Huddersfield Town (A) League 1 Saturday 26/4/08.

[Jolly Johnny]

no Lee Holmes in the 16 :shock:

No surprises there really - not contracted for next year, but Ishmel is. I think I'd be looking to give Ishmel the nod for the last 2 games.

Injured as is Asbo, dont you blokes ever read Ceefax ?

But Ishmel came on as sub. And no, I don't waste my time with Ceefax.

I also don't necessarily believe everything I read on print unless it's a quote from someone properly in the know. Countless times bbc sports site or many others say that a player is out injured and hey presto, they turn up in the 11 or 16 that afternoon! :wink:

[belgiansaddler]

Pants. Most impressive sight of the day was Batman and Superman's socks :wink:

We would not of scored if we had played till next month. Blinding bacon and egg cobs in the pub beforehand, not really much else to say

[hullsaddler]

We play a series of quick interpassing moves with balls to feet...unfortunately this is the warm up but this does have the advantage of getting this out of our system before the game starts.
The game starts ....YAWN....Huddersfield finally score after not for the first time passing balls through our defence....goodness it's half time all ready.
Second half we start at a rate of knots...briefly....YAWN....Gerrard fails to mark properly 0-2.
Ishmel comes on ( why only him?). We do have some pressure. There is a MOMENT OF EXCITEMENT but unfortunately their keeper makes an excellent save. Ince keeps the score respectable. I decide to miss the last 90 seconds so as to make the train.

I am not a great vocalist at games but I do generally shout 'Come on Walsall' WITH FEELING!
I arrive home in Hull with voice completely in tact.
Pretty woeful really.

[Salop Saddler]

We play a series of quick interpassing moves with balls to feet...unfortunately this is the warm up but this does have the advantage of getting this out of our system before the game starts.
The game starts ....YAWN....Huddersfield finally score after not for the first time passing balls through our defence....goodness it's half time all ready.
Second half we start at a rate of knots...briefly....YAWN....Gerrard fails to mark properly 0-2.
Ishmel comes on ( why only him?). We do have some pressure. There is a MOMENT OF EXCITEMENT but unfortunately their keeper makes an excellent save. Ince keeps the score respectable. I decide to miss the last 90 seconds so as to make the train.

I am not a great vocalist at games but I do generally shout 'Come on Walsall' WITH FEELING!
I arrive home in Hull with voice completely in tact.
Pretty woeful really.

I hope I'm wrong, but I think you've just witnessed next season.

[Geordiesaddler]

What a shame to read fellow Saddlers thoughts on the latest debacle, many of whom I've met and who I know would have travelled with a hopeful glad heart.
I can't take it anymore, its not just crud, I can cope with that all day, I don't need anyone to tell me that watching Walsall (yes I know we are a lower division football club) can be hard work. We have become a gutless, souless entity. We don't take part in the games its as simple as that. I've watched and played sport for as long as I can remember, I love Walsall Football Club, but this lot are an absolute shower - a pitiful excuse for football made in the club owner's sterile image.

Well done JB, your football club is really well run, just time to re-name it Pension Fund FC and then file a registration for the botton tier of the Cyrpiat League.
Meanwhile, just before you shut the helicopter door, put some people in charge of OUR football club who've got some guts, testicles, passion, and imagination.

[Salop Saddler]

Well done JB, your football club is really well run, just time to re-name it Pension Fund FC and then file a registration for the botton tier of the Cyrpiat League.
Meanwhile, just before you shut the helicopter door, put some people in charge of OUR football club who've got some guts, testicles, passion, and imagination.

I suppose it's a step up from 'Paul Merson's Walsall' though.....or is it :cry: Never mind, I'm sure those who take pleasure in constantly reminding us that without Bonscum there'd be no Walsall (yawn) will soon be out in force telling us precisely that, and everything in the garden is, in fact, perfectly rosy.

[Duke]

the season is ending the way it started :? :cry:

[BathSaddler]

Hard to know where we go from here, but it could, at present, be even worse. Look at Wrexham, a club who have been our contemporaries [sometimes worse, sometimes better] for 30 years or more and who are now relegated to the fifth tier.

