Originally, I wasn’t planning to do any sort of update for the Borehamwood pile of decomposing camel shite game, but after a round trip of 4.5 hours travelling and a “performance” that doesn’t suggest but confirm abject doom, I just have to put fingers to keyboard.
Make no mistake – we are fucked. And suddenly, my last report doesn’t seem so OTT, eh? Keeping players in for two consecutive games afterwards hasn’t worked. Making them watch the video of the Harrow game in an additional training session hasn’t worked either. Before the final whistle yesterday, I said to the guy next to me “that’s it, don’t expect to see some of these players again”. I’ll doubtlessly be proved wrong on that score, but it seems like TB has finally seen enough.
Wonder what he means by fringe players though? Shroot? Goddard? People like Beckford? Let’s face it, they couldn’t do any worse. Last night, we saw a collection of players only united by the colour of their shirts and the collapse in confidence to score. Even if Webb had buried that penalty, somehow BW would have just got a second. True, we ran about a lot more, and we did try a bit better after Saturday (not as though that was difficult), but this XI hasn’t got “it”. To paraphrase a famous quote by an ex-goalie, we’ve nothing here. No passion, no committment, no skill, nothing. Just shit.
Back to TB’s comments. He’s obviously waiting for RB to get fit so he can finally drop Jolly. I don’t know how long he’ll put up with Webb, but clearly Jolly will be the first to be dropped. If he gets this new guy in (and by naming him publicly it certainly sets out a message of intent) then Webb might be looking for another place as well. I don’t hate Webb, I don’t think anyone does, but if he drops out at AFCW that’s surely got to be it for him. He never lasts at any one place for long, and I think we’re starting to see why.
It’s quite blatant though that we’ve been badly let down. I can forgive a bad performance or two if we’re starting to come together. But BW showed that it won’t now. And probably not ever. If some of the underperformers are on nice juicy little contracts, bite the bullet and pay them off. Or at least scare the shit out of them – remove them from their comfort zone. It’s clear that they just don’t fancy the Ryman and we can do better.
And if it’s true that some of them are openly questioning TB’s competence, then they definitely have no place here. We all know about TB’s record at Aldershot and Hayes, but it’s common knowledge that he knew what our squad was like even before he applied for the AFCW job. I don’t think Brown is as clueless as some would like to believe. Fuck knows what they do with some managers I’ve seen who just yell abuse all the time……
All in all, it’s a pretty sobering time here right now. I don’t think we’ve ever had to experience a total loss of form like this, and with bad results to boot. We’ve been due something like this for a good couple of years now, if not longer, although it still grates like fuck when it does happen. I expect Leyton to be the lowest crowd for an AFCW away game, because there are people openly saying they just can’t be bothered without much signs of an improvement. While one will always reply “loyalty”, I can see their point.
Make no mistake, if we play exactly the same XI as we have done for the past 2-3 games at Leyton, leave the stadium and ask for your money back. It was a bit of a disappointment to hear that the same failures started yesterday, although it did make sense – one more chance and all that. Right now, none of them can turn around and say they weren’t given a chance. They have, and they blew it. At the end of the game, the body language said it all. TB just walked around them all as though we’d just been relegated, and somehow I sensed the players knew it. That’s something I don’t ever want to see from a Wimbledon team.
But there are no excuses now. Short of locking all of them in the slammer with a bunch of pyschotic homosexuals, nothing will sharpen this current crop up. I mentioned Shroot and Goddard earlier. Give them a go, give them a 4/5 game runout. Who knows, the confidence Shroot certainly has might rub off. We still have 108 points to play for, and right now we’re likely to achieve 10.8 of them. What have we to lose?
See, this is where TB will now need to earn his full time salary. Recognising there’s a problem is a start, dealing with it is another matter. If he does changes for Saturday and we put in a decent peformance (regardless of result, to a point anyway), the pressure is off a bit. Win, and it’s even better. I’m really not trying to think about either another shit performance and/or a loss on Saturday. I certainly had a gut feeling that BW would suck (see last writeup), and I’m worried how right I got it.
I honestly can’t predict what will happen on Saturday, because I genuinely don’t know. I don’t know if the players who played yesterday will finally realise what they’re throwing away. I don’t know who TB is planning to bring in, if anyone. I don’t know whether it can get worse, or whether the last two games are our absolute rock bottom. I don’t know whether the pressure/expectation is now off, or whether it’s just got a lot worse (personally I sense the former). And most concerning of all, I don’t know whether that’s a bad thing or not.
Normal service may or may not be resumed soon. Though I suspect the Golden Goal organisers are now printing tickets with “March” on them…………