Another saturday, another dismal result.

Those of you who know me by posts on here know I'm very much not a 'insert manager name here out' kind of fan, BUT; does a change need to be made in the coaches dugout? even at this early stage of the season.

Paterson's appointment was not exactly the rousing appointment we all hoped, especially given his CV; Burton fighting a relegation battle and barely escaping by the skin of their teeth.

But the question is, Who is to blame for this?

on one side, you have the brothers. who have been excellent owners for us, and have very much built our club. But it worked better when they were relatively hands off, this new committee and their increased scrutiny of results has caused more issues than its fixed.

another side, the Director of Football; is he to blame? or is he merely the figurehead?

and finally, the manager. He's still trying things; line-ups, formations, new players, but unlike with Stuart, the players aren't playing for him, and despite some glimmers of positivity i've been thoroughly unimpressed.

So the second question; how do we fix it?

do we sack the manager and try our luck despite the unemployed gaffer market being relatively dry?

do we stay the course; get a raft of new strikers including a marquee signing and give the manager time with an attacking threat?

or finally, do we accept the committee **** hasn't worked and just go back to the old ways, of letting the coach manage the club?

We haven't been the same since LW walked out.

The decision-making at the club all-round hasn't been great from that time (apart from Jatta, Platt, Bedeau, Bass coming in under Montague, who's gone)

Who's to blame? That'll need a 'blame pie' and cutting slices. The fans won't be part of that, because they've given the club great backing.

There's no magic fix to this poor start. Just the normal tools - 1) swap the players around searching for the best possible blend and some fight 2) one or two final desperate signings 3) assess the Head Coach like all clubs do, by results, and act accordingly.

Fortunately for Gagliardi, he's safe. Directors always get a longer period to be assessed.

The blame has to be fairly and squarely on the brothers I'm afraid. Look, I'm so grateful to the brothers for coming in and saving this Club, & what they've done since, to put this Club on an even keel, when the Club was close to extinction.

But some of the decision making over the last year has been a little strange to say the least. It begins with the infrastructure improvements. There is always need to improve & maintain the infrastructure of a Club, but the club invested in a Premier League Hybrid pitch, at great expense, when the priority should be the team & promotion.

Selling their important players like Langstaff, when he still had plenty of his contract to run was strange, as well as offloading other players like Bass & Nemane..The club at this point appears to have regressed on the field even though the Club has bought in eleven new players & released eleven.

We've had a steady progression since we were relegated to the National League & I give the owners great credit for that, but I'm afraid that progression has come to a halt in the four games we seen so far

As I've wrote on another thread, the club needs to go into the transfer market & try to bring in at least three good league two players, a goalkeeper, an attacking midfielder, & a proven goalscorer. Trouble is, I'm not sure if the players are working for the new HC or not now.

29 minutes ago, BiggestPieInGlasgow said:

Another saturday, another dismal result.

Those of you who know me by posts on here know I'm very much not a 'insert manager name here out' kind of fan, BUT; does a change need to be made in the coaches dugout? even at this early stage of the season.

Paterson's appointment was not exactly the rousing appointment we all hoped, especially given his CV; Burton fighting a relegation battle and barely escaping by the skin of their teeth.

But the question is, Who is to blame for this?

on one side, you have the brothers. who have been excellent owners for us, and have very much built our club. But it worked better when they were relatively hands off, this new committee and their increased scrutiny of results has caused more issues than its fixed.

another side, the Director of Football; is he to blame? or is he merely the figurehead?

and finally, the manager. He's still trying things; line-ups, formations, new players, but unlike with Stuart, the players aren't playing for him, and despite some glimmers of positivity i've been thoroughly unimpressed.

So the second question; how do we fix it?

do we sack the manager and try our luck despite the unemployed gaffer market being relatively dry?

do we stay the course; get a raft of new strikers including a marquee signing and give the manager time with an attacking threat?

or finally, do we accept the committee **** hasn't worked and just go back to the old ways, of letting the coach manage the club?

The second question is a good one! Not sure there is an easy answer. The worrying thing is the lack of playing style, there’s no real patterns of play, no identity. If we could see what the head coach is trying to do, but just needed more time to Gel, that would be an easier fix. It feels like he’s told the players to be aggressive in the press and move the ball forwards as much as possible. Resulting in constantly giving the ball away with poor passing and aimless long balls. I know the previous passing sideways and back was very frustrating, but at least it was done with a purpose to commit the opposition and create space. What we are doing at the moment lacks cohesion or purpose with very few clear cut chances and ultimately fewer goals. This looks like we have a head coach who is currently not able to get his ideas across to the players. What’s the fix? New head coach? The brothers won’t sack him any time soon. Sign several better players? That won’t happen till the January window now. More time for the head coach to sort things out? Looks the most likely. That being the case, I think it’s going to be a long season!

I know it could get worse, it could also get better and as we are only 3 matches into the new season I'm not going to act like we've just been relegated.

I'm am concerned though it feels like we've carried on from last season, where we finished with just the 6 wins from the last 20 matches, and after a full pre-season under the new coaching team I was hopeful even if results weren't great that at least the performances would be an improvement.

I would be cautious about adding even more players now to be honest, the squad is already too big even with a few injuries today we had numerous players like Jarvis and Macari who couldn't even make the matchday squad. I do think we need another forward but the reason we've only picked up 1 point hasn't been because we've missed a load of chances. The issue for me is the same as last season and it's more to do with creating chances than finishing them.

