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There’s nothing new under the sun, as they say. The biggest challenge for Hereford FC this season will presumably again be the lack of resources to compete on a level playing field with single investors at other clubs who seem to pump all of the profits from their businesses into chasing the dream of advancement to the utopia of two football matches against Wealdstone or Ebbsfleet or AFC Fylde each season. Let’s face it, who didn’t have a poster of Wealdstone on their bedroom wall when they were little?
We’re not alone in
this of course. Chester can’t compete financially either with clubs that
attract a quarter of their crowds every fortnight.
However, those home gates aren’t entirely irrelevant to results on the pitch, as the atmosphere generated is always good for sucking a goal or two in, in a way that doesn’t happen at Brackley, say. Also, in a way that’s not as quantifiable as boring old pounds, shillings and pence, some players thrive when given the chance to entertain a crowd, in a way they don’t in front of one man and a dog. Yusifu Ceesay was one such player last season, and if a deal can’t be struck to keep him for this season he probably won’t have as much fun elsewhere and probably won’t find the form he did at Edgar Street. His replacement Chay Tilt looks to have the same potential for rediscovering an enthusiasm for the game to match his talent when he finds himself performing in front of 3000 noisy people.
Someone else who falls
into that category, as suggested to me by a Telford mole, is Montel Gibson, who
will naturally thrive in front of a crowd, but perhaps might need a bit of
geeing up to put a shift in at Needham Market in February, and frankly so would
I.
So money isn’t everything. Tamworth, Alfreton and Curzon Ashton all did better than Hereford last season, and as far as I know don’t have huge backing, so a restricted budget isn’t an impenetrable glass ceiling in its own right. The aforementioned three clubs are also part-time, so semi-professional status is another aspect that isn’t automatically a blocker to progressing out of this singularly difficult division.
Also, a second season
for Paul Caddis with a core of players who know the club and know the manager
means that we’re not starting from scratch yet again, and that should be
something else that counteracts, to an extent, the skewed effect that single
benefactors at other clubs have on the league table.
There were times last season when the difference in overall quality was concerning, notably in games against Scunthorpe, Boston and South Shields, who are of course all full-time. Overall, the Bulls’ record against the better sides wasn’t good, but consistently beating the lesser sides is progress in itself when one recalls under Marc Richards and Josh Gowling the many, many home draws against sides who had been beaten by everyone else for weeks prior to those draws.
A goalkeeper who owns
his area will be a great leap forward, literally and metaphorically. Curtis Pond’s
replacement Aaron Chapman presumably won’t have the same propensity to stay
glued to his line, and that could be good for knocking ten off in the goals
conceded column. If there was one relatively easy area to improve, that was
certainly mine. That and changing ‘Right Here Right Now’ for ‘All I Want For
Christmas Is A Dukla Prague Away Kit’ as the players come out at 3pm.
A fit-from-the-start Willo-Cowley strike partnership would have had the same positive effect on the goals-for column as a commanding goalie will on the goals conceded one. That partnership now won’t be the one starting the season with Cowley out for a couple of months injured, but it does give Gibson an opportunity to cement a starting place.
When he does make his
return, will Jason score that elusive bicey this season after coming close on a
couple of occasions last time? Opportunities should come thick and fast with
Caddis urging the players, quite rightly I think, to get crosses in at every
available opportunity. Even if those crosses aren’t always pinpoint, they
should at least ensure that the ball spends more time in scary areas for the
opposition, and so many goals at this level come from defensive errors rather
than incisive forward play, so it’s a sensible ploy to do everything to instil
panic in the oppo’s penalty area rather than passing laterally in front of them
for ages and running out of momentum.
Alex Babos looks set to play an unusual not to say unique role this season, as playmaker and long throw expert, having revealed a previously unannounced ability to launch a Tamworth special over the summer. If that, coupled with lots of crosses, is mixed in with the passing game of last season, it could deliver a successful hybrid tactical approach that is a little more direct but still watchable.
ABab had a sparkling
first season at Edgar Street, and will be hoping to again get into double
figures for goals scored. If the quality of his dead-ball delivery is as good
throughout this season as it was towards the end of the last one, he’ll have
considerably more assists against his name too, particularly if the new central
defenders are a bit more capable of nodding in his free kicks and corners than
was the case last season.
Those new defenders look like excellent acquisitions in their capacity as defenders anyway, quite apart from any added ability to nod a corner in.
At the other end of
the ‘midfielder’ job description spectrum to Babos, Lawson Dath showed towards
the end of last season that he can do the dull stuff well, although he and
Aurio Teixeira may have to rotate a bit in that shielding role alongside Tate
Campbell, from whom a big season is expected if he can stay fit.
Off the pitch, the Blackfriars End is now incredibly well ventilated, as is Radfords, which has a new climate control system to manage all the hot air generated by the considered opinions of its customers.
Throw in Preston Bitemo, who excitingly could be absolutely anything this season, and Cosmos Matwasa, whose thighs make Ian Dalziel’s look like those of a dieting supermodel, and considerable progress has been made in all departments. This can only mean that last season’s advances are built on to the extent that the play-offs at least are a racing certainty for 2024/25.
COYW