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Loft was excellent today. I hope the guy who was bad mouthing him at the Supporters Club meeting was there to see it.

Amusing to see all the revionism going on concerning Flitcroft now that he is gone... The consensus was right - he wasn't good enough and he did a lot of damage to the Club - good riddance. Now we need to focus on rebuilding for next season.

Upon reflection I don't think the tenure of Flitcroft has been as bad as many make out given his role. The recruitment side obviously cost him his job. Initially his recruitment was good, although we were a relatively high payer (not the highest) in league 2. Particularly in the Jan 24 window my gut reaction is he was setting his sights too high, certainly for centreforward and possibly at leftback. What we needed was league 1 ready players to keep us up, not championship ready players. The summer window was mainly poor due to a lack of strikers. I know people will fire back that we recruited Loft but it's also true we missed out on a number of targets before we recruited Loft. Yes there were positive comments about Loft when he signed; but you don't sign someone and say I'm really pleased to sign my 10th choice centreforward. How much missing players was due to budget, wage structure and a lack of realism is conjecture but there were decent (not top) league 1/2 strikers within our budget. Someone like Joe Ironside wouldn't have been a promotion striker BUT we would have been a much better team with him in the squad. That striker failure has largely been responsible for where we are. We showed early in the season we could be competitive in the league but the lack of goals meant pressure on the defence and defenders who looked reasonably solid at this level for 3 months post Barnsley away have one by one turned into rabbits in the headlights. Where he certainly deserves credit is the way he has integrated the academy into the first team. I know there are strong supporters of Sevvy and that many of the youngsters coming through were recruited pre Shanahans. The truth remains young players were not coming through before Flitcroft. They are now. Whether that could have been achieved without sacking some of the existing staff is a different question. He should take some credit for aligning the youth development and the first team, even if it could have been achieved in a different manner. Going forward the challenge is can we maintain the progress of the academy with new management in place at the same time as improving recruitment and performance of the first team. If we are to be sustainable and progress I personally feel the academy is probably more important in the long-term than the first team. The Rudge model got shut down by Bosman. For a club of our size there is the potential fairy godmother / godfather model but this is far from guaranteed. There is the yoyo league 1/2 model which is performing in line with attendance. Or there is the academy model. If we are going to stick with the academy model is Moore a manager brave enough to give youth it's chance? There is also the question of does our fanbase have the patience? Micky Adams certainly didn't think so. My own view is pre Rudge glory year supporters are probably a bit more sanguine about things than supporters from the mid 80s to late 90s. If you followed the club in the late 70s you really experienced dire. If we are going to keep with the academy we probably also need to replace Flitcroft to try and maintain a consistent approach at all levels in the club. If not then I suspect we will end up as the yoyo club as we have spent most of our history, praying for a fairy godmother to come along.

Really good dogged performance. Every single player put a shift in. Loft was superb over the 90 minutes other than that atrocious miss. Isnt it amazing when the meddling piece of <ovf censored> in Flitcroft gets relieved of his duties. The cancer in the club has gone. Hope.

Absolutely buzzing for ryan loft what an absolute shift hes put in today could of gone hiding after that miss. Class from the lad

Should Loft have scored yes but beyond that he’s done a decent job for us so I think it’s really off some of these comments quite frankly. We’re in the game at least and hopefully should have the wind second half. Quick request to the team in future right on half time just boot it clear and not try some intricate move off a goal kick. That could have made things very different.

No he didn't ffs

Why did Loft not tell the fans he was on strike until Flitcroft left? He could’ve saved himself a lot of grief.

Loft easily man of the match , am I drunk ffs

To be fair the cat is looking more relaxed than usual 😄

OR HE Could SCORE The WINNING GOAL ! ! !

I must admit he has given everything today has Loft. Glad he got the finish. Hopefully that will mean his confidence improves.

If the bookies knows their stuff then a £10 bet on Loft to score should clear the mortgage

Think they said over 900. Using the Stoke City calculator we’ll call it 21000 😂

Personally I would never, nor advise anyone else to, buy a lower league team. No money and large amounts of grief. If she was after a hobby I'd have recommended a labrador. It's also one of the few businesses where 90% of the customers claim they can run the business better than the managers.

This is a little bit different because Foyle's got about 10 years experience now of being a Director of Football, Recruitment etc and he still lives local.

I honestly think everyone thought he’d smashed it over. Nobody around me could believe it when the roof of the net bulged. Fantastic celebrations. That’s what football is all about.

