Blarney

Haha 9 days off..... nice quick vacation!

Let's chat Nottinghamshire Live We had a chance to sit with manager, Eddie Sirrel, and wanted to ask him a few questions about where he thought the club was. Thanks for joining us, Eddie. So you've wrapped up January with a win after a couple of draws and a loss in the 3 matches before that. How are things at the club? We've heard some rumblings of maybe some discontent with the board? Eddie Sirrel Things are good. I think it's a good thing that the expectations are now that we're going to go out and win every match when we know that's unrealistic, but that's far better than our fans assuming we're going to lose every match. As far as discontent... just because there's a disagreement or two doesn't mean there's discontent. We're not always going to get everything we want. You just hope that sometimes you do. Nottinghamshire Live So obviously things still look good on the table but maybe not as good as they did 2 months ago. Wrexham is 12 points back and Solihull is 13. Wrexham has 2 games in hand which means that they could concievably close to within 6 points with 2 victories on their side. Are you feeling like things might be slipping away a little or are hopes still high that you have the league wrapped up with just 15 games remaining? Eddie Sirrel Well I don't want to dash hopes or bring anybody down but it's not over until it's over, yeah? Do we like where we are compared to maybe being in Wrexham's position, of course we do, but we can not sit here and think it's over. We have matches to play and matches to win otherwise either Wrexham or Solihull or both could catch us. Nottinghamshire Live So you famously - I think we can say famously - let Rodrigues go earlier in the season and just let Cameron go... and also Brindley as well. You didn't have a lot of depth to begin with and now with a few lingering injuries you've been hard-pressed to give players time off that maybe they need this late in the season. Are you concerned? Do you wish that maybe you had 1 or 2 more bodies to lean on? Eddie Sirrel I am not a fan of going back in the past and wishing things could be different because no matter how much you want things to be different... they won't be. Am I concerned? Not overly. Do I want my players to get rest? Of course. But we have to function within what we have and right now we have the players we have until we don't. Nottinghamshire Live Well best of luck the rest of the season. Go Pies!

January in Review Schedule Busy month. 3 wins, 2 draws and a loss in league play. You take it but you know the quality of your club this season means that maybe you should have done a little better. We started out really well but then we got a bit tired and our lack of depth sort of bit us in the arse there at the end of the month. Table 12 points in the clear but with 2 more games played than Wrexham. The distance has definitely been closed. National League Team Stats Our opponents are scoring too easily on us... granted we're scoring more but that's not sustainable. We must shore up our defense. National League Player Stats 44 goals from Langstaff now. 15 more from Scott... although he's really cooled off of late. Financials Good month. Board doesn't seem to care.

Match Thirty-One

Match Thirty

Match Twenty-Nine

Match Twenty-Eight

FA Trophy Fourth Round

Please Improve our Youth Facilities! So I went and had a chat with them. And they told me no. They told me we were doing great and they felt the youth facilities were fine. They're not. I told them they're not. I threatened them because I'm not going to back down. They told me to tender my resignation if I felt so strongly about it. **Honestly, I sat there for 15 minutes and thought about doing it, this is my biggest problem in the game is I can't separate at times what I would do in real life and what I have to do in the game to remain employed. Because in all honesty if I were in charge and if my ownership was so stupid as to suggest that we're fine, when we're not... I'd walk. Which I have before which is why I keep starting over... well that and being fired because I've argued with them. It's like a Notts save can't work unless you just capitulate to stupid ownership that doesn't give a damn about the club -- at least in the game. Oh, and our youth intake this season.... was horrible. But we're fine, right? I mean we have NO money. They refuse to increase our wage budget (I've asked) and they refuse to increase our transfer budget (I've asked) and our youth intake is terrible, but we're fine. Granted, we're destroying the league, I get that, but that's this league. If I can't make improvements to the club going forward then what am I doing.** I told them I didn't want to resign and went about my way.... fuming.

Match Twenty-Seven Magpie Weekly Boreham manager, Mark Sampson, had some rather unflattering things to say prior to the game about not only the club but about you personally. I think the words over-rated, over-hyped and not nearly as good as they think were brought up. Langstaff goes out and scores 4 and you put up a clean sheet against them. After the match he didn't back down and intimated that they were their own worst enemies. Do you have a reply? Eddie Sirrel He can look at the score and there's my reply.

Transfer News Cameron gone Nottingham Post If nothing else you're just not afraid to shake things up. You've let Rodrigues go earlier in the season when most would have said you needed him for the promotion push. And now you've let last season's team captain and one of your better defenders go here with a couple of months left in this season and Wrexham nipping at your heels for the league title? If this backfires you know the supporters are going to be calling for your head on a platter, but that doesn't seem to affect your mentality. Eddie Sirrel Well, it can't. I love the fans, truly I do. I am a fan. But I can't manage the club always worried about what a supporter is going to think. One thing I've learned is that you can sit in the stands and follow a club but you're never going to know what's really going on behind the scenes. I had as much if not more - honestly more - access to this club growing up than 99.9% of the fans out there and once I took this job and sat in this chair I learned quite quickly that I didn't know anything about the inner workings. Okay, maybe not nothing, but you know what I mean. I loved Ruben, great player, great influence, strong attacker in the middle... but we let him go and we're setting scoring records. Could it have gone a different way... of course. But we took that chance because I had faith in the rest of the boys here. When it comes to Cam, we've been in communication this season to talk about a new contract once his was up this year and we couldn't come to terms. He had told us early he was thinking about exploring options which every player has a right to do but as I said before that puts us in a situation where we have choices to make also. In this case we couldn't come to an agreement and we decided to take advantage of being able to sell him before we got nothing in return. Will he be missed... of course. Do I have faith others will step up... yes.

