Who was mainly to blame for our relegation from League 1 (2 Viewers)

[Esoterica]

Mowbray for his ludicrous transfer targets and whoever was responsible for the short term loan/ contract recruitment model (which may also have been Mowbray).

Suspect that was Mowbray's decision but based on a shitty SISU budget and was eventually a key learning point when they brought Robins in.

 

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[junglej13]

Slade who has failed miserably at every job he's ever had apart from LO? The guy was an absolute catastrophe, he couldn't motivate, made the squad worse and played dire football. You say that the squad was appalling but Robins didn't have us in relegation form did he?

Not saying Slade did well just that the damage was done. I honestly dont think there is a player from that squad Mowbray assembled who has even played regularly at League 1 level since. Lameires is the only one I can think of.

 

[shepardo01]

Burge

I'll raise you Reice Charles-Cook.
So much worse than Burge!

 

[Liquid Gold]

I'll raise you Reice Charles-Cook.
So much worse than Burge!

Our record holder for clean sheets in a row.

 

[vow]

Mowbray, without a shadow of doubt.

 

[Deleted member 5849]

I'm going to stick with everywhere but LO thank you

View attachment 16410

I do agree it wasn't a crazy appointment as he was a manager with a record in the league but he was just awful, I rank him worse than Thorn for us.

And the others were successful. Scarborough, Grimsby in crisis but he turned them around. Cardiff had to prune costs all over the place, but he kept them competitive. Yeovil he took to the playoff final when they had no right to be there.

To say he wasn't successful at those clubs would be like saying Robins was a failure with us if we have a poor season next season. And of course it would be a nutter who demanded his head if we struggle, with the constraints we have.

Now... based on his record from Charlton onwards, you'd be having serious questions if he was appointed at your club! Grimsby second time around was his last chance really, but it seemed to go utterly pear shaped.

I'm agreeing with your last sentence btw! Thorn falls into the category of another caretaker we shouldn't have kept on so long, but I'm not sure he was *as* disastrous as all that. Pretty obvious Slade was!

 

[Liquid Gold]

Not saying Slade did well just that the damage was done. I honestly dont think there is a player from that squad Mowbray assembled who has even played regularly at League 1 level since. Lameires is the only one I can think of.

The second point still stands though, Robins was able to get that squad, that he wasn't even able to draft in replacements for, playing lower mid table form.

 

[Esoterica]

I'll raise you Reice Charles-Cook.
So much worse than Burge!

In a moment of rare weakness last week, I happened to click on one of the fan picked 'best in your lifetime CCFC XIs' they've been running on the offal and the poor lad had picked Reice Charles-Cook as his keeper. He was a teenager tbf but still! He must have seen at least one of Westwood, Murphy, Marosi!

 

[shepardo01]

Our record holder for clean sheets in a row.

I do know that. Very poor keeper though.
Can't recall who played most in the relegation season, but a lack of experienced (or could even say standard league 1 keeper!) Keeper in Mowbrays first season is, in my opinion one of the main reasons why we fell short.
I'd say the players in front of him and the opposition were bigger factors than his quality in the consecutive clean sheet record.

 

[shepardo01]

In a moment of rare weakness last week, I happened to click on one of the fan picked 'best in your lifetime CCFC XIs' they've been running on the offal and the poor lad had picked Reice Charles-Cook as his keeper. He was a teenager tbf but still! He must have seen at least one of Westwood, Murphy, Marosi!

Probably replied to a social media message or two...

 

[HuckerbyDublinWhelan]

Pissing about with Venus as long as we did didn’t help

 

[fatso]

I blame Craig Bellamy.





For pretty much everything!

 

[Legia Sky Blue]

Although Mowbray set us on the way with poor Summer transfers and a bad start, when he left there was plenty of time to turn things round, or at least not to be relegated anyway. As such I think Venus and Slade were more culpable. You have to be seriously bad to get relegated from league 1 and we were embarrassingly bad. Venus was in charge for more games than any of the other managers used in that season and seemed to be the easy option. It took too long to bring in a permanent manager in Slade, but he was a bad fit too, and provided no new manager inspired uplift in form, as frequently happens elsewhere.