Please note that this is not a pro-Bonser post, I personally loath his view of the world, but things really could be even more crud than they are. Although supporting a club who gave up on success, when it was potentially there for the taking, runs it pretty close.

[otherbournemouthsaddler]

Thought I'd go today just to see out the season. Wondered if there would be some sort of response from the fans after the last week. Within a second of walking in the ground, it was obvious that no-one really cared anymore. Dazed, blank faces. I felt like i was sat at a cricket match when the game started, to the point that i started reading the programme (and i never buy a programme!) rather than watching the game. Huddersfield fans briefly tried to raise the volumes but it quickly became obvious that they weren't gonna get anything back from our fans so i presume they were all reading their programmes as well. I've never been more bored at a match in my life. I stayed until the end watching the minutes tick by before i saw the plug pulled on my season watching my club. Doncaster away seemed like a very hazy memory and I was happy that the huddersfield chavs ran onto the pitch cos i couldnt clap any of those players off. I couldnt even be bothered doing that and then everyone left with the same blank expressions on their faces that they came in with. I woke up this morning wondering if it was all a surreal dream, but one look at my bank balance shows it wasn't. I seriously worry for next season cos the board don't care, the players dont care and now the fan's dont care which means nothing will be done to change it. I even dragged my other half to the game today - my god what have i done???!!!

[belgiansaddler]

Thought I'd go today just to see out the season. Wondered if there would be some sort of response from the fans after the last week. Within a second of walking in the ground, it was obvious that no-one really cared anymore. Dazed, blank faces. I felt like i was sat at a cricket match when the game started, to the point that i started reading the programme (and i never buy a programme!) rather than watching the game. Huddersfield fans briefly tried to raise the volumes but it quickly became obvious that they weren't gonna get anything back from our fans so i presume they were all reading their programmes as well. I've never been more bored at a match in my life. I stayed until the end watching the minutes tick by before i saw the plug pulled on my season watching my club. Doncaster away seemed like a very hazy memory and I was happy that the huddersfield chavs ran onto the pitch cos i couldnt clap any of those players off. I couldnt even be bothered doing that and then everyone left with the same blank expressions on their faces that they came in with. I woke up this morning wondering if it was all a surreal dream, but one look at my bank balance shows it wasn't. I seriously worry for next season cos the board don't care, the players dont care and now the fan's dont care which means nothing will be done to change it. I even dragged my other half to the game today - my god what have i done???!!!

Know what you mean, the apathy and resignation in the away end yesterday was deafening, almost as deafening as it was from our players. Nobody expected to have a shot and nobody cared really, it was just a feeling of "lets get this over with". Even at the end the players hardly acknowledged the fans and the fans didn't acknowledge the players. Good to hear some of the old gallows humour coming out but even that was subdued.

To turn the feelgood factor of last years championship and performances like Donny away with a teams of kids steamrollering their way into the play offs / promotion places has taken a herculean amount of appalling management from the masters of our so called well run club. Gentlemen congratulations.

I can't believe you took the other half :shock: :shock: :shock: Are you some kind of masochist? Hope your relationship survives :D :D

[Geordiesaddler]

the season is ending the way it started :? :cry:

Ah but if only that were true Duke. At the start of the season the results were poor, but we had a newly promoted team full of promising youngsters, there was hope, indeed belief that once those youngsters gained a bit of experience at the higher level, and if manager could add some quality, we could have a decent season. That belief proved well founded, and on we kicked.

Thanks to JB that's nothing like the present situation. He's pulled the plug once too often, and as Beligian describes its taken some doing!!

The best youngsters have departed, along with what quality that was added, and there is a feeling that even if the next crop of youngsters make the grade they will be flogged off as well, so the potential to actually build a team of quality is never realised. Also we have of course lost the manager who did so well to develop those players. JB has shown his hand, he even then went in the press and bragged about it, the whole thing is just feels like a massive kick in the balls.