I got a weird feeling on Thursday night that I should go to this game. It was weird as I hadn’t had an interest since Derby. 30 minutes later and it was announced Flitcroft had gone. I took it as a sign. Brilliant afternoon. They got into them! Proper scrapping. Horrible game in horrible conditions on a horrible pitch. Loft outstanding without the goal. They’ll have nightmares about him. He’s absolutely rapid! Moore’s clearly got some confidence into him. Absolute carnage when he slammed home. I still don’t think we have the quality to win 4-5 more games, but there’s some fight in those dogs! The fans proper deserved that. Full voice and incredibly positive.

Vale much the better side in the 2nd half and deserved the win. Massive effort on display and the players' celebration of the goal said it all. Well done Ryan Loft, you deserved that goal from persistence alone.

Flitcroft goes. Vale win. What a coincidence.

Wrong Loft. 🤣

Without tempting fate, a win, a clean sheet and Flitcroft out on his arse all in the same week. What kind of sorcery is this?

Feed the Loft ………

What a great player Loft is - we all knew 😀

Ripley Simon Mills - Dean Glover - Neil Asin - Darren Hughes Steve Guppy - Robbie Earle - Ian Taylor - Jon McCarthy Darren Beckford - Andy Jones Bring on Ron Futcher for the last 15 minutes

Paul, my personal opinion on Clarke is that he was overwhelmed with grief , and his heart and mind wasn’t in the right place to manage the Vale. A very sad situation , but I’m really glad to see him back in management again with Cheltenham, and I hope he keeps getting better and better.

Right behind it. No chance was he missing. Helped that he didn't have time to think. Unlike the first half miss.

It's amazing how much more of the game sky show in the highlights when there aren't any Premier league games

Well said. Best game Smudgers had since Chrimbo

Mines going go mad when I tell her we're going home Friday not Saturday 🤣

Finally played with passion, fight and determination. Nearly burst into tears when Lofty slammed that in [emoji1787][emoji6] Clean sheet, Lofty scores the winner. Can't believe it, we've won a fking game!!!!!!! No negativity tonight. Ryan Mom worked his butt off today [emoji106] UTV [emoji123]

Get <ovf censored> in So happy for everyone especially loft My lady is going go mad when I tell her we ain’t going away till Saturday morning now 😂

Yessssssssssss not sure what to do tonight- not used to this 😵‍💫

Gotta say Loft today has looked a different player best player for me in a Vale shirt never thought I would say that but I'm glad to be proved wrong

Get in!!!! Massive goal. Lofty for England! 🥰

Good luck to all travelling today, hopefully there’ll be something for you to cheer about.

I agree...30 odd games in and defending set pieces has been a weakness all season,put that with no strike force and it's a recipe for disaster 😬

Musslewhite was a far better keeper than Ripley and probably Goodlad.

You’re right, the reason the recruitment was good was because we had a biggish budget for league 2. Flitcroft then signed good league 2 players and we did well. Budget in league 1 has been nowhere near enough. That same standard has given us this woeful outcome. The only reason academy youngsters have been anywhere near the first team is due to budget cuts, not because they are actually good enough. Thank Auntie Carol for our dire budget and impending relegation.

🤣🤣🤣

Great post and I have no doubt in my mind at all that she will strive to try her hardest to put it right

Yeah but he had experience of older ladies😉

We really are. He’s not only raising his own profile but the profile of the club as a whole.

He will be very important to us IF work out how to play to his strengths, which by the sounds of it, may have been the case today. He might not score another goal this season, but if he gets us up the pitch and makes space/chances for Wilson, Chizzy & Garrity then great.

Before getting to Vale what an ugly side Burton have become. They are a talentless Wimbledon. I thought the players stood up well to the physical challenge. First half against the wind was a challenge. Second half we actually played some good stuff. I thought Loft's overall game was outstanding. They had big centrehalves and he won more than his share of headers. After a poor start at Vale his general play has been quite good, just no confidence infront of goal. Did well to create the chance for Chislett. Chislett probably did us a favour in missing as you could see how much scoring meant to him. Hopefully he can knock a few more in over the remainder of the season. Sadly probably a bit too late in the season to make a difference but I want to see fight and for the players to be trying to stay up.

I’m on my way the pub right now

There's only one Ryan Loft!! Beers tonight, come om Vale..

We got our wish flitcroft is gone. We know this bunch of players are probably not good enough but lets get fully behind them. We need a miracle and that will only happen if we are all backing the boys . UP THE VALE

I took it as a plea from the heart for fans to back her judgement, from someone feeling the pressure and no doubt overcome to a certain degree by emotion. Probably one of those things that someone says in the heat of the moment and then in the cold light of day regretted. Agree or disagree with the content, it really wasn’t as big a deal as many folk are making out.

I genuinely hope that she apologises for that. It was utterly ludicrous to publish.