However, without all that MR would probably have not come back and we wouldn't be where we are now. Although at times the season in League 2 was difficult and frustrating, the successful end to it set us on the upward path to where we are now. If we had somehow survived in League 1 with Venus or Slade as manager, we would probably still be scrapping at the wrong end of that league with the likes of Rochdale and Shrewsbury, so maybe in a strange way that relegation needed to happen.

 

[ajsccfc]

I liked Charles-Cook, when a pass went back to him you never knew if you were going to get a standard clearance up the pitch or a couple of stepovers and conceding. Bit of drama

 

[Tommo1993]

I’m just gonna say Sammy Clingan. Water under the bridge, hasn’t mattered for ages now.

 

[skybluetony176]

Venus being allowed to stay in the caretaker roll too long followed by the appointment of Slade were the final two nails in the coffin. The future was written by the time Robins arrived. Genuinely believe if Robins had have been appointed earlier, at least when Slade was if not sooner we’d have stayed up.

 

[SeaSeeEffCee]

It's a combination of Mowbray, Venus and Slade. Mowbray (and to a degree Venus) for the dreadful summer recruitment and the awful start to the season. Venus for sticking around in charge for too long and not getting a proper manager in. Slade for all round being a dreadful, dreadful manager. We were far from dead and buried when Slade came in and he turned us into one of the worst football teams I've ever seen. As has been mentioned above, had we appointed Robins when Mowbray had been sacked we'd have probably not been relegated.

Although, tbh I think getting relegated to League Two was a blessing in disguise. Not sure we'd be where we are now without it, really reunited the fans and the club, as well as contributing to the good vibes around the place that have been crucial these last few years.

 

[SBT]

Russel Slade was awful – However, somehow he got us through to the Checkatrade Final, or was it the players, either or it was a friggin miracle!

We played just one game against a L1 side on the road to the final - all the rest were against L2 or academy teams (and we needed penalties against one of those)

 

[Flying Fokker]

Having a discussion with someone on Twitter who is stating that all 4 managers in the relegation season had a part to play in us going down.

I for one feel Robins should be excluded from the blame, as at the time of his appointment we were 13 points adrift. Who do you blame in the whole debacle?

The players as well. End of contract lethargy, poor general motivation and a disregard for the management structure or absence thereof.

 

[skybluepm2]

I blame Craig Bellamy.





For pretty much everything!

come to think of it, if the little weasel had put away even a tenth of the chances that he squandered, we probably wouldn’t have gone down. You’ve opened my mind up completely to a whole new apportion of blame for the past 2 decades!

 

[Liquid Gold]

Bigger question is if going to league two actually made the club better off in the long run.

I think sisu learned a lot of lessons in that season and have clearly got football people in place and left them to it since. Also we've been able to instil a winning spirit back into the squad, had Robins come in mid season and just kept us up, seeing survival as an achievement again may have meant we just plodded around mid table for a couple years.

 

[SBT]

Bigger question is if going to league two actually made the club better off in the long run.

I think sisu learned a lot of lessons in that season and have clearly got football people in place and left them to it since. Also we've been able to instil a winning spirit back into the squad, had Robins come in mid season and just kept us up, seeing survival as an achievement again may have meant we just plodded around mid table for a couple years.

Getting relegated didn't make us better off in 2001 or 2012. We all have fond memories of the L2 season but it was one game away from being a failure. I think most of us would have been happy with Robins getting us back into the Championship within three years regardless of whether we had to drop down to L2 in the process, so it's not as if we needed to get relegated per se.

 

[no_loyalty]

Mowbray, Venus, Fisher and Slade.