Reading the thoughts of the fans who spent their hard-earned to go to the latest non-event makes me feel sick. We're talking about passionate, dyed in the wode supporters here, who've followed the team through many a black time.

I admire anyone who can be optimistic about the future while JB is at the helm, I wish he would just come to the realisation that he's made his millions, but this time he has been well and truely found out. Instead of the usual BS act like he attempted this week, why doesn't he just declare at the current level (£5-10 million anyone?) and allow this football club, that has made him a very rich man, to have its life back.

[Jorge14]

Couldn't be bothered to go, despite it only being an hour down the railway line and a tenner in and forgot there was a match on until I got in from the pub, put Final Score on and saw Huddersfield Town 2 0 Walsall flick up on screen at full-time.

If we are to get ANYTHING out of next season, the new manager needs to be a clean break from this season, and that means that Mullen surely cannot get the job.

[Geordiesaddler]

Match threads that were regularly getting uo to 250+ posts earlier in the season, now seriously struggling to make 100 or even 80 perfectly mirrors the apathy that has been injected into our football season. The last game of the season is usually one of the best attended, especially in a successful season. I await with interest next week's attendance, and some interesting posts from the missing regulars as to what the causes are and how we move forward from here under JB as there is apparently no alternative. Are moves stll afoot post Trust meeting to work in conjunction with the club to make things better? Or like everything else this season has premature death been welcomed as a blessed release, because JB said so?

[tinned]

Thought I'd go today just to see out the season. Wondered if there would be some sort of response from the fans after the last week. Within a second of walking in the ground, it was obvious that no-one really cared anymore. Dazed, blank faces. I felt like i was sat at a cricket match when the game started, to the point that i started reading the programme (and i never buy a programme!) rather than watching the game. Huddersfield fans briefly tried to raise the volumes but it quickly became obvious that they weren't gonna get anything back from our fans so i presume they were all reading their programmes as well. I've never been more bored at a match in my life. I stayed until the end watching the minutes tick by before i saw the plug pulled on my season watching my club. Doncaster away seemed like a very hazy memory and I was happy that the huddersfield chavs ran onto the pitch cos i couldnt clap any of those players off. I couldnt even be bothered doing that and then everyone left with the same blank expressions on their faces that they came in with. I woke up this morning wondering if it was all a surreal dream, but one look at my bank balance shows it wasn't. I seriously worry for next season cos the board don't care, the players dont care and now the fan's dont care which means nothing will be done to change it. I even dragged my other half to the game today - my god what have i done???!!!

Are you reading this Bonser? You ought to be ashamed, you prize prat. But you won't be will you? Still made your wedge eh? No need to worry about the team is there? Not as long as the gravy train keeps rolling.

Will the last person out of The Banks's please turn out the lights (just leave the chequebook somewhere Bonser can find it). :evil:

[Exile]

If we are to get ANYTHING out of next season, the new manager needs to be a clean break from this season, and that means that Mullen surely cannot get the job.

Will Mully be here next season if there's a new manager- he was brought in by/for Money, wasn't he?

On the game, didn't even check the score till Sunday night, couldn't muster up the courage needed to check how much we'd lost by. Sad sad sad. The team I support used to care, and until someone arrives at the club to rekindle that passion it's not the same.

[Pedro]

Have to say the pizza pods where crap.The Mexicans where good, along with mario,batman and robin and catwoman with a tail.There where some Ygas in the home end.Ned Kelly was in a good mood at half time. man of the match Batman and Robin.

[belgiansaddler]

Have to say the pizza pods where crud.The Mexicans where good, along with mario,batman and robin and catwoman with a tail.There where some Ygas in the home end.Ned Kelly was in a good at half time. man of the match Batman and Robin.

Most accurate match report of the season, epsecially the bit in bold :D :D

Cat Woman did lose her tail several times though :oops:

[leics_saddler]

This may sound ironic or insincere but I can assure you it isn't...

Just I take my hat off at the fantastic apathy shown by us posting on here (yes I know I've spoilt it now) if I could be bothered to reach up towards my own head and remove my hat.

