Twenty-Nine days ago it was my birthday. I think it was probably the best birthday I've ever had, you appreciate em more as you get older. The kids came back from Uni for the day, we went to the football and watched us demolish Tranmere 4-1. Ali Al-Hamidi scored a hat-trick, and I had a fiver on it at 80/1, (I also had a few quid on him scoring twice), it was a beautiful day all round.
We went in the Phoenix after, it was one of those pinch yourself and drink in the fact that you're so happy moments. Then, a Wimbledon fan came up to me and said "Let's sack Johnnie Jackson eh?". A cheap shot perhaps, but one I took on the chin. I did make no secret of my feelings at the time that we ought to have called it quits with Johnnie at the end of last season, so I suppose someone taking the opportunity to "rub my nose in it" was only to be expected.
My reservations about sticking with a manager who had won one league game in nineteen weren't simply tactical nor results based. They weren't just that I doubted whether he could take a bunch of new players and make them a fighting unit (a doubt which he has categorically proven to be unfounded). No, my chief concern was that I think a manager needs credit in the bank, political capital if you like. My worry was/is that Johnnie had spent all of that credit last season. As soon as we hit a bad run I thought, people would inevitably turn on him.
Twenty eight days after we smashed Tranmere 4-1, Morecambe did the same to us. I hope the manager has the good sense not to look on Twitter and has not sneaked onto a fan WhatsApp group under a pseudonym. If he has, he'll know that many folks are salivating over the prospect of getting Gareth Ainsworth. The only surprise is that nobody has said "Cowley brothers" yet. Probably most bizarre of all is the fact that many of those calling for the chop are the self same people who have been going around asking where "The Jackson haters are now". It truly is as someone once said, a funny old game.
My own feeling is that sometimes in life you have to gather yourself, take a deep breath and think. This is one of those occasions. I said before the season started that if we were going to back the manager (which we did), then we have to back the manager. I wouldn't have done it myself, but that matters not a jot. All the stuff about people "wanting to be proven right" was and remains nonsense, we must take the course of action which best preserves the viability of the club in the EFL.
We HAVE a manager, one who has shown encouraging signs this season of finding his method. Yes at times we aren't the easiest watch, and yes we've had our arses kicked twice in a week, but we ARE tenth in the league. We've gotten there by being a bloody good team, managed very well by Johnnie Jackson. We did until yesterday's game have the best away record in the league (let's not talk about the home bit for now), and the team is really obviously better than last season. Craig Cope has recruited well, and the players don't look (to me anyway) like they're downing tools as far as Johnnie is concerned.
So my call, such as it is, is that we should stick with the manager. We've hit a bump in the road, but in League Two pretty much everyone gets banjoed at some stage. Everyone has a dodgy spell, this is ours but there's no need to litter the concourse with lobbed out toys. Stick with the manager.
That's not to say obviously that the "Get out of jail free" card is everlasting. I totally disagree with those who said last season's debacle was unavoidable given the circumstances. Yes we lost players in January (which L2 club doesn't?) but we did pick up Ali Al-Hamidi and a kid who in a Leicester shirt is one of the best in the Championship. We didn't in that player turnover lose any of our "marquee, signed and on top money in the Summer" recruits (Alex Pierce, Harry Pell, Chris Gunther), nor did we lose our record signing (Josh Davison). I know someone will say "injuries!", and I know we had a lot. Infact, the "injury index" (remember that method where you add together the shirt numbers of the players who have missed games, divide it by the number of minutes, add twelve then subtract your last three house numbers) came up at 24.87 or something. Apparently that's the highest number since anyone thought of it.
But despite all the injuries, the rubbish squad, the floodlights not being bright enough, the home and away kit being too similar, the grass being too long and all the other reasons put forward, we continued to take the lead pretty much every week. That despite taking the lead each match we were singularly unable to ever "see it out" was to mind on the manager.
This season though, things have been different. Because of that, and because I'm not convinced that a change of manager right now makes sense, I think we shouldn't get trigger happy. Johnnie and the management team will know that they ain't gonna get nineteen games this time to turn it around. They'll know that an FA Cup exit and defeat away at you know who might prove very sticky, even IF we beat Doncaster in between (which is no gimme). We need results, and Johnnie needs one sharpish.
How to get one? Me, I'd be working the defence all week. They've gone from superb to shambolic in a week, let's get that sorted. We KNOW they are good players, let's do some fine tuning. I'd get Morgan Williams back off loan straight away (it was a bad idea in the first place), and I'd get James Ball into the team in a 4-3-3 formation. We are getting overrun in midfield, Tilley in the 10 slot behind the front two makes sense to me. Williams then becomes first change option, Larkin and Lemonheigh-Evans are good players but not ours. They can wait for injuries.
Most of all though, Johnnie has to look in the mirror. I'm convinced that his inability to arrest the tailspin of last season was caused at least as much by his haunted, hunted gait as it was by an injuries. He had that same look about him in yesterday's interview. He's got to lose that, get a smile back on his chops. Lift the mood in the camp don't drag it down, take the lads out for a game of golf, a few beers, a curry.
We ARE a good team at the level, we DO have good players. We also have a manager who is obviously piecing together the kind of boss he wants to be. He deserves to be given a chance, deserves to be allowed the opportunity to turn around a worrying decline.
So in answer to the question "Where are the Jackson haters now?" this one is still here. No of course I don't "hate" Johnnie or indeed anyone else, but I still have my views re last season. This isn't last season though, it's THIS season. We've stuck with the manager, so we should stick with the manager.
Come on Johnnie, time to prove people like me wrong again. Get us firing again 👊
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