 

[Earlsdon_Skyblue1]

It'll be interesting to see the Mowbray apologists come out here. Some people seem to think because we had half a good season that he gets exempt from any criticism.

The catalyst was him, and for me that squad as pretty much as good as relegated before we had even kicked a ball. I remember saying on here at the time that I thought we could be in for a really tough season, and got a fistful of abuse!

Slade certainly didn't help things, but he is an easy target really. If I could sum it up. Mowbray gave us the grenade, Slade just pulled the pin out.

 

[It’sabatch87]

Russell Slade,I’ve never been so embarrassed as that joke of a performance at Bristol rovers on the Boxing Day it was Baltic.
I was gone by 80 mins back in the car think it was 3 or 4 by then!!

 

[Grendel]

Russell Slade,I’ve never been so embarrassed as that joke of a performance at Bristol rovers on the Boxing Day it was Baltic.
I was gone by 80 mins back in the car think it was 3 or 4 by then!!

you clearly didn’t go to the hawthorns in the late 70’s then

 

[wingy]

Mowbray - 10 games without a win 6 points

Next 6 games after he left 13 points

1 win in the next 22 under venus and Slade 7 points

Next 8 games 13 points


so our 39 points were split


13 points in Venus 1st 6 games
13 points in Robins last 8 games
13 points in the other 32 games in 2 long periods of dross under Mowbray/Venus/Slade (ok, took Robins 2 or 3 games at the end of that spell, but showed in the last 8 games that it was possible to get points with that team)

Reading that I can't dispel the idea that the oft mentioned renewal plan was implemented .

 

[hill83]

Bit of everything really. Slade was absolute shite. But Mowbray shouldn’t get away with it either. Put it this way, I wouldn’t have any of them back.

 

[AlansEyes]

Ben Turner. His glass ankle going (when we ended up drawing with Oldham) completely killed our season the year before relegation.

Seriously, from then on Mowbray seemed utterly clueless and his pre-season and start of the relegation season was an absolute disaster. Venus gets a bit of a pass as he was given a job he was in no way qualified for. I really thought Slade would turn us around so he gets some extra negative points due to the false hope.

 

[bawtryneal]

Always amazes me the slating Slade takes. Mowbray knew when he resigned that him and Venus had failed miserably with the recruitment that summer. The squad was appalling. I remember going to Swindon away on the opening day and fearing the worst. Slade was brought in January with no budget to try and wheel and deal. He had a stab in very hard circumstances and couldn't improve a really poor side.

In Mowbreys defence he had identified several transfer targets, all agreed with SISU original budget for the season, and then SISU reduced the budget significantly and he had to build a squad at the last minute with 30% reduced budget. Hence the dross they panic bought !

 

[It’sabatch87]

you clearly didn’t go to the hawthorns in the late 70’s then

Funnily enough my first away game was at West Brom in 82 that cup game lost 2-0 it rained a bit that day!!

 

[wingy]

In Mowbreys defence he had identified several transfer targets, all agreed with SISU original budget for the season, and then SISU reduced the budget significantly and he had to build a squad at the last minute with 30% reduced budget. Hence the dross they panic bought !

Can you remember what was going on around that?
Was it a transfer fee Coming in or anything to do with the ground situation .
I know that scenario was out there,just can't remember what caused the uncertainty.

 

[hamil99]

Just had a look at what Mark Venus is doing now. Seems he's run back to daddy and is assistant to Mowbrey at Blackburn.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

In a moment of rare weakness last week, I happened to click on one of the fan picked 'best in your lifetime CCFC XIs' they've been running on the offal and the poor lad had picked Reice Charles-Cook as his keeper. He was a teenager tbf but still! He must have seen at least one of Westwood, Murphy, Marosi!

Blm

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

In Mowbreys defence he had identified several transfer targets, all agreed with SISU original budget for the season, and then SISU reduced the budget significantly and he had to build a squad at the last minute with 30% reduced budget. Hence the dross they panic bought !

Really? Do we know that?