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Who Should We Appoint?
Bill Thomas from Bradford on Avon Praises Jerry Gill.
I felt incredibly sad when I found out that Paul Caddis was leaving. I think he’s a decent genuine bloke, and whilst I can’t criticise the decision at all, I can’t help feeling sorry for him. He increased our attendances, and our two highest pyramid finishes since the new club were formed were under his management. The club also have a lot more money in the bank than they did when he started. Obviously I wish him well in the future.
What the club need to do now of course is make the right appointment, which is obviously much easier said than done. I’m not going to try and tell the club who they should appoint, but I will say that when I found out that Jerry Gill was interested, I got very excited by the idea.
As well as supporting the Bulls, I also watch Bath City and Bradford Town, so I’ve seen quite a few Bath City games during Jerry Gill’s management. Naturally, I am pleased to read the positive words about him from Bath City fan Adam Matravers, who obviously knows him well.
I don’t know a lot about him, I just watched his teams play, but during his time as manager, it was very rare for me to come away from a game without the feeling that I’ve been entertained. Since I started watching them, Bath City have always tried to play decent football, and Jerry Gill fitted in well with the Bath City way. If he was Hereford manager, I definitely think that we’d be entertained.
His record at Bath City over 335 games was 144 wins, 76 draws and 115 defeats, with a win percentage of 42.99 %. If this record were pro rated to 46 games it would equate to just under 70 points, which is about the same as Paul Caddis achieved in season 23/24. He had more good seasons than bad seasons, and I think he did a really good job. He made the play-offs three times and I was really sorry when he left.
I would also like to add that the average gates from the season when he was first appointed to his final full season gradually rose from 691 to 1495. Bath City have more competition for support than Hereford, so they’ve done really well to increase their gates.
A lot of this was probably down to the excellent off the field work that was done by the club since it became community owned, but I’m pretty sure that Jerry Gill’s teams were a contributory factor.
Obviously I can’t and won’t try to tell our directors who they should appoint, but if they did decide to appoint Jerry Gill, then I think he could be a great choice.
Bill Thomas … Bradford on Avon
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