78th post on the match, I haven't even been / listened / cared about it. Geordie has summed it up. If we were all Dingles, it'd be all over WM "gorra gew" etc. But we all just slip away with so much class, like our best players and hard cash being offered. Walsall fans are truly brilliant and deserve so much better than they get. If one day, when I'm older and greyer, we do get the club we deserve now, I hope that we'd still deserve it then.

I can't wait for the clearout. Darren, just make Mr Mullen a cup of tea before you go, will you, he's got some more shredding to do yet. :oops:

[Magic Man Fan]

Have to say the pizza pods where crud.The Mexicans where good, along with mario,batman and robin and catwoman with a tail.There where some Ygas in the home end.Ned Kelly was in a good at half time. man of the match Batman and Robin.

Most accurate match report of the season, epsecially the bit in bold :D :D

:evil: Saved a tenner!

Great day out. Looking forward to many more next season.

[Geordiesaddler]

Yes I can't wait also.

"Next year I'm gonna party like its 1991". :shock:

[Magic Man Fan]

Yes I can't wait also.

"Next year I'm gonna party like its 1991". :shock:

I'd luv it, luv it if we signed Micky Cecere.

[Neuromantic]

The soul of the club is dying. I think I started a thread about two years ago saying the heart was going and it had become cold, nothing has changed, in fact the heart has been replaced by a voidless hole. A supermassive black hole (per annum) that is eating the life out of the club I dearly love.

A new appointment will be made, we might have an ok-ish season, but it will just paper over the cracks. I fear we may be witnessing the beginning of the end, I hope to go its not that, but with Peter Gilman et all getting into position, it looks bleak.

Sad, sad times.

[Whitti Steve]

The soul of the club is dying. I think I started a thread about two years ago saying the heart was going and it had become cold, nothing has changed, in fact the heart has been replaced by a voidless hole. A supermassive black hole (per annum) that is eating the life out of the club I dearly love.

A new appointment will be made, we might have an ok-ish season, but it will just paper over the cracks. I fear we may be witnessing the beginning of the end, I hope to go its not that, but with Peter Gilman et all getting into position, it looks bleak.

Sad, sad times.

Hang on, i'll just get my violin. No, no, sorry I can't... I'm filling up here...
:cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

[Magic Man Fan]

A new appointment will be made, we might have an ok-ish season, but it will just paper over the cracks. Sad, sad times.

The same as it's been for our 120 year history then. No change whatsoever. It's not a Bonser thing, it's a Walsall FC thing.

Why do others never get the blame? Barrie Blower was fully aware of what was going on at the time Bonser took over yet he never gets anything aimed at him. He saved the club with SWAG then oversaw the whole giving away of it not long after yet never gets any blame whatsoever.

The whole current situation came about because people let it happen such as:

1. the other board members who were in charge at the time but allowed the asset of the club to be taken away. Why did they let it happen? I wonder. Mike Lloyd has been very critical of Bonser in recent years yet he was always heavily involved back in the 80s and had the money to do what Bonser did. If he was so interested why didn't he do something?

2. the same apathetic fans that have always held us back. Some on here are only too happy to give us their views on Bonser and how they know the workings out of what happened at the time because they were around. Some of those have money to their name I believe and did so at the time. If they involved enough to know what they did and had money to do something about it why didn’t they stump up the paltry sum to do what Bonser paid to control the club? I can only assume they’re the most angry now because they’re jealous/regretful that they didn’t think of the idea themselves?! Even those fans around that didn’t have the money to make a difference why weren’t they protesting at the time? It all slipped through without a whimper. They’re as much to blame as anyone. That was the time for protesting, not now. So blame your dad Metfan, blame the many on here who are happy to slate the current regime because they weren’t interested enough to do it at the time.

[Geordiesaddler]

Hmmm, there's truth in what you say, but none of it really mitigates Bonser and what's gone on, particulalry over the last 5 years.

