https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SldtQaUT6nQ
It must be that time of year again, if SW19 is putting this old favourite (?) out on the airways.
Country Joe McDonald died last month, coincidentally, and I don’t think he would have been interested in the trials and tribulations of AFCW.
Maybe his political activism would have gone down well in the Dons Trust, though. On second thoughts, they’d probably consider him too much of a moderate.
But if he was a secret fan, and if he was alive today, he would likely be turning in his grave over how this season has ended.
Yes, we’re safe. Yes, it didn’t matter yesterday. Yes, these kind of things happen when there’s absolutely nothing to play for.
But by fuck, I’m not sorry we don’t have a game now until the 7th to 9th of August, when the Carabao Cup kicks off.
Well, a competitive game anyway. No doubt we’re lining up lucrative friendlies against Crawley, Barnet, Brentford and the usual pissup training camp in Benidorm as we speak.
No doubt there will be a out-of-nowhere type fixture that will be of potential interest. Only to find it will be Bracknell Town away.
Fixtures that we’ll pretend don’t matter, but will gleefully over-react to when our lot lose 3-0 at the Hive.
I was enjoying what proved to be an anti-climatic day at Orient, and when I saw the scoreline ratchet up against us in SW17, I was certainly glad I was in east London.
I think if truth be told, this is a squad that has reached the end of its shelf life, and a lot of it now needs tearing down and starting again.
Our defence, that got us into L1 this time last year, now looks ragged and as easily penetrable as a [SIMILE CENSORED FOR COMMON DECENCY]
Our midfield is nothing to write home about at the best of times, even more so when Reeves is playing.
I really, really hope the post-game rumours that we have a one-year option on him aren’t true. Or if they are, we and he decide it’s best to move on.
Up front tells its own story, and while we’re not a bad side when everyone is fit and on form – our strength in depth basically doesn’t exist.
Yesterday, this squad metaphorically died.
Maybe that’s why JJ gave them until Thursday off? He knew that they’d done the job of staying up, that they’d given everything** and it could have been 8-0 to Huddersfield and it wouldn’t have mattered.
** – and while one can bemoan the quality, this particular bunch of players certainly put the effort in. Which hasn’t always been the case in recent seasons.
To put it another way – if we hadn’t have won at Wigan, yesterday would have been much, much different…
We can relax now, and see what happens this week with the released list, and who will be wearing our shirt next season.
Maybe we could start looking at those dinghies that cross the channel, and ask any of them whether they can kick a ball in the right direction?
On second thoughts, they might ask for three meals a day and a warm blanket at night, which will be far beyond our 99p budget.
And relax is what we should do, because we haven’t had much time to do that in the last two seasons.
We can sit back and watch everyone in the playoffs suffer, like we did twelve months ago.
It’s easy to forget that Wombley II was quite late in the month (I’ve just looked it up and it was the 26th May), so we hardly got a close season last year.
This time round, we can take our time, think about things a bit more, and take a bit of a much needed breather.
Unless my maths is even worse than first thought, there’s just over three months to the next competitive fixture.
You have to think we’ve lined up some gettable players already, with the research we’ve done under Cope (PBUH) and Andy Thorn even as we were conceding goals left, right, and down the centre too.
This time of the year is actually one of the busiest for a football club, because players need to be released, others signed up, and budgets discussed with various hierarchies.
We’ve got time now. Perhaps not enough time to dawdle and do nothing, but perhaps one of the reasons our signings last season underwhelmed was because we had little opportunity to be more discerning.
And yes, going up via the playoffs is a nice problem to have.
As for this season just gone, I’m going to put my proper thoughts in the usual end-of-season review I do, which will be a couple of weeks time.
If I was to sum up 25/26 though, I think we did achieve what we set out to do. Which was to stay in the division.
Imagine this – before we first kicked a ball, you’d given us the opportunity to survive with a finish above Leyton Orient and on the same points as Peterborough, with a double over Reading and a win against the eventual champions – you’d have taken it.
Yes, there’s issues. The way we slumped at the back end of the season is a concern, although while I was looking up the date of the L2 playoff last year, I noticed we did likewise last season too.
People are mentally worn out, both on the field and off it, and there’s some big changes needed in the way we do things.
The season wasn’t a failure though. And it’s important not to forget that.
Unless I’ve missed it, at the time of writing there’s no JJ post-game interview on the OS, so I don’t know what he’s made of yesterday.
I can probably guess what he’ll say, and he might have semi-expected what transpires.
There’ll be some big decisions for him too, both in terms of comings and goings, and indeed whether he’ll be here next season.
If somebody comes in, be it another L1 side, or even an upwardly-mobile L2 outfit, he’s going to be tempted.
He’s stabilised us, got us into L1, helped kept us in L1 and is our most successful manager since NA (or even TB).
This time of year is a big one for managers too, because their own futures get decided – either by their own choice, or by somebody else’s.
I expect to see JJ back in the AFCW dugout in 26/27, but knowing how football works it maybe wouldn’t be a surprise to see him back at PL for another club too.
A couple of other things, before I shut the door on this season just concluded. Kai Jennings started yesterday, and didn’t seem to get good reviews.
Granted, it was probably a poor match to put him in, but it does show the dangers of throwing in youngsters at the deep end when they may not be ready.
There’s a tendency to big up our yoof to be better than what they perhaps really are, and I don’t think it helps anyone.
Jennings might be better off at Sutton again next season, or at least until January. And yes, I can already sense the reaction from some about that.
Rumours that Marcus Browne might be off for a fee would be disappointing if true, although that’s the case for most L1 sides anyway.
Anyone who’s any good will be off in the next transfer window, and at this moment in time that’s a fact of life.
The only reason we’ve still got Matty Stevens is that he keeps getting injured.
Finally, and to be honest I’m getting a bit fed up trying to write about yesterday – some grumblings about the POTY awards were notable afterwards.
They’re something that are quite difficult to get right at the best of times. Do it before a game and it feels like trying to get it out of the way.
Do it in a public bar area and it becomes a free-for-all. Make it a separate show with admission fee and accusations of money grabbing surface PDQ.
Personally, I care very little for them anyway, though others clearly think they’re very important events.
The trouble is, when you’ve just been gubbed 4-0 they can be a bit wanky to attend.
Maybe there should be other awards? Like best hairdo, best attempt at a long range pass, best defensive clearance?
Or for next season, best crunching tackle on a Franchise player.
Anyway, that’s that for 25/26. It was fun at times and not so much fun at others. But we have a 3 month break, and it’s a very good idea to use it…