Ford 2 Billericay 1

[Rod]

A very poor display from Billericay. Manager decided to play himself in the centre of defence but this just seemed to confuse the other defenders who it appeared did not know where they should be. Also we started with just two attacking players on the pitch (Hockton and Ansell) so it was no suprise we did not create much.

 

Second half we changed things around with Justin bringing himself off and Marlon coming on. Things bearly improved though and the goal from Danny at the end was merely a consolation.

 

There were a number of bad performances today I wont list them all, but the most worrying thing is it is difficult to see where improvement is going to come from. No money to buy players and clearly we only have a few who can hack it at this level.

[Andy P]

Yep, agree with all that you say. At the end of the day if you're not good enough you're just not good enough, simple as that, no matter how much time is spent on the training ground or how much effort is put in on the pitch. The longer things are left the more desparate the situation is going to get, a big clearout is needed now whilst the season is still young and we still have time to pull things round.

[paulc27]

can i ask peoples opinions on something? I work in an industry where if i dont achieve certain targets or if i make too many errors i will and would expect to lose my job. How long is Justin going to be given to 'turn things around'? i know funds are limited but there are only a few teams in this league that are cash happy. The players that are here now, except JJ, Penn, Ansell and Henty are all players that Justin has bought in. He has been given a budget of some kind and clearly the players he has picked are just not good enough at this level. With the football league having financial troubles there was supposed to be a serious influx of exleague players filtering down the leagues which in turn could have given the non league game some decent 3rd div or more likely conference players available. Our manager opted to go for the best of youth from divisions lower than ours without bringing in one player that has any proven ryman experience. surely there were/are older players with a wealth of experience that wouldnt have cost much more than the youngsters we currently have (chris moore being a very good example). Are that not players we could get on loan for a few months? (DJ and that young fella from hornchurch made a big difference last season)

yes, there have been games we were unlucky to not get something from but i think if most are honest, we have looked pretty avergage for the most part. The manager is judged on results,and 4 points gained, coming up to 20 goals conceeded, with only a handfull scored is surely not acceptable. Is not use to anyone looking back at the end of the season and saying 'but we were so unlucky to not have won here...or there'

Please dont think im trying to start a witch hunt here, and i will always support my team, but what are people views on how long a manager/our manager should be given to turn this around. do you think he can turn it around?

Ford are not having a bad season but they are by far one of the lesser teams in our league and we have been turned over once again.

[BTFC Martin]

Give the guy a chance. I think a manager deserves more than 9 games. Unless its a complete disaster and we don't get another point then I think a manager should be given a season or two to turn it around. Calder was given 4 years.

[Rod]

I don't think you can blame Justin for the players brought in, he was acting on the advice of others presumably Tony Cross in particular who has a knowledge of local players, if not Ryman Premier standard.

 

Equally players like Chris Moore and DJ Campbell will want wages we can no longer afford.

 

When you have no money you have to get results on team spirit and getting the maximum out of the players you have. We will have to see if Justin can do this, I do not think the answer at the moment is to bring in a new manager though.

[jl]

agree with rod and andy p but disagree to a degree with paul.

 

saturday was a miserable performance, in fact the first 45 mins was as bad as i can remember in the 5 years ive been watching town. i dont think the manager helped himself in this game by

1) not playing his best available xi. in our position whatever the reasons you play your best team, even if there are arguements, disputes, or someone is on their way i am sure they are professional enough to do their best for 90 minutes.

2) when you have a poor team one of the ways you can improve them is get them organised, in other words everyone knows the system, knows what is expected of them, and where they are expected to play. our change of system was one of the reasons we lost the game (although the main one was we werent good enough)

 

however in my opinion the root cause of the problem isnt the management or the players (they are doing their best, they just aint up to it - pay peanuts get monkeys - sad but true). we need a rather rapid cost-benefit analysis of spending some money on players, whether its worth risking some money on better players to get us in the conference south next year or be left wallowing around in div. one medicority next year as that is what will clearly happen should the staus quo continue.

 

coming back to the game ford were pretty average to my mind but they were still good enough to outclass us completely. well over half the crowd came from billericay and it was a pretty sickening experience, especially watching sammy inhaler cooper have time to have his barnet re highlighted before slotting in their second.

 

trying to think of some positives i spose we won the second half 1-0 when we reverted to 4-4-2 (altho we didnt deserve to), danny hockton made it 4 goals in 9 which is pretty good for a struggling team and i take my hat off to redders who has the never say die attitude a few of the others could do with.

 

god help us tuesday

[c'mon ricay]

Well Justin shouldnt be got rid of a manager needs to be given time am sure he would have learnt something from all the top managers he worked under such as Terry Venables. I feel the problem lies at board level the resources Justin had were tiny or non-existent which has led to the club bringing in players on small wages and as the club has paided peanuts bar Hockton and Reddington they have got monkeys that will probably see the club playing football in the 1st division next season unless Rod investing money into the club which I cant see happening. Division 1 the price of Basildon

[cro]

To my knowledge Saturday's squad at Fords and indeed other squads, and I think I am correct in saying, consisted of only Steve Jones from Tilbury who Tony Cross advised Justin on, a player, who I believe was chased by Thurrock and a number of other Ryman Prem clubs until Billericay signed him. Being an onlooker , we as supporters instead of presuming should may be more aware of the facts. Speaking of Tony Cross, we should all perhaps take a trip and watch the reserves that he and his assistant have grouped together, considering the club had no real reserve side last year, they have built a reasonably young squad who play attractive football and can only bode well for the future of Billericay Town. A team that have beat Hornchurch, consisting of 7 first team players and lost 3-0 to Dagenham, consisting of 8 players who have played in and still play conference football. Blame is easy to apportion when things are not going to well, however, I assume that Justin as 1st team Manager has the last say on who plays and who doesn't. Let's all pull together and support Justin, his staff and the club in general, presumptions are easy to make, be sure of your facts before posting these sort of comments.

[Always Blue12]

In response to Rod's post of the 14th September 2003, presumptions are very dangerous and he should have found out the facts before making rash statements like he has done on his post. The only player in Billericay's current squad who Tony Cross advised Justin on was Steve Jones from Tilbury, as quite rightly stated in a previous post he was sought after by a number of other Ryman Prem clubs(and don't forget is only twenty years of age). As a few of our fellow Town supporters have said after watching a few of their games, "you should go and have a look at the squad of players Tony and his assistant have pulled together, a few of them could break through into the first team later on in the season". Let's hope future post's are based on fact not fiction. The facts are Steve Jones played in our only win against Hornchurch and also in our draw against Kingstonian, let's all get behind Justin and his players. Once a blue always a blue.

[Urchin Boy]

Ok, From What I've Gathered, None Of You Have A Problem With Justin !

 

It's Just That You Have No Transfer Funds Available !