Firstly, Blower. What he did with SWAG and latterly in "finding" terry Ramsden was admirable, however, calling a spade a spade BB should never got anywhere near the boardroom of Walsall FC. In that environment he didn't have the capability to understand the consequences of anything beyond "the club must be saved....oohhhhh bostin a new ground.....now where's the pie and peys?" Great bloke, big heart, but not boardroom material. Whalley on the other hand....??

As for supporters at the time, nobody really knew what was going on. Even in this day and age you can't find any acurate and definitive account of how the freehold passed to JB. Back then there was no internet, people were reliant on the media who even to this day havn't picked up on the arguments over the freehold, it was a stealthy operation conducted by parties who knew exactly what they were doing.
You were around at the time, did you pick up on it? I didn't, I'm a football fan not a politician. Like BB I was just concerened that the club bounced back and had its new ground, I didn't suspect that ulteria-motives were at work and I had no evidence or reason to suspect anything It wasn't until many years later that I gained a limited awareness of the situation, and even then by and large I've backed JB. But... don't forget that the rent has now increased twelve fold since JB took over the freehold, so things have significantly changed over time to the detriment of WFC, and teh recent emergence of conflicts of interest have seen a huge mindshift in the whole Bonser/WFC relationship.

As for apathy, I couldn't agree more. i'm sure that there are many businessmen and people with the necessary zest and acumen to move this club forward within our support base. However while JB has the situation by the short and curlies there's not a lot anyone can do apart from 1) stop moaning and get behind the lads, or 2) Try and bring some pressure on JB to review the situation.

You might think there is little point or hope for point 2 and you would probably be right, but JB's record for reacting to pressure is hardly cast-iron!! he has made his money and is looking for an exit strategy that might well involve the transfer of the freehold. There seems to be one such opportunity looming in the shape of Peter Gilman. So are we going to just sit back and allow this to happen, same as last time?? Or this time are interested parties going to ask the right questions via the right media in the hope that awareness is raised and then who knows what might happen. Using apathy as an excuse is like saying a victim of abuse was at fault because they sat back and took it.

Its a common misconception that the majority of Walsall fans understand the situation, that's not my experience. And the silence from the media is deafening.

Also I don't think any of the above discussion conflicts with going to an away game and having a laugh with your mates. You can still do that AND be critical of what goes on and those involved. Hoping for major change and a brighter future doesn't make you some kind of miserable git, but if the football has been relegated to such minor significance that the only thing that keeps you going is the pre-match craik then is that not a prime example of what is wrong with the football club and how it induces apathy?? Constantly at all levels of this football club the football seems to get forgotten about. The reason people have stopped going this season is because of the football, and quite rightly so if that's what they want to do - the football has been dire and the way in which the football side of the club has been treated since January is scandalous, and if it continues (which it won't, because the penny has now dropped with JB that he must reluctantly do something) there won't be a football club, just a well run business putting on turns and a Sunday Market, and a bunch of middle-aged blokes meeting up every Saturday to talk about the good old days.

[Exile]

MMF's post also assumes that there were opportunities for others to get involved, and, to a degree, no complicity. What if the deal was done over beer and sandwiches in a dark club room?

The time for protesting is any time you feel like it, by the way. By MMF's logic no American should ever have moaned about Vietnam after it started, even though it took a while for them to realise it was a right pig's ear.

[Magic Man Fan]

MMF's post also assumes that there were opportunities for others to get involved, and, to a degree, no complicity. What if the deal was done over beer and sandwiches in a dark club room?

It doesn't assume that at all. I actually mentioned, if people were that in the know and had the best interests of the club at heart they'd have know about any such meeting over beer and sandwiches. They weren't there because they weren't interested. Plenty of others in the know were around longer than Bonser, who appeared from seemingly nowhere.

Geordie, I'm not talking about the every day fan. I'm talking about the ones with money who had a vested interest in the club, or were in the clique enough to know a lot about what was happening, like they do now. The same people that often complain most, as I say, gutted they missed out on a golden opportunity themselves most likely, or guilty they didn't do what they should have done at the time.

