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| Josh Gowling Challenging The Hartlepool Keeper Back In December 2008 |
In October 2008 Simon Wright wrote an article suggesting that Hereford's time in Division One would be limited. By April 3rd 2009, his prediction looked as though it would be correct.
"Last October Simon Wright suggested that Hereford United's time in League One would be limited. Now in early April it looks as though his predition will be correct.
Here's another chance to read his provocative article which was written just after the 4-0 defeat at Oldham.
A Division Too Far for Hereford United? by Simon Wright.
The Key Facts
• Bottom of the table and becoming adrift
• Fewest number of goals scored by any professional club
(five men in our Division have scored more individually than our entire squad collectively)
• First six away League and Cup games lost
• Lowest average gate and with a support so thrilled by promotion that home supporter attendance haven’t increased.
• Second smallest ground capacity and second worse ground (Brighton being the patsy)
• Highly limited off-field earning capacity – no executive boxes, no conference facilities, no club car park, no Commercial Manager etc., etc.
• One of the smallest (if not the smallest) budget in the Division
Nothing exactly earth-shattering about any of the above. It’s a burden all regular supporters are carrying around with them. Question is – how are any of these points going to significantly change?
I can only just about refrain from adding that Hereford’s cause this season is hopeless. Stranger things have sometimes happened, and as the Gaffer will point out in public, there is still three quarters of the season to go.
Returning to GT, I really wonder what he is thinking in private. Could he just be cutting his losses, just going through the motions? Even … “I’m in my 60’s now, I just don’t need this any more.”
At Boundary Park, I heard the whisper that club funds are staying in the club bank. Just a rumour, of course, and the club is unable to buy players until January anyway, but I wouldn’t blame our leader if that was the case. Graham Turner has become a victim of his own success. It’s simply a Division too far for Hereford United. It is hard now to imagine any manager being able to pull this shattered, demoralised squad together. At Oldham, the team had more holes than a colander. Hard even to imagine how the best manager in the country could have come up with a survival strategy over the summer, given the tools at their disposal. And who wants to just survive anyway? Hereford tried that in decades gone by and it’s no fun at all.
The vocal few naturally Have To Blame Someone. United supporters are out of the habit of following a struggling side so Turner gets the flak. There are a few questions I would like answering myself but I’m certainly not resorting to personal abuse.
• One might ask, with all the connections with the Dingles enjoyed by both Turner and Trewick, how is it that the fleet-footed and goalscoring Daniel Jones is on loan to Oldham and not ourselves.
• Mention of the word Fleet raises another point – what a pity that such a goalscorer is on loan to Cheltenham, when he could conceivably have returned to Edgar Street.
• Fifteen months ago, I mentioned that a certain Lee Hughes would be available, and somebody would take a chance on him. Somebody did - and what a mess he made of our defence last week. Scoring, setting up another, neat ball control, good distribution, tackling back, working the channels, dropping deep to pick up the ball – it was something of a strikers master-class at this level.
Overall, our club owner has pulled so many rabbits out of hats in recent years that it’s harsh to complain too much. Two promotions in three years is probably unique in the clubs modest history. The shock for younger supporters is that they can now see that Hereford United have hit their potential ceiling. And that hurts. The club can currently go no further and will almost certainly have to return to League Two. Any future promotion bid will be accompanied by the nagging doubt “what’s the point – we’ll only be back again in twelve months time.” One of the joys of the Conference was that we knew Hereford had not only earned their promotion but could compete at the next level.
Given our moribund league position, it’s probably already too late to sign players, unless they are desperate or are people their manager is desperate to offload. Neither scenario is helpful. With heads down on the pitch and much resignation off it, it’s all too easy to imagine managers thinking “how is a near-hopeless relegation struggle in the countryside going to help my starlet?” They fairly expect their loanee to return in a positive frame of mind, not sounding like a devotee of Leonard Cohen.
Relegation struggles are very taxing for players. Team spirit is paramount but that’s difficult at a club with so many hired temporary players. So many of the promotion winning team are no longer with us - and that doesn’t help.
Common wisdom has it that experienced old salts are required for such a struggle, and leaders are required, old stagers, people who care about the club. From whom will our inspiration come from? Two of our longest serving players – Deano and Ben Smith - are no longer starters. Our most experienced remaining men are Steve Guinan, who is probably winding up his football career, maybe as soon as next summer and our on-loan defender N’Gotty who is probably counting the days till he can get back to Leicester. Clint Easton is another of the bench brigade. The rest are mainly young players - and it shows. “Diag” looks like a lost soul, in complete counterpoint to his dominant showings last term. Equally what on earth have Bristol Rovers done to Willo? It’s as though he’s been training with a rugby ball in Brizzle. I could go through the entire squad but the point is made. These are the players we have and we’re largely stuck with them.
When Carlisle, Doncaster and Yeovil blazed a trail for us into the higher Division, they both had the reassuring bulwark of increasing support behind them. This enabled them to maintain progress, continue to invest in new players. As a result, Donny earned another promotion while the others both came close to also reaching the Championship. Hereford United haven’t enjoyed the same backing. One can easily imagine Graham Turner muttering in private: “Do the people of Herefordshire really want a football club?”
The issues have been well aired, so there’s no need to repeat them here. What is particularly difficult is ascertaining what will make a difference to our gates. The prices are already reasonable compared to other clubs in the same Division, and the downturn in the economy does affect the whole country. The population of the shire, I’m given to understand, is only 110,000 - that’s the whole county, of which only half live in the city itself. A higher proportion of the population than elsewhere (a quarter?) are elderly – people from the rest of the country who move into the shire to retire quietly. If they do support a team, it’s unlikely to be United. That’s one of the problems.
Transport, of course, is another. I don’t need to tell Herefordians just how wretched their public transport “network” really is. Travelling to the game by car is basically the only realistic way for much of the Shire. Several large clubs counter the problem by laying on coaches to bus in outlying supporters, such as at Charlton, Nottingham Forest, West Bromwich Albion and Norwich. It’s just not going to happen at Hereford.
But for me, the biggest issue is retaining the youth of the city, and the bedrock of future support. Without a university, and with only a limited number of graduate level jobs, the county is continually waving goodbye to its young talented people who leave, and simply don’t return. Some, like popular author Mitch Stanbury, make the effort to travel back to their roots to support their team, but for the rest, life and other distractions take over. Take Talking Bull as an example. For a decade, the editorial team lived in Cardiff or Leicester. In the latter days of TB, Peter Povall added a Herefordshire flavour to proceedings, but even he lives in the far North of the county. Not one local person felt able to take over and so the fanzine folded.
To have a future at this level, Hereford are going to need extraordinary luck, extraordinary talent, coupled with extraordinary persuasion, or a major injection of cash. I’ve often fantasised about winning the lottery, and pushing a slice of the moolah in the club’s direction. A million - or even half a million - would make such a difference to a smaller club like United. Hey, the entire proceeds of a lottery win would make precious little difference to a Premier club, so why not? Years ago, I conducted a straw poll at another club, asking just over 300 supporters whether they would make their donation to the club, and around 40% agreed they would. So carrying that rather dodgy result forward, that would equate to around 1,500 United supporters (assuming they all enter the lottery) willing to help out the Bulls. Trouble is, that’s only 1,500 max against the 14 million-to-one odds of winning the lottery. Hmmm…. Like I said originally, it’s a Division Too Far."