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Post by back4more on Feb 18, 2024 10:26:57 GMT
I would question backmore's analysis of Eastleigh's history. At the end of the 2010/11 season we obtained 72 points from 32 league games, but fail4d to reach the playoffs. At the end of that season we released some of our higher earning players, but still retained Gareth Barfoot, Andy Forbes, Ross Bottomley, Tom Jordan, Danny Smith, Jamie Brown, Jamie Slabber and Richard Gillespie who were all good clubmen as well as players with Conference South experience. We tried yo supplement the squad by introducing a ne3w youth policy, but when this produced fewer first team players than had hoped we bought in some loan players with Ian Herring, Michael Green, Graeme Montgomerie and Chris Flood coming coming in. I would regard a team of Barfoot, Herring, Green, Forbes, Jordan, Brown, Flood, Smith, Slabber, Gillespie, Montgomerie sub Bottomley as a decent Conference South te4am and some off these players have also played successfully in this competition for other clubs. I think that Bridle's takeover was announced before our F A trophy match with Chippenham in November 2011 and by that stage of the season I had witnessed at least 5 of the 15 league wins Eastleigh achieved that season (it could have been more), but I am certain that when bridle took over we were not in a relegation position. In fact I think we had gone from a top half of the table not good enough to be promoted, to a bottom half of the table yoo good to be relegated. As you say Malcolm, the club was going backwards. There was no money to reverse that process. The high earners with the quality to get the results needed to progress upwards were let go. There was even a bizarre confusing lack of direction with some of those retained players you mention having been let go and then brought back including Jamie Brown for example. It would have continued to go backwards were it not for the change of ownership. My assessment at the time and that of others I know was that the club was needing to cut the wage bill - I believe we would have gone on to lose others once their contracts came to an end - and with a reliance on players the club could actually afford it seemed our new lower budget would inevitably lead to operating at Southern League level. The ground was no better than that at the time either.
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Post by unknownquantity on Feb 18, 2024 13:07:45 GMT
What I will clearly state is that I felt that in terms of results already achieved and the players we had our disposal at the time of Bridle's takeover is that we had enough to stay in the division that season. What would have happened next season if the current owners had been in p[lace is something we will not really know if people have clear opinions on the matter.
It is perhaps worth pointing out that during the 2008/08 season the club made a mid-season budget cut and reached the playoffs with an excellent run of results and Jamie Brown, Andy Forbes, Danny Smith and Tom Jordan who were amongst the retained players in 2011/12 were all members of the team.
Ian Herring was as far as I can make out was the one player who returned to the fold after being released, but it seemed to me that he played better on his return on less money than previously and I see nothing wrong with that. Jamie Brown was I believe one of the retained players at the start of the 2011/12 season.
I think that after Bridle came in they had a good run of results for a short while, but did not maintain this form and ended up 12th. The following season Ian Baird was given a bigger budget, but was sacked after losing three successive games. Richard Hill then came in, bur initially struggled to get results away from home. When his team had lost to Bromley in the first week of January to go 21st in the table Richard asked Stewart for money to buy reinforcements and we ended up reaching the playoffs that season followed by promotion the following season and 4th place following promotion.
Some people maay feel this is long ago in the past, but I personally think that learning what works from past experience is often a helpful tool.
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Post by sattsy on Feb 18, 2024 13:22:04 GMT
I remember one of the players released back then as part of the cost cutting exercise was Warren Goodhind, who then came back a week or so later and played the remainder of the season for free! Legend. He is now coaching in Kentucky, USA.
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Post by unknownquantity on Feb 18, 2024 18:55:46 GMT
think it was during the 2008/09 budget cut, not the 2011/12 budget cut that Warren Goodhind played for free. He was in that season part of a team that obtained 35 points from 14 games to clinch playoff sport. That team had a good team spirit and in my view team spirit will be important for us during the remainder of the season. I believe that in 2011/12 Goodhind played for Hemel Hempstead and Thurrock.
AS for Richard Hill who the thread is about I have already commented that I thought it would have been easier if he had appointed someone to work alongside him with a view to subsequently taking over as was the case with Andy Hessenthaler a few years ago.
I also thought that he made a mistake when describing the Newport County F A Cup r4eplay as the most important game in the club's history, as even if we had faced Manchester United we do not really know the exact effect it would have had on the club. Since losing the replay we have played 6 league games, losing four and drawing two and it is that sequence of results that have led to Hill's departure from the club.
With a lot of new players signed on decent wages at the start of the team and neither of two managers this season able to achieve better results this season with them in the team it will certainly be a challenge for a new manager taking over.
Unless we recruit Matt Gray who was Assistant under Ian Baird or utilise Jason Bristow's and Alex Pike's Conference South experience it is likely the new manager will have no previous associations.
Steve Evans is one person who has twice managed clubs that have been promoted to the football league is currently at Stevenage, but even if he was available I think few Eastleigh fans would want him.
I think yjat whatever else you nay about Richard Hill he certainly worked hard for the club and had a genuine affection for it and finding a new manager might be more difficult than some people think.
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Post by unknownquantity on Mar 10, 2024 22:32:17 GMT
I realise in my earlier post I should have sent 72 points from 42 games, not 72 points from 32 games in an earlier post. I would also say that I would not necessarily take the view that the club was not necessarily going backwards prior to the Bridle takeover, but I also think that some of the progress we have made since then has been greater than anyone who was at the club 12 years ago could have envisaged.
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