A lot has been said on the County Grandstand thread about this topic. That will wind down soon so I thought it was appropriate to keep it going here. My view:

We are in a results based business but entertainment is also important. If the Managers don’t get the results, eventually they are moved. They are not moved because they haven’t entertained the fans. The fans decide if they are entertained or not by the numbers that attend. Or do they attend to see the win? Hmmm.

Entertainment for me, is not as important as the result. I go to see the County win, if they do it with entertainment, great, but for me it is more important that we win. Just my opinion.

At the moment, we aren’t. That is the frustrating thing. We were superb at the start of the season, now we have tailed off and are just hanging on and hoping. We could do so much better.

Just ask the old Wimbledon fans Mike and I think you will find your answer!

As a rule Stan would be all over a thread like this like a tramp on chips. Perhaps my inappropriate simile will draw him from his cover.

Imagine a hypothetical situation where every County game you attended was either a dire 1-0, 0-0 or 0-1. But whenever you didn't watch (I'm putting this to the test on Saturday) they romped home 5-0.

Would you still go?

Good Morning

As always there is no black and white answer that applies to everyone. So are we looking for the answers that suit the club as opposed to individuals?
Then, who decides the club’s view? The board as a fans representative? Long term survival has to be the sole objective, building foundations for a secure future must be priority over which league we play in.
All the answers are intertwined in my opinion and opposed views are not mutually exclusive. A hard core of fans will attend whatever the level of entertainment, another group will add to that by attending when things are going well and success is imminent. Not sure if a large group will attend solely on entertainment grounds without results as this eventually will take us down the leagues.
I think I look at in short term situations, at this very moment in time, with promotion a possibility then I’ll take the crap 1-0 win. Not necessarily within the ninety minutes of watching but very soon after and until the start of the next game, where it’s back to hoping for a stunning 4-0 master class.
In summary, for the rest of the season, just win, however it’s done. For the following season plan to find players and a tactical approach that delivers both a good visual experience and a tangible return in points. That will increase crowds and in turn , if managed correctly, progress the club in the right direction.

Phil in Northampton

Depends on the tools available to you.

When you're plucky underdogs with a poor budget, I will accept playing the percentages to try and squeeze the maximum out of a limited squad.

When you have a squad of about 28 players and clearly have a budget of a top 7 side, I expect us to play with a little more swagger than what we've seen over the past 3/4 months. Not much more, just to be able to string together the odd decent move and create some chances from open play would suffice.

The other issue at the moment is the COVID situation. As a supporter you don't get the benefit of a couple of pints, the matchday atmosphere, the ability to sing and shout during the match, so the quality of the product is actually reasonably important at the moment. If the match is of poor quality, and continues to be of poor quality for a sustained period of time, people will lose interest as the product has nothing else of any interest whatsoever.

The annoying thing is, our dull and predictable way of playing is easily solved with the personnel we already have at our disposal, but we're choosing to carry on boring everyone to death.

One final point, if we are going to insist on playing percentages and trying to feed off set plays, can we please revert back to the ideas of early season, where every set play appeared to have a purpose? Why is it, that as soon as we rely on set plays a lot heavier, we have stopped being creative with them? Braindead.

A team top of the league and winning games will with boring football will draw bigger crowds than the same team bottom of that league getting spanked every week but playing attractive football.

So on average results are what matter but the average is made up of many very different individuals.

As long as we are in contention who cares how we get the points

I'm not enjoying the football this season, but I have no idea how much that is down to the alien playing conditions for the team. They are in the entertainment business which implies an audience to perform for. The fact that we are still in contention would suggest other sets of supporters are equally frustrated. On that basis I'll cut the team some slack (a lot of slack). They feed off the approval of an audience, that has been denied them this season. It must be a strange way of earning a living at the moment.

The way we started the season I honestly thought we would win the league. We were playing the best football in years, but just like last year at a certain point in the season we revert to hoofball. it didn't work then and it hasn't worked this season. 24 pts from a possible 74 is a pretty poor return.
If hoofball worked and we were walking the league we would not be having this discussion, but it hasn't worked yet we still persist with it.
If our form was reliant on one player (Twine) then our recruitment has been very very poor. What's even more baffling is bringing in players in January and not using them when everyman and his dog can see your plan is not working. At the moment we are not getting entertained and not getting results the pack is closing and I personally think we will miss out on the play offs.
Hope I'm wrong, big question is if we drop out of the play offs we will try something different to get back or stick with the awful spectacle we are being served up at the moment.

