Chesterfield FC, The end of an Error? Or the start of a bright new slump?

So that's it, it's all over Chesterfield FC is no longer a Football League club, it's been a 3 year long balls up. Jack Lester, Nicky Eaden and Tommy Wright have all gone, whether they walked or if they were pushed is academic.

Looking at both ends of the league table makes a sorry sight and a sobering thought on how to run a football club, nobody said it was ever an easy thing to do, but when it goes well you take the credit when it goes pear shaped you should be big enough to take the flak.

Accrington Stanley are up and should be worthy champions and may proudly display the trophy at the Wham stadium and no doubt dine out on an McDonalds takeaway and £1 pint from their pub. Meanwhile at The Proact maybe the players could run out to the Death March or maybe “It’s Over” by Roy Orbison might be more appropriate.

Thrashed at the Wham "Stadium"

How did Accy do it with their limited budget, reported in the national press, of £15k per week to run the club and a massive crowd of over 3,000 to see them make it to League One? Well their manager John Coleman certainly knows how to pick a player and fit them into a simple system that works. They play 442, with an excellent right winger, 2 decent forwards and a team that works hard. Their main striker Billy Kee, who scored against us in both games, suffers from depression and was considering quitting football at one point, let’s hope he can crack a smile at their end of season do.

Our financially lop-sided team was initially recruited by Guy Branston and Gary Caldwell and despite recent additions still can’t fit into any formation, so we are at the bottom of the table.

Meanwhile our esteemed leader Ashley “Promotion is the only option” Carson recently said that Jack Lester is to stay at the Proact even if we get relegated-however Lester is now not at the club due to getting relegated.

I’ve lost count of how many “mistakes” have been made in the last 4 years, from not faxing the FA regards our on-loan centre back playing in the FA Cup, to Sally Swain’s recent departure, perhaps there’s someone out there who could compile a full list? Or just the Top 20 chart rundown of off-field cock-ups would do.

This is Phil Tooley's take on things http://d3d4football....by-phil-tooley/

Here goes, eyes down for a full house

1 Set up a club with too many employees

2 Have it reliant on cash flow involving selling young players on a regular basis, what if you have no-one to sell? What if you sell your best player with 2 days of the transfer window left and no time to replace him?

3 Employing Chris Turner and making sure the people who previously ran the club are ushered out of the door.

4 Promising the fans a 5 year plan, which would get the club to Championship

5 Employing a great manager in Paul Cook, but financially pulling the plug, so that we could not sign enough quality players to get to the Championship

6 Being involved in a scandal whereby someone at either Wolves or Chesterfield forgot to fax the FA about us playing a loan player. Chesterfield had to replay a cup tie, Wolves were not punished, draw your own conclusions.

7 Allowing Chris Turner on the radio sounding worse for wear. Allowing Chris Turner to say "This club does not make mistakes"

8 Alienating your fans, asking for regular attendances of 7,000, getting more than that and inferring it's the fans' fault the club does not have enough money

9 Having a fire sale of all your best players as soon as Paul Cook leaves

10 Employing Dean "3 relegations on my CV" Saunders after he impressed the Chairman at an after dinner speech and not interviewing other candidates properly, we may as well have employed Bernie Clifton.

11 Allowing Saunders to spend most of the budget on crocked players, such as Ebanks-Blake on their way down the career ladder

12 Under Danny Wilson allowing Paul Mitchell , the head of player recruitment, to leave and not replacing him

13 Signing Ched Evans, a man who would face a public court case, 3 months into his contract. The club slid down the table as soon as he was on trial.

14 Not allowing Wilson funds to sign a decent central midfielder to go alongside Jon Nolan

15 Giving Wilson the elbow and having to pay him off, only to put Gary Caldwell in charge, a man who had previously won League One, but was given the boot from Championship side Wigan who were about to be relegated.

16 Gary Caldwell having to sign a group of under performing rejects from other clubs in the January transfer window, as he had little budget, what with Sylvan Ebanks-Blake still raking in the cash whilst not being played-we get relegated to League 2

17 Liam Graham fielded as an ineligible player in the reserves, under a false name, he is easily identified

18 Starting up a youth academy which then goes bust in dubious circumstances, despite fans warning the club not to employ the people who they put in charge-An FA investigation is ongoing. Allowing Chris Turner at a public meeting to make a fool of himself, basically saying he did little to check the backgrounds of the people involved.