I don't care when is the right time to protest Exile, I have nothing to protest about. All that is long done and dusted and no amount of protesting will change that. It's about the future and there isn't much of a future due to several reason, the most important one being the club isn't a viable business to get a large investment on someones return...unless the land is sold with the club. All that leaves the club open to is someone running us into the ground or spending what we can't afford then using the ground to bail themselves or WFC out and leave the club in a far, far worse situation than it is now.

If any protesting is to be done, why doesn't someone try doing it to the council and get them to buy the land so that is safe(ish) and the club may then be saleable for someone who is interested in the club and not the land. I doubt there would be interest, just like there wasn't last time unless the land was available.

[Exile]

MMF's post also assumes that there were opportunities for others to get involved, and, to a degree, no complicity. What if the deal was done over beer and sandwiches in a dark club room?

It doesn't assume that at all. I actually mentioned, if people were that in the know and had the best interests of the club at heart they'd have know about any such meeting over beer and sandwiches. They weren't there because they weren't interested. Plenty of others in the know were around longer than Bonser, who appeared from seemingly nowhere.

Geordie, I'm not talking about the every day fan. I'm talking about the ones with money who had a vested interest in the club, or were in the clique enough to know a lot about what was happening, like they do now. The same people that often complain most, as I say, gutted they missed out on a golden opportunity themselves most likely, or guilty they didn't do what they should have done at the time.

I don't care when is the right time to protest Exile, I have nothing to protest about. All that is long done and dusted and no amount of protesting will change that. It's about the future and there isn't much of a future due to several reason, the most important one being the club isn't a viable business to get a large investment on someones return...unless the land is sold with the club. All that leaves the club open to is someone running us into the ground or spending what we can't afford then using the ground to bail themselves or WFC out and leave the club in a far, far worse situation than it is now.

If any protesting is to be done, why doesn't someone try doing it to the council and get them to buy the land so that is safe(ish) and the club may then be saleable for someone who is interested in the club and not the land. I doubt there would be interest, just like there wasn't last time unless the land was available.

I agree.

[Geordiesaddler]

I have to say, and maybe its being in (partial) exile that affords me this perspective, just take a look at your post. Mystery cliques, people in the know, council, business opportunities, jealousy from people who missed out on the business opportunities who may or my not have been in the clique.

Is this a football club or what??

Yes I'm an ordinary fan, very much so, and actually quite proud of it, i have no truck with my ordinariness or any ambition to aspire beyond it.

At work I can be a right git, to be honest, and this isn't bragging, just stating the obvious, if our wires ever crossed in a business envirionment I could probably run rings round the Jeff Bonser's of this world without getting out of second gear. He owns some tin pot company that turrns over about £6m in a good year and boasts about having 300 employees. I presently run, part time!!!!, and completely joint-handedly with my girlfiend who left school at 15, a business that turns over roughly half that amount. The only interest I have in uncle Jeff's tin-pot little enterprise is that it happens to be my football club, ie the one I support.
I don't take kindly to being preached at by the likes of Jb about his well run business, because I know fine well from personal experience, and from a common sense perspective that the business is atrociously run, and then there's the football....

Tonight I went to watch my local non-league team again, because I love going to football and would rather go and take my 4 year old to a game than hurry him off to bed so I can watch Champions League on the tv. Again I saw a better game of football than I've seen involving Walsall since before January. Better game, better attitude. better customer service ( the bloke who runs the club shop had been and got my son a kit custom made in his size just because I said I was interested in getting him one), better value for money, just better full stop. Walsall Football Club at this moment in time, the club I love, and WANT to support, can't even touch a level 9 pyramid club when it comes to every aspect of being a football club, and most aspects of being a business.

That to me is all that really matters, the football side that is, that's why it's called Walsall FOOTBALL Club. If I want intrigue I'll buy a John Le Carre book, If I wan't a lesson in business opportunism I'll watch some cruddy doccu-compo on Fiver, I just want a football club that behaves like a football club - ie get in with a chance of the play-offs and try and get into them, its supposed to be competitive sport not politics...why is that too much to ask??? It really shouldn't be.

[tinned]

Thank you Geordie.