Deja Vu

Brett, i admire your optimism mate but really? As Merse rightly points out, the other teams are out to spoil our party. I have no confidence in Buckle. Where are the new players to nail on a playoff place? We need to be proactive and brave now. It's time to push the boat out, not sit and watch it sink!

For Burton to blow it now would take a Bucklesque bottle job. McFarland may be a lot of things but he's not an idiot. He will safely steer them to the title now.

Oh please Buckle chose the players and picks the team. He also coaches them in his desired mode of playing. He is responsible, that's what he's paid for. Merse i expect better of you than that pathetic effort.

In my opinion, it would be both unfair and unwise to get rid of PB merely because of a failure to get the club promoted after two seasons. I think it would be fair to say that he and the team he quickly assembled exceeded initial expectations last year.......and in the end he was a victim of his own success in raising expectations to an unrealistic level.

When there is only one automatic promotion place the most us supporters can expect for is a play off place. Of course we can hope for more, but how often in our history have we finished top of our table? However, I do believe that considering the resources and support given to the Manager and the league we are playing in, a failure to secure a play off place this season would be tantamount to a sackable offence for Buckle. Once in the play offs one has to accept that they are a lottery and hope for the best. A play off spot this season would be viewed as a success in my eyes..............whatever subsequently happens, although it would rather get on my nerves if Buckle repeated his errors of last year when he suddenly thought he was a tactical genius, but just ended up sending a team out where individual players had no clue what they were supposed to do!

I should add that I have every faith that we will make the play offs this year. It looks as though over the next few weeks we will slip out of them and some will panic, but we should be fine and if we don't something has gone seriously wrong and Buckle would have some pretty serious questions to answer because whatever anyone says, it is HIS responsibility. Some on here repeatedly give PB credit for our fine run and then hide behind individual players and rather bizarrely the fact that everyone wants to beat us (when has that not been the case??) when the results are not so good. I should also add that it may not necessarily be wise for the board to ditch PB if we do miss out on the Play Offs - I just think that if it were to happen the season should be viewed as a failure - whatever happens in the Trophy and FA Cup.

Whenever the merits of PB are debated someone always chucks in the experience of Tisdale........and just now Nigel Clough. Did it take 5 years for City to get out of this league? Yet they kept faith and eventually went up. Is it relevant to the Buckle situation? I don't know - Did he enjoy the resources that Buckle has during his first two years? Were City not financially on their knees during these years? Maybe someone with knowledge can explain.

I really can't believe that I'm hearing this utter tripe once again. We're talking about a young manager with a season and a halves worth of experience. Although the table might not show it we are a much better side than last year. We've got a better squad of players with a skillset that allows the provision of different and more adaptable tactics. I think that the type of football we can play this year is a huge step forward.

Last season Buckle cobbled together a team in a very short space of time, he had to because we had hardly any players, and for a while we were excellent. When we lost our way a bit in late November he tried to improve the playing squad in the January transfer window. Some signings were more succesful thn others. It was a shame the Poke couldn't have stayed all season, Mohammed did a job but was a bit one dimensional, Banim had lots of skill but not the fitness (Clough managed to extract little more from him than PB did and had him for the whole pre season), Adams is a good player but now we have better, and D'Sane is becoming a useful player.

As for man management. The failure to deal with the Raynor situation cost us a decent amount of points last season. Not enough public backing was given to Rice who was then cast as the pantomime villian to Rayners snow white character and he was shamelessly abused by our very own loyal supporters, some of whom speculated that he let in goals at Exeter on boxing on purpose.

However he's been quite succesful of getting underperforming players to play much better. This season, he's turned D'Sane into an asset and Woods, who was very close to a move to Truro into a player who's been a mainstay of a team that's done very well.

As for transfers and signings. Most have been very positive. Sills, Hodges, Phillips, Bevan, Poke, Ellis, Nicholson, Zebroski, Dsane, Green, Hargreaves, Carlisle and Benyon (although his jury is still out) have all been very positive editions to the squad. For people like Brough, Adams, Thompson, Carayol, Stevens. I haven't seen enough of Brough, Adams was a gamble given his injuries, Thompson is a bit inconsistent, Carayol has potential but very raw and Stevens although he is sharp and has a good finish doesn't warrant more than a place on the bench. I don't think that he's had a bad record in the transfer market at all. He hasn't committed the club into giving huge contracts to players when there might be a risk. Brough excepted so far but I'm hoping he'll have a positive influence at some point in the season.

As for additions in the transfer window. Yes I would like to see some in a couple positions. Another striker and a right back wouldn't go amiss even if they were loan signings. I think he's right about making sure that they bring players to the club who are right for the team as a whole. There isn't a manager alive who hasn't ballsed up in the transfer market. For every Wayne Rooney, there's an Eric Djemba-Djemba or a Kleberson.

Get off Buckle's back and get behind your team. You're showing as much backbone as a Frenchman with a hole in his concrete wall faced with an advancing regiment of German Tiger Tanks with 88mm guns.

If we were near the bottom of the league with a whole team of underperforming show ponies who were tied to 3 year contracts then I would agree with this whole Buckle character assasination. If you haven't any patience or the stomach for gradual improvement then go and support Man City.

I can think of two things. Dave Shaw's deja-vu and the deja-vu one gets from reading his posts.

Its a bit like the Premiership - instant success. Bucks has done well and if gets us to a second successful play off, whats wrong with that?

Dave S, you know I have said before that while I may never agree with your views, you will always be free and welcome to post them.

I do feel that Andy(capitalgull) made a very good post and offered you the opportunity to provide answers to what you seem to think are Buckle failings. I see you have not replied, do I take it you really don't have a clue? or maybe the fact is he is doing a good job really and so you can't see where or how he could or needs to improve.