19 Relations between those running the club and fans going from bad to worse. One fan sends offensive messages to club employees, he claims to be warned off when someone knocks on his door, true or not? it is never denied by the club

20 Gary Caldwell then employs Steve Eyre as assistant, he doesn't last long and Caldwell replaces him with Graham Barrow.

21 Caldwell allowed a fresh start, in League 2 he gets Guy Branston in to recruit players. Despite Branston having made a mess of Notts County the previous season. County fans warn us of impending doom.

22 The club announce that Chris O'Grady has been signed and is our highest paid ever player on a reported £4,000 a week. No pressure then on O'Grady, a respected player, but one who has a career record of only 10 goals a season.

23. The team go immediately to the bottom of the entire league as Caldwell insists on playing 3-5-2 despite getting regularly beaten and it being obvious he and Branston have recruited a lop-sided squad with too many journey men midfielders, no decent full backs and little pace, many from the same agent.

24 Caldwell sacked, meaning Chesterfield is now paying off the last 3 managers and all their backroom staff.

25 Ex Player Jack Lester employed as manager he starts off brightly, but soon injuries take their toll and he has to compile half a new team in the dreaded January window, picking up a couple of decent players, but also cast-offs and crocks. He can't get the team to perform on a regular basis, there seems to be no winning formula to a team formation. We get relegated out of the league.

Fun times at Grimsby

Of course many fans would like the club to be sold. The ominous thing for us is that it may be a consortium of convenience with Ashley Carson. Mr Carson has said that there’s an interested consortium who want to buy Chesterfield. They’ve shaken hands but no deal is finalised, they speak regularly and have already appointed a Director of Football, if nothing is finalised by the final whistle of the season then the club will walk away from the deal. Based on what Mr Carson has previously said publicly and then contradicted, who knows what lies ahead?

The only ray of sunshine this season

But there's always new hope, next season we can get thrashed by more village teams, as the new season budget is £1m for players, which is average for the national league. Can someone ring up John Coleman at Accrington and see how he does it?

Not Fit To Wear The Shirt

"You're not fit to wear the shirt!"

That's what our own fans were chanting at Chesterfield's players after one of the most embarrassing and humiliating displays in the club's history.  That’s it then, we’re relegated out of the football league, it’s been a 3 year slide to oblivion as predicted by many and the last straw is, that we have played 2 relegation rivals both of whom were on long winless runs and we’ve lost to them both. We were pretty toothless against Port Vale and then exactly the same thing happens against Grimsby. We have a team who can play nice football for 45 minutes, but not for the whole game, if that’s the case, you usually lose. We literally handed the game to a godawful Grimsby team after Sid Nelson under no pressure, presented our opponents with a penalty, after handling a long throw.

In reality neither side deserved to win the game we had 4 or 5 good chances in the first half but only one shot from Kristian Dennis really troubled their keeper, they made Ramsdale save once in the first half and we hacked a hopeful Grimsby header off the line in the second half. That was it, you couldn’t complain if the league awarded no points to either team. Grimsby are dire they have no attacking threat apart from lumping it to 2 big men with no pace

In reality the main attraction for many was watching Grimsby idiots fighting each other and being led away by stewards and Police one twerp even tried the solo pitch invasion, only to be dragged away trussed up like a turkey, it might have been funny if the Police had let him jump in with our ugly crew

Idiots of Grimsby, they like to fight each other

Teams tend to get out of trouble by being hard to beat, especially away from home, however we’re trying to play 4231 in a similar style as under Paul Cook but we just haven’t got the players to do it, in the last 2 away matches as soon as we lose the ball our wide attackers Brown and Hines just aren’t in the game and we might as well have 9 men on the pitch. We’ve tried playing 2 up front but O’Grady and Dennis don’t seem to work together, and if we play a straight 442 formation the team appears weak in central midfield, we don’t have a balanced side and haven’t had one all season

Many Spireites have been suggesting that we will get out of it with games in hand on relegation rivals and a series of six pointer matches on the way, based on what I’ve been watching all season I can only see home wins for Forest Green Rovers and Barnet, against Chesterfield and us finishing last, roughly 6 or 7 points away from safety. Next season the side will be worse, the budget will be lower and we'll be non league and losing to village sides, this is just shameful.

