Still Life Left in the Forest Green Rovers’ dog.
The only Vegan club on the planet visited the Mazuma Mobile Stadium today to complete Morecambe’s home League Two fixtures this term. They arrived in a beyond parlous position as far as their survival as an EFL club is concerned. Last September, Derek Adams’ Shrimps pulled-off their first away victory of the season at Nailsworth with a 1-2 win. They won there by the same score last year, when Forest Green Rovers shared the distinction with us of being League One clubs. But FGR were already in deep doo-doo. Rookie Manager Duncan `Disorderly’ Ferguson was way out of his depth and under his leadership took the leaders of the Legion of the Doomed back into League Two as the club became increasingly isolated from everyone else right at the bottom of the Division.
The woman who replaced him – Hannah Dingley – wasn’t sufficiently trusted by the Chairman of the club to last even from the closed to the new season. Shame: she couldn’t possibly have done a worse job than what was going to come along next. Because the next two men their Chairman appointed to take-over from her – David Horseman being the first – proved to be yet more totally disastrous choices.
Troy Deeney – clearly taken-on as Player/Coach earlier this season with an eye to becoming Mr Horseman’s replacement in due course – didn’t last long either when he was inevitably offered the job as Forest Green struggled at the foot of the EFL. He was unceremoniously sacked after just six games in charge. He hadn’t helped his own cause by being banned for four matches from the touch-line after a very aggressive reaction to refereeing decisions when his team lost to Swindon, just nine days into his short reign at the club. Following this up with publicly criticising one of his own named players as `awful’; labelling this man’s team-mates as `babies’ and saying he’d rather watch the Antiques Roadshow than his own team is probably the quickest way of committing professional suicide as anyone could devise.
Washing his hands of any responsibility for any of the succession of poor decisions concerning management which has seen Forest Green fall from the bottom of League One to the bottom of League Two in a matter of a few short months, self-styled Green Guru and FGR Chairman Dale Vince said the following about this sad state of affairs after sacking the latest incumbent of the Manager’s role at the club:
“Results haven’t been what we wanted – I know it’s only been six games but we didn’t manage a win, There was an outburst after the last game against the players; public criticism of the players. Harsh words were said. I think that was a mistake. I think Troy understands that was a mistake. He has apologised for that. The four-game ban for abusive and violent language towards officials in the game against Swindon where he got sent off was another factor.”
In previous EFL meetings, Morecambe have beaten FGR five times in eleven meetings and lost three of them. The Shrimps started today’s match on the crest of a slump: three losses in a row and just two wins out of their last six games, of which they have lost four in all. Ged Brannan’s team started the game in fifteenth position in League Two; with a three-point deduction from the EFL just having kicked-in; CEO Ben Sadler announcing his intention to leave the club for Walsall and the club under a financial embargo meaning they cannot either negotiate new contracts for existing players or offer potential new ones any sort of deal. As things stand, we are looking at the club ending the season with only Charlie Brown signed-up for next term; no change in the ownership which is slowly strangling Morecambe by not letting the Manager know even what the budget will be for the next campaign and just the hope that Ged Brannan will stay and perform another even greater miracle than that he has achieved so far in actually taking his men as close to the Play-Offs this season as they managed to get. The Shrimps had nothing to play for today other than pride – and the points which would contribute to a record tally for them in a non-promotion campaign. This is what Our Ged said before the game about last week’s points deduction which finally popped the Play-Off bubble:
“Obviously, we’re very, very disappointed. All our hard work has gone down the drain really but we’ll keep going until the end of the season. Hopefully we can get the six points to get us to sixty-three points now.”
As far as the opposition are concerned, Ged said that he is facing an even more worrying situation than today’s visitors have. FGR is a stable club off the field with an owner who is committed to the cause and is prepared to put his money where his mouth is. The same can certainly not be said for Morecambe…
In the Green Corner, the visitors had even less to play for today. Colchester’s 2-0 win at home over Grimsby Town last Tuesday night made it impossible for the club from Gloucestershire to overtake the points totals any of their rivals for relegation any longer. So they were already relegated before a ball was kicked this afternoon.
Despite this, the seventh Manager in less than two years to take charge of Forest Green had been guaranteed a job for next season in the National League. Record striker for the club – Christian Doidge – was re-signed from Hibernian earlier this year. He said – after scoring both goals in Forest’s defeat of Bradford City last month – that under latest boss Steve Cotterill, `a lot of belief’ had been injected back into the squad. Mr Cotterill was appointed in January and had won four and drawn two of his first ten games in charge up to that point. Sadly for him, they have lost all seven of the matches they have played subsequently, including a 6-0 hammering at Wrexham last time out a week ago. This is what he said about the significance of their penultimate EFL fixture for the foreseeable future:
“What needs to happen now is – after last week – there needs to be a reaction from the players. I definitely think that. What price do you put on professional pride?”
It was a very good question which would be comprehensively answered as from three o’clock this afternoon. Steve Cotterill’s team didn’t let him down. Ged Brannan’s, on the other hand, did.
