Before I get into it, I agree with what IB said in yesterday's interview about us having chances we should have taken in the first half and Grimsby being the better team in the 2nd half. That is correct. He's changed it up before earlier in the season, when we went on a bad run and I hope we change it up again. However something needs to be said about us a whole.
I don't think we act like we want to go up. We are regarded as a "big fish" in this league and we need to start acting like it without the self entitlement. No less than 100% every week. Other clubs who were relegated into this league had that mentality: Leyton Orient, Tranmere, Bristol Rovers etc. Other teams who had this further up the system: Bolton in League Two last season, Villa in the Championship, Newcastle in the Championship.
We've got to realise and the players have to realise that we're Notts County in the National League and being 8th is unacceptable. I don't think we have the self entitlement like a certain Wrexham, but it's more a self congratulatory mindset of "we've been on a good run that'll do" kind of thing. It's the sort of thing where we go "Oh it doesn't matter, we'll still score in a bit or we'll get points next game." We're allowing ourselves to take the foot off the pedal too many times. No less than 100% on and off the pitch to get out of this league.
The club needs to look at itself and realise it's unacceptable to be "just hoping to get into the play-offs." Not being cocky or arrogant, but we are the biggest fish in this league and scraping into the play-offs isn't good enough. I'm not saying either that we should be beating teams in this league just because we are a bigger club than them. I'm saying that a lot more hard work and a ruthless mentality, is needed to achieve promotion and win against whoever the opposition is. It was the same throughout last season and we only really got going in the second half of 2019/20 as well,. There's not been a siege mentality of hard work and high standards for a long time and it needs to change.