Comments on social media haven’t been kind one person commented that he feels like someone close to him has been suffering a terminal illness and has now been put out of their misery. Others are now questioning whether Jack Lester should have got the job in the first place and perhaps an old stager like Ronnie Moore could have guided us to safety. Anyway there’s a deafening silence coming from Dave Allen and Ashley Carson, what will their next move be in their grand plan, if they ever had one at all?

Jekyll and Hyde team

I hate Port Vale FC, I hate everything about their horrible scummy suburb of Burslum, they have some troglodyte trouble causing vermionous fans and we always go there and fricking lose.... why? Look at it they never even completed the ground the "exec box" appears to be 9 seats bolted onto an empty stand

I don’t know if I can stand this much longer it’s going to go right down to the wire and Chesterfield need to put together a run of results and it seems like they just can’t manage it. An away draw a home win and then a result against Port Vale would have seen us start to put pressure on others, instead it’s Barnet under Martin Allen who have also started winning. If Grimsby hadn’t been on such as poor run we could have been dead and buried now.

I’m sorry but being at 1-1 against a 10 man Port Vale should have yielded at least a point, our team didn’t seem to have the belief to stick the ball in the box or even have a shot in the second half, stats don’t lie and the fact is that at Vale Park both teams had an equal number of chances over 90 minutes. This league is bad, really bad and we lost due to the fact that Tom Pope was back for them and they always had the out ball of simply booting it up to him to relieve the pressure, as it proved their winning goal was simply a big kick from the goalkeeper flicked on by the big forward to Whitfield who finished well.

The difference between the Notts County game and the Vale debacle was simple, against Notts Chesterfield pressed the opposition and forced their back line into mistakes and their long ball game unravelled. On Good Friday our forward line stood off their back line, whist the opposition stopped our side getting the passing game going by simply pressuring us. It’s a division where attackers mark defenders and teams grind out results by playing hard working football that isn’t pretty to watch. Our side need to put in 100% effort in every game and can’t just stand around waiting for a pass, many fans thought we went off the boil after scoring and it’s hard to disagree with them. 

On that note I think most people will say well done to John Coleman and his Accrington side who look like they are going to win the title. They simply have a compact hard working side with one excellent winger in Clarke and a couple of decent strikers in Billy Kee and Kayden Jackson, they keep it simple and it’s paying dividends.

Chesterfield have the worst away record in the division and it’s those crucial fixtures where the future is going to be decided, in my book two away wins are needed and it’s hard to see where they are going to come from, we simply cannot afford to lose at Grimsby now. I wonder when our players will realise they have to run their nuts off for 90 minutes or it's the end of their careers?

Air Ambulance Saves Supporter

The Chesterfield v Lincoln game was held up for for 30 minutes and an entire football crown saw a man have his life saved I think we can all now really appreciate the work of the St John’s Ambulance, the match day stewards and of course the Air Ambulance serve for their effort in the game against Lincoln City

One of the Lincoln supporters has taken the initiative to set up a Just Giving page to donate to the air ambulance service. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbSyu3raMtE
Air Ambulance Lifts Off

Over 6000 people today witnessed events at the game I thought that someone must have died in the stand right in front of us, but it seems the person in question is still in hospital in Derby, if everyone gave a little to the Air Ambulance  it would go a long way. Also the club has announced a match day collection, which I am sure will have most of us chipping in.

Off the field rumours abound as usual about who current consortium might be who are going to take over the club and if they even exist at all? Last week Ashley Carson informed us that things would be moving forward in 14 days, well that leaves til Friday of next week for the mystery benefactors to come forward. However when Mr Carson said that things were as good as signed and sealed with the Chinese bid and then Dave Allen said they weren’t and made some rather unflattering comments about their offer, it makes fans wonder if they can actually believe a single word that comes out of the club.

One thing is for sure, the Chinese people did actually exist, because they were seen at games.

When Dave Allen says that fans need to be “Careful what they wish for” it sounds ominous, personally I’d wish for reasonable business people who could run a third tier football club on lower costs than the current regime has squandered, a bit like Barrie Hubbard used to do.