Unusually of late, it was actually dry by the north Lancashire coast today. You could almost kid yourself that Spring has finally sprung – until you found yourself in shadow away from the sun. Then, a keen breeze reminded you that there is still very much a bite in the wind.
But there was absolutely no bite in the home side’s attack once the game got underway.
Forest Green played all the football in the first half. They linked well with each other, were quick and skilful time and again as they worked the ball forward from back to front and created quite a number of chances. In truth, they could quite conceivably have been four or five up by half time. But a combination of poor finishing, desperate defending and sheer luck kept them out. Fankaty Dabo’s dangerous cross was well collected by home custodian Archie Mair after twenty minutes. Then Kyle McAllister only just missed with a shot which was deflected inches wide and then the Morecambe goalie was forced to save a header from Jordon Garrick. Forest players were lining-up to score after 29 minutes as first of all Charlie McCann and then Garrick had attempts blocked before Emmanuel Osadebe walloped the ball way over the bar.
But – right against the run of play – the home team took the lead after half an hour. One of the very few men in a red shirt who put in a shift today – Charlie Brown – chased-down a routine pass-back from Jordan Moore-Taylor to his own keeper, Vicente Reyes. The goalkeeper panicked and next thing, the ball was in the back of the net as he simply failed to clear it and Charlie managed to connect with the loose ball.
You wondered if this was the sort of regular catastrophic blunder which has seen FGR end up in the mess they are in today. Personally, I expected their heads to go down and the team to capitulate. But I was absolutely wrong. By half time, Rovers had taken the lead with two really slick goals. Just nine minutes after they fell behind, Forest were level as Kyle McAllister found McCann with a neat ball and he made no mistake as he took the ball onwards and beat Mair all ends up with an emphatic finish. Rovers then took the lead just before half time with an even better goal. They worked the ball quickly and fluently virtually from back to front before McAllister himself smashed the ball under Archie’s body to give the visitors a very well deserved lead at the break.
Morecambe improved a bit in the second half. But not a lot. Reyes partially redeemed himself with a great save from a Joel Senior free-kick with 64 minutes on the clock. Morecambe enjoyed most of the possession but even so, FGR were always dangerous on the break. Mair pulled-off a simply phenomenal save to keep out a downwards header at the near post from Christian Doidge following a corner from their right after 70 minutes. How the same player failed to score during injury time with the goal absolutely at his mercy, only he could tell you. Instead, Archie was again allowed to pull off another breath-taking save to keep him out.
But it didn’t matter at the end of the day. A team which has lost seven games in a row won all too easily this afternoon in north Lancashire. Call it the freedom to express yourselves when all is already lost – call it whatever you want – but this performance against a team which has forgotten how to win was simply shameful today as far as Our Ged’s men are concerned. They let him down, simple as that.
Morecambe ’s latest loss saw them fall a single place to sixteenth. They have now lost eight of their last ten league games: relegation form. Talking about relegation, the three points FGR deservedly took today did nothing to help their position right at the bottom of the entire EFL. But at least the few tens of supporters who made the long trip from Nailsworth would go home with a positive memory of their last away match as a Football League club, at least for now.
Did Our Ged try to put a brave face on the latest failure by his men? This is what he said afterwards:
“Very, very disappointed to be honest. We should have come here today; we should have steam-rolled them; got straight at them with tempo, desire. We showed none of it. We were just not at the races again today. It’s not good enough. I keep saying it every week. We’ve put some bad performances in. It’s not acceptable. You’ve got to have pride when you play football. You’ve got to able to go out on the pitch and put in a good performance week-out and week-in and not every six or seven games. We’ve got to be consistent. It’s driving me mad to be honest. I’m so disappointed, Again.”
Morecambe: 30 Archie Mair; 2 Donald Love (C) (16 Jacob Davenport 77’); 3 David Tutonda; 5 Farrend Rawson (Y); 10 JJ McKiernan (11 Julian Larsson 85’); 12 Joel Senior; 14 Jordan Slew; 19 Gwion Edwards (17 Cammy Smith 85’); 20 Charlie Brown (8 Joe Adams 77’); 22 Kayden Harrack (6 Yann Songo’o 57’); 38 Nelson Khumbeni.
Substitutes not used: 21 Adam Smith; 28 Oscar Threlkeld.
Forest Green Rovers: 39 Vicente Reyes; 7 Kyle McAllister (Y); 8 Charlie McCann; 10 Christian Doidge; 11 Jordon Garrick; 15 Jordan Moore-Taylor (C); 17 Jamie Robson; 25 Fankaty Dabo (Y) (2 Marcel Lavinier 91’); 27 Harvey Bunker; 36 Richard Keogh (3 Dominic Bernard (Y) 68’); 46 Emmanuel Osadebe (28 Callum Jones 79’).
Substitutes not used: 9 Matt Stevens; 18 Jacob Maddox; 20 Jamie Searle; 23 Tyrese Omotoye.
Ref: Ross Joyce.
Att: 4,491 (84 from FGR.)