Match Twenty-Six Nottinghamshire Live That's back-to-back matches versus Oldham and back-to-back wins that puts a little distance between your 2 clubs. Do you like the 2 matches in a row versus the same opponent? Eddie Sirrel Yeah, it gives you a chance to just focus all your intention for a week or so on just one club. It also puts a little pressure on you if you win the first match you know that they're going to be coming even stronger for you in the 2nd but it's good, that's what you want. If you fancy yourself the best you need to bring it each and every match, otherwise why are you playing?

December in Review Schedule Little blip at the start of the month in our march to the finish line but we recovered and things are still looking good. Table 10 points clear with a game in hand as we're into the 2nd half of the season. National League Team Stats 82 goals scored on the season.... #2 has 55. Wow. It won't matter if we don't win though. National League Player Stats Barring some major (and inconvenient injury) Langstaff is absolutely going to destroy the single season record for goals scored. Dude is an absolute beast. Financials Please can we make some money.

Match Twenty-Five

FA Trophy Third Round Nottingham Post Sirrel took a chance by resting most of his first choice players but came away with the victory and Notts Co will be moving on.

Transfer News Jordan Davies signed Eddie Sirrel Sorry, Wrexham

Match Twenty-Four

Match Twenty-Three Magpie Weekly Here we go again. Mair goes down with injury last match, Brooks comes in and we give up 5 goals. We need another new keeper.

Match Twenty-Two

Interview with Sirrel Magpie Weekly Thanks again for your time, Eddie. Just a couple of questions if we can. You sit at the top of the table, rather comfortably at the moment we might say. We know you predicted that you were going to win the league this season but are you surprised at all by how well the club is performing at the moment? Eddie Sirrel I mean I predicted we were going to win because that's the goal. And honestly I fully thought we were good enough to take the league, with a couple of other clubs that I felt would be there with us, including Wrexham for one, Oldham for another. And both of those clubs are up there. As far as if I'm surprised... that we are ahead by as much as we are at the moment, yes. But that just turned in our favor in the last couple of months, for a bit it appeared as though Oldham wasn't going to lose a match and were toe-to-toe with us. Magpie Weekly You do know it's not supposed to be this easy? Eddie Sirrel *laughs* I'm not so sure it's been easy but the boys have been playing very well so it makes it look so I suppose. I may be young, but I'm not stupid and as you know I've been around the game. I'm going to take it while it's here, while we're playing this well but I'm not going to let a game or two that might go bad ruin everything. I might be upset if I see something I don't like but right now we're just playing very well. Magpie Weekly Trying to think of a question you haven't been asked before and this one popped up. We know you've been around the club. We know you're Nottingham born and raised. We know you want the best for the club. But if you had to break it down, what do you think your main job is or what do you want the most out of this? Eddie Sirrel Wow, there could be a lot of answers there depending on which part of this you're asking about. I know what the supporters want. I know what the board wants. I know in the end what I want. But if you're asking me to break it down to right now, when I took the job what my main priority was or what my main job is... that's a two-fold answer. My main job is relationships. You have 11 men on that pitch... and a number more than that just waiting their turn. They're not all the same. They come from different walks of life. Born in different town, countries... might speak different languages. My job is to bring them all together and not only make them the best they can be on the pitch but to make them better people if I can. My second answer is to grow the community. We are nothing without the supporters. I care deeply about Nottingham and if we're going to be a Nottingham club then we have to represent the community. I want the fans to be proud to be supporters. Magpie Weekly Any predictions on the remainder of the season? Eddie Sirrel Don't expect us to give up or let down. Magpie Weekly Thanks for your time again.

November in Review Schedule A very simple month of just 4 matches but we're back on the streak... and what a streak these 4 matches were. 17 goals scored against just 4 allowed. Table 13 points clear. I'm not going to say it, you can say it, I'm not going to say it. National League Team Stats I don't know, given enough games we could probably lap the 2nd best team in terms of goals scored. National League Player Stats Langstaff has already lapped the 2nd place guy in goals scored. What a ridiculous season he's having. Finances We're making a little bit of cash but no real progress in terms of where the board thinks we are in financial status.

Match Twenty-One

Match Twenty

Match Nineteen

Match Eighteen Nottinghamshire Live It's fair to say you gave Southend a right thrashing. Was there a bit of revenge in mind here for the FA Cup loss? Eddie Sirrel (with a smirk on his face) Did we lose to them in the FA Cup? Would I ever remind my boys about that and suggest we teach them who we are? Nottinghamshire Live Well whatever it was, it was certainly a special match for your side. Does this put to rest any of the noise about there being issues with any of the players? Eddie Sirrel It shows who we are when we play as one squad... and that's dangerous. That's what I want to see.