Currently most Spireites are hoping that, contrary to rumour, Reg Brearley, the former Sheffield United owner has nothing to do with the future of our club, having done a little research on the gentleman it seems he has a “colourful” financial past which has never seemed to have ended well.

The EFL Appendix 3 has an owners and directors test, which is intended to protect the image and integrity of the League and the well being of the clubs; you can read the details here https://www.efl.com/-more/governance/efl-rules--regulations/appendix-3---owners-and-directors-test/ although whether the EFL actually apply any of these tests is another matter. Let’s cast our minds back and look at some of the characters who were allowed to take over at Portsmouth, for example, when they went bust.

6 wins now needed from 11 games to stay up, it’s not looking likely that we can do it.

Air Ambulance footage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te_lqSQYpeA&t=13s

3 points v Swindon

This is going to be nerve wracking right to the very end whether we manage to stay up or ultimately go down, if Swindon had equalised in the last 10 minutes we’d have been looking at a very bleak picture indeed, still a win is a win and Chesterfield played some good stuff and also indulged in a little gamesmanship and 3 points are ours.

The relegation dogfight threw up 2 totally unexpected results with Morecambe going away to Wycombe who are in the automatic spots and scoring 4, with 2 of them coming from 39 year old Kevin Ellison. Meanwhile Crewe went away to Lincoln and tore up the form book bagging 4 goals one from our ex player Jordan Bowery.

It’s great to see Drew Talbot back in the side and he makes a huge difference to the team, we look so much better both in attack and defence on the left side plus he was unlucky not to score with a flick header form a corner just before half time. Jack Lester called it right changing the attacking midfield 3 who had played so poorly at Carlisle last week in came Hines, Dodds and Kellett, and we actually had width and pace in the side, it’s great to see that Hines and Kellet can also swap flanks and cause problems for the opposition. It was a top drawer goal by Andy Kellett, but if there’s one slight criticism it’s that we only had 3 efforts on target in the whole game, still we needed the points.
What is it with this season and injuries? Chesterfield must have had one of the worst injury lists ever, great to see Robbie Weir having a good game until he took a bad knock, maybe Giles Coke will be back in time for Exeter? Let’s hope so.

Off the pitch the planned demo before the game turned out be a bunch of people in the car park milling around and having a bit of a shout, although I did notice a sense of nervousness around CFC towers with stewards keeping a close eye on proceedings and the main doors being locked for a short time. Still this does not quell the general sense of scepticism surrounding the intentions of the great and dear leaders of Chesterfield FC who chose not to grace Proact on Saturday afternoon. To many, the question does remain if a Chinese consortium does come in and are looking to buy and the club are looking to sell, why were negotiations allowed to falter? Perhaps there is some other offer about to emerge from people who have nothing but Chesterfield FC at heart? I’m not holding my breath.
Rumour abounds that ex Sheffield United director Reg Brearley is involved, with Ashley Carson, who wants to do something or other of a financial nature. Many would prefer it if this were not the case.

A Brief Encounter...with no love lost

Carson legs it from Warfey

It was something of a brief encounter on platform 4 of Carlisle train station, not exactly Trevor Howard and Celia Johnson, dejected fans who walked back from Brunton Park found none other than Chesterfield FC’s Director Ashley Carson actually in the bar on Carlisle rail station, all on his own, after the game. There were plenty of people who saw him, when confronted by fans he did say words to the effect of " You cant get rid of me I'm here for the long term" he blamed Jack Lester for the defeat, we were rubbish, v Carlisle, it’s fair to say that.

Then when asked "Where has all the money gone?" Carson said Lester had a budget of £1.6 m which was the third highest in the division, before quickly leaving the bar. In an odd twist on "Strangers on a Train" we did see him on the Preston to Manchester service, where he was mouthing off about the club's finances to fans of Wolverhampton Wanderers, stating that owner of the club would have to write off large debts, if we go out of the league. I’d suggest that Ashley conducts himself in a more prudent way on match days, this is really not good PR for the club. Why was he on the train on his own anyway why not with the team on the bus? Why did he get back to the station before the fans? did he leave early?

