playoffs then fall back. Then make a push then fall back. We're technically still within striking distance but are going to have to win and get some help from the clubs above us. Either way, it's been a really good year with some really good growth from some of our kids.

February in Review Schedule Well we reverted back to the up and down we were playing for most of the season and unfortunately it was a little more down than up. Table We fell back to the pack a little. Still comfortably in the middle and keeping ourselves safe from relegation. League One Team Stats Conversion rate and pass completion still good. League One Player Stats Mac fell off the pace and Rogers had a great scoring month. Mac has put up 20 shots less than Rogers has. We still need him to shoot the ball more. Financials A little drop but with our transfers we're still looking good for the season. Review Like I said we fell back a little but we're still comfortably safe and that's all we're looking for this season.

Transfer Deadline News Out Gill told us he wasn't going to re-sign so left us with little choice but to sell and get what we could. McClelland had a release clause so there was nothing we could do about this. I'm not overly concerned about this one, he was purely a backup player who rarely played. We REALLY didn't want to move Miles but we were getting repeated offers and he was getting upset that we kept turning them down. Finally we agreed to let him go just to save the headache and keep the players that were revolting of our back. Another player that was begging to leave and we had the depth at this position to let him go. This offer was absolutely insane and was so much that we couldn't pass it up. Plus they offered to loan him back for the year so we didn't lose anything here. In Needed another body at this position after losing Miles. We honestly probably didn't need him after we had previously done the deal with Adam but for the money I couldn't pass it up as I think he'll increase in value down the line. Strictly a warm body signing. Review I've been waiting for this to happen but I was hoping to avoid the carnage. This is why we signed Mac to the big contract we did. I guess I should have worried more about Miles as well because I didn't want to lose him but it was causing problems with the club by keeping him and I couldn't get him to agree to a new contract. In the end I lost far more players than I wanted to but was able to get a couple back on loan for the season. I had previously said I didn't want to spend money and in the end I didn't spend much compared to the asking price of some guys that I like..... but I needed the replacements so we did make a few moves.

January in Review Schedule Very busy month but also very productive. We lost our FA Cup match but won 5 of our 7 league matches with 1 draw and 1 loss. Table Our impressive month sees us vault up the table to the #8 spot. There are only 20 points separating the #3 club to the #16 club however so there's a big grouping right there that needs sorted. League One Team Stats We continue to play good ball lately. League One Player Stats Look who has taken the top spot in goals scored..... and it's driven our run to playoff contention at the same time. Financials Look at all that cash in the inbox! That's what happens when the transfer deadline comes and your team gets raked. We'll talk about that next. Review A very good month. The best we've had in awhile. We went from up and down and down and up to just straight up. 5 league wins out of 7 played is excellent and shows the growth of the club overall from the first of the season until now. Now let's see if we can continue it.

December in Review Schedule More of the same.. win some, lose some, maintain our hold in the middle of the pack. Table So actually despite our "middling" play over the last couple of months we've managed to move up the table a little. We're sitting less than 10 points out of a playoff spot now. More importantly we've put more distance between us and a relegation battle. League One Team Stats Slowly but surely we're starting to put up better numbers. Our possession has been good and we lead the league in pass completion and tackles won ratio now. League One Player Stats Langstaff has been much improved. Now sits 3rd in total goals scored, 1st in shots on target percentage and 2nd in conversion rate. He still needs to get more shots off though. Financials Almost broke even this month. Review I'm very happy with our progress. Over the past couple of months we've been winning or drawing as many games as we've been losing despite still being a little low on depth and being very, very young. It's a good indication of how the players are developing. I certainly think if we maintain this and continue our growth into next year we'll be playing a lot better. Especially if we can find a few more warm bodies to bring in.

Youth Intake This is getting old. This is 3 straight years of getting nothing but crap from our youth intake. Not even one decent player for 3 straight years. I'm having a hard time even putting a U18 and U21 team on the field since I can't recruit any decent youth at all.

November in Review Schedule Busy month. Decent month. We're holding our own. Table We're solidly mid-table now. 10 points from a relegation battle and 8 points from a playoff push. I like where we are, it's comfortable. League One Team Stats Our possession has been improving. It's certainly helped with our matches. League One Player Stats Macaulay has definitely been better lately. He's gone up the ranks in goals scored, shots on target and conversion rate. What he's not been doing is getting a lot of shots off. Financials Another month... more cash lost. Review Well we've settled down a little... win some, lose some... which is fine with me. At least we've pulled ourselves from a relegation battle. We've had a few good matches and a few not great. We lost our 2nd straight pizza match to penalty shots. But we won 2 FA Cup matches this month -- the first one against Tamworth who had already beat us twice this year. We also managed a draw against Barnsley who currently lead the league. Mac has certainly been better and is tops in the league in conversion rate but he's just not getting a lot of shots off. For some reason my midfielders have been taking a lot of shots... and a lot of them bad. They're basically firing on shot and I wish I could find a way to tell them not to. My instructions are to work it into the box but those don't appear to be being followed. It's not that I don't want them to ever shoot.... but I definitely want Macaulay taking the majority of the shots.