It's been a poor start, but that's all it is so far, nothing is won or lost this early in the season.

Think there needs to be a manager who is in control of all first team decisions. The current set up is poor.

There is a worrying trend setting in and confidence is draining from the squad.

Got to be better leadership and it is missing.

Hopefully this can turn around

I'm really trying to be patient as we have only had three games. Sometimes you appear to be having a poor start but then unexpectedly win a couple and suddenly it all looks a lot better. But having seen our opening games I don't think that's likely.

The brothers have already shown they can take tough decisions when they need to. If we're knocking around the bottom four after about ten games, I'd expect Martin Paterson's job to be on the line. Gagliardi will probably get another transfer window.

So who's to blame if the season turns out as bad as we fear? Everyone. I think our success in recruitment in recent years has made the owners complacent when it comes to selling players. They seem to think anyone can be replaced. On top of that, taking so long to recruit a new head coach no doubt meant we lost out on transfer targets. It's definitely too early to say whether the technical board is having an effect on team matters, but it almost certainly scared off potential head coaches.

The DoF is in charge of putting the squad together. It's too early to deliver a final judgement on our summer signings, but the signs so far are far from promising - we have a lop-sided squad heavy on wing backs but light in the areas that badly needed strengthening, with loanees filling the gaps. But then he's operating within the financial and time restraints the owners give him.

And of course there's the head coach. He's got an unwieldy squad that has lost key players, but he's also got the bulk of the team that reached the playoffs last season. It's his job to get the best out of what he's got. They're not this bad. Today I saw confused, demoralised players; there was no sign of pre-prepared routines for set pieces (always just hit and hope) or a clear idea of how we should be playing. The least a coach can do is to get his players to move into space and show for the ball. I hope we'll look back on this thread in a few weeks and think it's alarmist, but I don't have a good feeling at all.

I don’t think you can blame one person or one department, it’s a combination of things which is letting the club down at the moment.

The owners have shown lack of foresight, they’ve allowed our best players to leave, they have implemented a system (Technical Board) which has meant the position of coach was unappealing to experienced coaches who might have applied.

The recruitment team (dof) haven’t replaced the players who have left with the equivalent. Last seasons squad has been gutted and new players brought in who haven’t (as yet) proved to be as good let alone an improvement.

The coach and coaching staff haven’t managed to get the players at their disposal to play to their instructions.

The players have failed to implement what they are taught on the training pitch when it matters on matchday.

It’s early days admittedly and we shouldn’t lose faith just yet, things can change very quickly in football, however early signs aren’t good.

I really don't know what to make of it. Notts with our support, recent transfer revenue, profile and facilities should be flying, and I still maintain these are, at least could turn out to be, the good times. But on the pitch, we're starting to look like a badly run, impoverished, rotten behind the scenes, 4th division basket case. It's hard to get my head round it. I worry that the owners have made the same mistake as a few other recent owners, which is to have been taken in by chancers who are good at interviews.

Just a thought. We bought in 11 players & released 11 during the summer. Do we believe that the wage bill has been cut? It may well have been. What does that tell us about the Notts finances?

One more thing. Didzy & the club couldn't agree a new contract. But three of those new players or even just two of them may be costing the club as much as what Didzy wanted. The point I'm getting at, was Didzy worth two or three of those players we brought in? Maybe he was, but we will never know.

A couple of things:

I think it's not felt right since Jason Turner passed away. The club has felt more robotic and operational since then, which isn't a bad thing, but makes despondancy seem larger when it's somewhat faceless.

Secondly, even though a large portion of the pre-season comms were about "the final say is gonna be made by the head coach", given that he was obviously third/fourth choice, I doubt they even consulted him when say Bass left nor when Roos came in.

It's slightly overwhelming for MP is my guess that there was/is a sign of structure/ways of working, but it's not working, or if it does, we won't know because it needs time to gel (just like half of our team).

I'm not completely crestfallen, but I felt let down by Maynards appointment and his lull at the beginning and end of his tenure was only qualmed because he has amazing talents in McGoldrick and Jatta. This time around, MP has Jatta to effectively put all his hope into and prays that it works out, because mate, you're 4 into that 10 games that most people are giving you and you ain't painting anything in glitter apart from a day old ****.

MP knew what the system was before he took over but it's clearly not working. He's got 1 hand tied behind his back. Give him the same role as SM and see what he can do. The technical group is a nonsense idea IMO. It immediately limited us in terms of who would be willing to join us. The owners need to bit the bullet and end the nonsense. Let MP manage and then we'll see what he can do.

Some people outside this site are acting like we’re already 15 games into the season. I do understand the disappointment and concern, but it’s still very early days. There are a few who seem to enjoy being negative, and it shows in how they talk about things. It’s good to see some sensible suggestions being shared, though. I don’t mind reading thoughts like the ones in this thread because they’re fair and make sense.

I do worry that with a new head coach, changes in staff, lots of new players, many of them on loan, and not much time for the squad to settle, it’s going to take extra effort to get things right.

There’s no excuse, though. We need a win, and that has to come in the home games. Martin Paterson will be an easy target for criticism, but I think the delay in recruitment and appointing him hasn’t helped at all. The club needs to work harder to fix this and show the fans who like stirring things up that progress can be made through teamwork.