Carlisle away was awful, truly terrible. 2 bad teams slugged out a dull match playing uninspiring tactics. Neither of Carlisle’s goals were from good moves or any kind of great play, just them being quicker to a loose ball and getting a shot off. We had one shot on target, it went in, and was scrubbed for offside.

If we’d been playing “Premiership rules” the goal would have stood, as no one seemed to be interfering with play but the Linesman decided we were playing old fashioned “any body standing offside then the goal doesn’t count,” rules and so we didn’t score.

For 80 minutes we were simply terrible, what has happened to the free flowing football the Jack Lester got the side playing in November and December? We look a totally different side to the one that beat Luton, our current form is so bad that it looks likely that we will finish bottom of the pile.

Frankly our tactics were so bad we look non-league already, booting the ball to Chris O’Grady in the air doesn’t work, for the most part he can’t win a header and even if he does we hardly ever got the second ball so it was a complete waste of time.
Once the lively Brown came on with Weir moving to midfield and Binnon-Williams having a go down the left, it looked as though we might create something. Therein lies the rub, the club is in debt and chooses to pay out ludicrous salaries to has-beens like O’Grady who has scored a mighty 2 goals all season, some say he’s on 4 grand a week or even higher, whatever it’s a bad decision to have him here at all, but it looks like we are stuck with him.

For the most part the fans are becoming resigned to relegation, it’s simply a question of whether we are going to “Do A Leyton Orient” or “Do A Stockport County” in other words, due to interesting management behind the scenes, we sink into the National League, or if we sink even further into National League North. Fans of other clubs ex league teams say that it’s a novelty for a while going to places like FC United but that soon wears off and you are faced with a grim non-league reality. Fans are now getting somewhat upset at the current regime and there may be a protest at home before the Swindon game, but as to what effect this may have is anyone’s guess. Blackpool supporters, for example, have been protesting for years against their current ownership, but if someone else is in charge of the finances there’s little that a demonstration can realistically achieve.

Thanks to Holly for the picture

Eric didn't bring any sunshine to Morecambe

Postponed games used to be a regular part of the season, before under soil heating and clubs having adequate covers and all that sort of thing, so were you one of the ones who waited for the ref’s pitch inspection at Morecambe? Had you already set off and got halfway there or perhaps you’d booked a weekend at the seaside?
Anyway Lynne North has taken the picture of the season, it’s the Eric Morecambe statute dressed up in a Chesterfield hat and scarf, pity he didn’t bring us much sunshine.

If you’ve ever been to Morecambe there’s a beautiful view across the bay on a summer’s day, but if it’s raining it’s grim and there are virtually no attractions or things to see. I’ve been to every ground in the north-west bar Morecambe’s Globe Arena, I fancied watching Manchester City or Everton but both were sold out, so a football free weekend beckoned.
I remember when I was young games would always be called off, so you'd have coach loads of fans visiting the next nearest game just to get a fix of football, plus football was cheap and you could get in to most matches

Now the Morecambe fixture away will be midweek and will definitely be a relegation 6 pointer.
It’s a simple case now that Chesterfield have got to win 7 games for league survival and the future of the club as we know it. It’s fair to say that the players on the pitch now are Jack Lester’s team and he’s got to do it. Morecambe face Forest Green Rovers next week so they can’t both win. The current side we have are capable of beating or losing to anyone in the division, my only fear is the side might not have time to gel together and are capable of letting in comedy goals witnesed against Crawley and Stevenage

Morecambe’s manager Jim Bentley has been quoted in the press as saying that he tried to sign players in the transfer window but he doesn’t have the budget to match teams at the top end of the non league who are out bidding him for players’ wages. If the Shrimpers can’t get any new faces in and we can, then surely we must ultimately be the better side on paper, but we all know football doesn’t go like that.
Accrington Stanley can’t have the biggest budget in this division but they look favourites to go straight up alongside Luton. Meanwhile Notts County have slipped away from the automatic spots, managing to get beaten at Barnet.
Budget wise it’s been revealed that getting relegated last season cost the club £500k, conversely Forest Green Rovers have published losses of £2m in 2016 and a similar figure 2017, however their chairman who owns an energy firm seems happy to take such losses on board, well no-one said that football wasn’t an economic madhouse...now what about the next mystery takeover bid for the club?