JonD wrote:As a rule Stan would be all over a thread like this like a tramp on chips. Perhaps my inappropriate simile will draw him from his cover.

Imagine a hypothetical situation where every County game you attended was either a dire 1-0, 0-0 or 0-1. But whenever you didn't watch (I'm putting this to the test on Saturday) they romped home 5-0.

Would you still go?

I’m an exponent of the ‘if I don’t turn up we’re bound to win’ hypothesis. I’ve tried it twice recently and saved myself £20. The last game I enjoyed was the Bradford game at the CCS.

amberbhoy wrote:The way we started the season I honestly thought we would win the league. We were playing the best football in years, but just like last year at a certain point in the season we revert to hoofball. it didn't work then and it hasn't worked this season. 24 pts from a possible 74 is a pretty poor return.
If hoofball worked and we were walking the league we would not be having this discussion, but it hasn't worked yet we still persist with it.
If our form was reliant on one player (Twine) then our recruitment has been very very poor. What's even more baffling is bringing in players in January and not using them when everyman and his dog can see your plan is not working. At the moment we are not getting entertained and not getting results the pack is closing and I personally think we will miss out on the play offs.
Hope I'm wrong, big question is if we drop out of the play offs we will try something different to get back or stick with the awful spectacle we are being served up at the moment.

Find myself agreeing with almost everything written here, but would emphasise the difference between pre-Christmas entertainment levels and style of play compared to post-Christmas. Don't ever recall such a stark differential. I'm sure someone will disagree, but to me this is why disgruntlement and disappointment is so acutely felt. 'Hoofball' has returned IMO as a result of many factors, including deteriorating playing surfaces, changes in personnel, opposition managers 'working out' how best to counteract our early season style of play, players feeling the weight of expectation resulting in a more tentative safety first approach on the pitch, and management not successfully adapting to the changing circumstances, and players mindsets. Rarely is their only one simple reason in competitive team sport.
Trying to keep a realistic perspective on the season, I will have been entertained sufficiently if we do somehow reach the lottery of a 1 in 4 chance of promotion via the play-offs: coupled with hugely successful financial cup runs.

Don't care whether win or lose as long as the players tried there best and the manager has the ability to attempt changes when things are not working, setting up not to lose is that of a manager with few ideas.
I am more corncern with the county becoming a finacially sound club, run as a business, and not returning to the dark days. The money made during cup runs should have been invested in property to give a return/income, not wasted on loan players who were/are not better than what we already have. True supporters would want a stable club looking forward, the possible inclusion of a SD is a way forward. Entertaiment or results, me I would want a stable club financially secure, developing youth and bringing them forward to the first team. Remenber we do not have a money man to bale us out

All supporters of any club would prefer a boring 1-0 win over a entertaining 4-3 defeat.The trouble is,we now seem unwilling or unable to play any decent football at all,relying totally on anti football,just like last season,to try and crawl into the playoffs.Some have said that they would take a boring 1-0 win every game,in theory I would agree but,how long could we tolerate watching mind numbing tactics and style.Would we be happy with results over performance forever,I think not.

pembsexile wrote:A lot has been said on the County Grandstand thread about this topic. That will wind down soon so I thought it was appropriate to keep it going here. My view:

We are in a results based business but entertainment is also important. If the Managers don’t get the results, eventually they are moved. They are not moved because they haven’t entertained the fans. The fans decide if they are entertained or not by the numbers that attend. Or do they attend to see the win? Hmmm.

Entertainment for me, is not as important as the result. I go to see the County win, if they do it with entertainment, great, but for me it is more important that we win. Just my opinion.

At the moment, we aren’t. That is the frustrating thing. We were superb at the start of the season, now we have tailed off and are just hanging on and hoping. We could do so much better.

Of course the result is more important than entertaining the crowd. And entertaining the crowd doesn't necessarily mean playing attractive football. Wimbledon did very well at being the underdog and sticking it to the "rich boys" and you can understand how that would be pleasing to watch. I used to find watching Lee Minshull on a boggy pitch arriving three or four seconds after the ball had gone and protesting to the referee that he got there as quick as he could. Arsenal fans were ecstatic during the period where they gained a reputation for eking out (often dull) 1 - 0 wins. I'm not expecting to see Barcelona when I pay my admission, it's League 2 football ffs but I don't think it's asking too much to see a side with some semblance of organisation, an ability to adapt to how the opposition plays and is going produce an element of attacking play that will test the goalkeeper at some stage during the game.

It would also be nice if County didn't display this annoying trait of their results more often than not falling off a cliff from the winter months on...