Absolutely tearing it up right now.

October in Review Schedule A little up, and a little down. I can accept that. Table We pulled ourselves up a little. We need to keep doing that. League One Team Stats Pass completion and tackles won are good. League One Player Stats Mac righted himself a little this month with 4 goals scored. Financials Another bad month on the financial side. Review So let's start with the good first. We played Plymouth - who are currently the best team in the league - and we beat them easily 3-0. It was easily our best match of the season so far. We also beat Sheffield Wednesday 3-1. So back-to-back matches with 3 goals scored. Unfortunately other than that we had some issues. 3 more losses and a draw in league. We also lost our pizza match. I'm still not concerned about that though.

The Independent Reports sports with Trent Crimm Notts County finds themselves in a spot they haven't been in since new manager Eddie Sirrel took over the club 2 years ago. They're losing. Now, before anybody goes crazy and starts writing me and complaining that they're in League One and it's growing pains and give them a chance.... we are. I'm just reporting what we see. Personally I think Eddie has earned enough leeway to go through a rough patch here or there and for us not to wonder what's going on. But it is our job to wonder what's going on. So we ssked Eddie and this is what he said. "I am a strong believer that the quality of play between the National League and the National League North and South isn't that much diferent. Just like I believe that the quality of play between League Two and the National League isn't much different. In other words I think the best teams from those lower leagues can be competitive in the leagues above them. I don't think there's that much that separates them. I do however think there is quite a bit that separates League One from League Two. I think that is where you start seeing a pretty good change in talent levels of both clubs and players. I also think that talent level grows as you move up to the Championship. This is where you start separating the men from the boys.... to borrow an old cliche. Now I don't say any of that to make excuses but just to explain that I think this is where we have to really start growing as a team. If I was being honest I really think that if we had stayed down in League Two for another year that would not have been a bad thing. It would have given us a chance to continue to grow and develop our young players without the added pressure of having to play against much better competition. No disrespect intended to the clubs down in League Two... but obviously being in League One is more of a challenge. Regardless here we are and we're going to go through some growing pains. I would hope that our supporters understand that and give the boys a chance to develop and continue this path that we're on. I know I'm looking forward to it. We're going to take some lumps along the way. We're obviously taking them now, but I have complete faith that we're going to figure it out. Whether that means we go on a run this year or fight a relegation battle all season long remains to be seen. But I think we have the talent to stay up. We just have to put it all together out there and part of that is on me as the manager to put my guys in the best position for them to succeed." We think that most supporters would agree with that sentiment. They are certainly struggling right now but they're not being blown out. They've been in pretty much every contest. The defense is still playing well but on the other side of the ball they're just trying to figure out how to make their attack work. Once they do, I think they can make a statement in the league and hopefully stay up. Eddie is right about one thing and he'll never shy away from taking responsibility for what's gone wrong. He needs to make some changes and make them fast. I would bet we'll see that going forward.

September in Review Schedule Not optimal. We lose our first match in the Pizza tourney and then drop 3 straight in league play while only scoring 1 goal. We manage a hard-fought draw to finish the month... where again we don't score. Table We're free falling down the table. League One Team Stats Well... we're still passing the ball well. League One Player Stats Langstaff is being mugged every time he touches the ball. His expected goals scored is 5 but he's only scored 4 with a 6.61 match rating. Financials Ouch.... just a bad month all around. Review Well... I said I believed there was a big difference in quality between League One and League Two. Granted it's only a month and things can turn quickly for the good, but we're really struggling right now. Our defense has still be adequate... but if you can't score you can't win and we went 3 matches in a row without getting one in. Langstaff is good but it's possible he's topped out for his skill level... or he just had a really bad month. He obviously needs help around him and maybe that would get him going. I think I'm going to mess with the tactics a bit - it's highly possible what worked at lower levels isn't going to work here.

August in Review Schedule Other than the loss in the Carabao Cup match we had a pretty decent start to our League One season with a couple of draws and a win. I will admit in both of our draws we pulled it out with last minute goals... but last minute is better than a loss. Table Our start has been good enough to put us up toward the top of the table. League One Team Stats Offensive stats look pretty decent to start the season. League One Player Stats WHAT???? Langstaff isn't leading the league in goals.... oh no. Financials Lost a little cash to start the season. Review So like I seem to always say at the start of the new season, it's early. I don't take much stock in how things are going to finish by how they start. However, it's always good to have a decent start and be toward the top of the table rather than the bottom after the first month. I'm not going to pretend it's been easy. In one of our draws we scored the tying goal with a minute left in stoppage time. In the other one we scored the tying goal with a minute left in regular time... about 2 minutes after they scored the go-ahead goal. So both matches were "skin of our teeth" draws. We're holding our own, but barely over the first few matches. The Carabao Cup loss I still don't care about. I know it's money but we still don't have great squad depth as I just don't want to waste the money to go and grab a bunch of backup players. I'm hoping that that will come naturally from building up my youth prospects. I have put bids in on a couple of decent players that could fill roles but I'm just not going to blow a wad of cash that I'd prefer to hold on to for now. Overall, I'm happy with the start of the season.