JoeB2

It’s what £7m losses every year can do on top of a huge turnover for League 1 can do.

A very short “we got it wrong, we should have listened, we’ll work to out it right” might buy them breathing space. We really don’t need chapter and verse. Carol has a habit of saying things which get quoted back, out of context, for years to come as a stick to beat her with. Say very little, leave communicating over the summer to Hancock, go on holidays for a fortnight and relax. She’s probably lived Port Vale to a far greater extent than all of us for the past 18 months - and we can all attest to how damaging it’s been for us. I really don’t want Carol panicking about appeasing the fanbase, promising us the world, and then making poor short-term decisions which come back to bite her.

She just needs to start making some better decisions. She doesn’t owe us anything - on that logic, we owed her something after Wembley. It’s just not how it works. I genuinely couldn’t care less about apologies or plans. Just win games of football next season.

Chey Dunkley out of contract at Shrewsbury. Has always played for a Midlands club. Highly experienced and would immediately improve our set-piece problem. Fans don’t seem to like him so a good chance he’ll want to move on.

A word of advice to stay away from social media when relegation is confirmed. We’ll rightly get pelters and it’s wholly unedifying to engage. We are all grown men/women and please act like that when we’re relegated. Try not to make a holy show of yourself.

Ojo signed a 2.5 year extension. Likely going nowhere. Perhaps the hardest to shift.

I don’t think Carol ‘owes’ us a personal funded title bid in order to win fan’s forgiveness. She definitely shouldn’t operate that way next season - will lead to poor decision making built upon ‘winning the fans round’. She’s effectively undone 21/22 so is broadly level in terms of net positive and negative, probably edging positive as the club is in a better overall place than 2019. Title bids aren’t as simple as ‘owner spend money’ and I think we’re more than a summer away from sorting out this mess, considering contract lengths.

You can’t hold the view that this squad of players is the worst ever and would struggle in League 2, and also demand a manager is sacked for doing poorly with them after 15 games. You can say Moore has underperformed with this group of players, and want him to be removed, but the reality is that most fans view this as a relegation squad and he’s getting relegated with them. Othwrs are correct in saying he struggles as a small fish and does well as a big fish - his record post-relegation is pretty solid with a consistent record of being in the playoffs, so let’s hope that trend continues.

Describing a 96 point season as ‘not exactly difficult’ is just twisting a situation to suit the position you hold. There’s a load of clubs with big budgets who don’t put up anywhere near that. It was impressive. You’ve settled on Moore being bad after 15 games, inheriting a side you’ve also described as one of worst in Vale history who some have said are on course for back to back relegation battles. I’m not exactly happy with how he’s done but he will rightly get the summer.

4th at WBA when sacked, which is a bit silly. ”Challenging for promotion” to the Championship with Doncaster when he left to join Sheff Weds. I can’t find the exact position but it would seem they were top 6.

I’m sure she’ll want to but it may take longer than one summer. To pay off 6 players, you’re talking about 300k+ (as a conservative estimate) being used as a lump sum. I’m not sure we’ll have that money lying around if our revenue is to drop by a million. I’d love for Carol to chuck a load of her own money at things to put it right immediately, but the more realistic path will be a 12-month, more gradual rebuilding stage. It isn’t easy to undo the disaster of the last 18 months when so many players are contracted. The sale of Dipepa may help us on the way. I also expect Shorrock to go. I’m confident we’ll get there - but I’m not expecting us to right this ship within the next 4 months.

I think we're going to have to be patient for a year. We can't release many. A few are taking the view that we should 'pay off' as much as we can, but that would cost us hundreds of thousands of pounds in a lump sum. It's not viable for a League 2 club. The best we can hope for is a couple of players being paid up, and transfer listing the rest in the hope someone will come close to matching their wages (or we pay a proportion next season). The stark reality is that most of this squad are here to stay, and we cannot 'rebuild' this summer. Summer 2025 is the big one where we will effectively have an entirely new squad.

Out of contract 2024: Uche Wilson Wynne Massey Out of contract 2025: Smith Yak Chislett Garrity Ripley Clark Sang Loft Jones Lowe Debrah Grant Out of contract 2026: Ojo Dipepa Lomax Out of contract 2027: Plant

Doing poorly with a bad hand is a good way of putting it. You either believe that his relative success at WBA, Doncaster, and Sheff Weds was all a big fluke, or he’s got something about him.

We are the worst side in League 1 for set pieces. 10 scored from them, and 20 conceded. -10 GD. Something to consider. None of the centre halves are aerially dominant. We concede loads from deep crosses. Size and height at the back is an absolute must for the summer.

The best post I’ve seen in months and articulates my thoughts perfectly. Carol inefficiently overspent (with good intentions) and we’ve made a real hash of cost-cutting, resulting in a horrible 18 months in which being a fan has been horrible and folk are lashing out. We will be OK moving forward, even if it takes a couple of seasons to compete as we undo this mess. Well said mate.

Mate, you’ve posted at least 6 times in the last hour about Carol, and probably 20+ times in the last day. We get your point but it’s getting a tad obsessive and it might be worth closing OVF for a bit.

Some lads need to take a step away from the keyboard and stop embarrassing themselves. There more to life than making a holy show of yourself on the forums.

As bad as it’s been, he’s had enough success to suggest he knows what he’s doing with competent players. You don’t rack up 96 points in League 1 whilst being completely clueless. This squad is nowhere near League 1 quality. He’ll get the summer and the first half of the season. He’s often done well when managing newly-relegated sides and I hope he can replicate that here’s However, he’s given himself very little breathing room and he’s going to have to start the season reasonably - a tall order with a demoralised, poor squad.

SMURF is Norman Smurthwaite 100%.

I’m not going to complain with frozen prices.

Norman Smurthwaite lecturing us on respectful conduct.

A DoF/Sporting Director/Technical Director is manifestly a good idea with how football has changed from the days of Rudge- we just employed the wrong individual into it and got the scrutiny all wrong. If you had all control to a manager you impinge on the amount of time and energy he spends on day-to-day coaching and match prep, and also undergo big shifts every two years when the manager inevitably leaves - as 90% do in football. Don’t throw the baby out the bathwater.

Yep, bang on Tony. Some of the stick has began to seep into the personal, with some laughable comparisons between herself and a pernicious character like Smurthwaite. Folk seem to have forgotten the well-meaning person who is probably going to be feeling a tremendous amount of guilt, in their efforts to lash out at someone for causing relegation. She’s ballsed up and I don’t think we need to spend any more time banging on about them - there’s absolutely no doubt that Carol is well aware of them and will be regretting them massively, both on a personal and financial level. I sincerely hope she takes some time to reflect and rest after a very intense and damaging couple of years. The club and fanbase can survive relegation to League 2 (I’ve already been through it twice in 20 years!) and a break is sorely needed. Relegations happen and mistakes are made I still don’t think we will find an owner who offers us a surer guarantee of a future in this madcap football landscape. To find a local fan, willing to run the club at a loss funded by her own money, is pretty fortunate - the alternative is likely an American hedge-fund on a leveraged buyout. We’ll be sound.

I’m amongst the most cynical, pessimistic football fans going, but far weirder things have happened in football than Port Vale getting 4 more points than Burton across the next 3 games.