Balance, from a moaner

[Valiiant]

53 minutes ago, Bimbleabout said:

F me. We just support our team. AC is our manager and until otherwise, we may not like what he does, we are all aware of it, he is our manager. Nothing we can do about that.
Relentlessly calling people happy clappers etc and veering constantly to insinuating people are clueless is just all abit, you know.
If he stays, he stays, if he goes, he goes, we will all still be here. Just ease up on the 'happy clappers are clueless' or whatever. Everyone is aware of the situation, but are powerless to do anything about it.
It could be alot worse, a hell of a lot worse.
UTV

 

I don't think anyone who I attach happy clapper to gives much of a damn to be fair. Some people here think I do nothing but whinge (I do enjoy a moan, but also have given plenty of praise when I feel it's deserved) but I don't take anything personally. Although the term is becoming a bit stale and over used now, admittedly. Shall have to come up with a new term to freshen things up a bit. 😉

[Bimbleabout]

 
I don't think anyone who I attach happy clapper to gives much of a damn to be fair. Some people here think I do nothing but whinge (I do enjoy a moan, but also have given plenty of praise when I feel it's deserved) but I don't take anything personally. Although the term is becoming a bit stale and over used now, admittedly. Shall have to come up with a new term to freshen things up a bit. 

Heheh I'm sure we can come up with another terminology
It will all be reet eventually. Just hope we get something tomorrow as we all do. UTV

[MelbourneValiant]

6 hours ago, Bede said:

46 in a couple of weeks, Mike!  Hope you're doing well mate.

Funnily enough, I was looking back through some old PM's in my inbox the other day - they go right back to 19 years ago.  A lot has changed since then.  Including my hair and waistlines!

I tried to send you a message, but I get a message saying that you can't receive them.

Woody,

[[email protected]]

Doom merchants out in force. After watching the Vale for over 50 years through reelection to scraping the bottom of the league. Small gates old railway stand has anyone got millions for new players or buying a new stand No. Are we in the bottom 4 of this league No. Look at Exeter or Cheltenham anyone swop places with the No. Cut out the pessimistic tone it's boring and in some cases unwarranted. 

[Rockape99]

I believe the pessimism is caused by the dire home performances people aren’t going to pay to see keep ball in midfield. Saying that Wilson comes back and we look different. For me it’s get a striker in like Wilson to play off the chuckle brothers as Wilson won’t play 20 on the bounce for us 

[Osh]

23 hours ago, Brian Johnson said:

I like that philosophy 

Me too

[Osh]

21 hours ago, PV1993 said:

Pretty much agree entirely with this. Came on to post something similar so I’m glad you have. Just wanted to add in a couple of points.

1. Injuries. Injuries have plagued us this year with a lot of our first team being out for lengthy spells. At the beginning of the season when everyone was fit we were playing the best football I have seen a vale team play. On the Ale and Vale podcast they said think back to when we were doing well and it was still boring - I don’t agree. It was actually nice to feel in control of games, and we were creating lots with good play. The amount of games and injuries put paid to that. If I were to pick an 11 with everyone available it would be:

Ripley

Debrah - picked up a bad injury recently, unlucky.

Smith

Jones - injured for most, although you could argue whoever decided to give him a 2 year contract was at fault for this one.

Clarke - injured all season, not injury prone though - really unlucky with here. Sang now injured too as back up - again, unlucky. 

Ojo - out until at least Feb Crosby says.

Arblaster - did so well that he was recalled. Also injured. Replacement in Devine hopefully okay after Carlisle.

Grant - injury prone so falls into the same category as DJ. However there’s not enough competition here, so we all know it’s a priority area for Jan.

Garrity - been carrying a calf injury for a while and played through (presumably due to the high amount of injuries we have already). Hope he’s not out for a while.

Chislett

Wilson - proved that when he has played we have been good. He is the missing piece. Yes he is injury prone but our system needs him. There must be a young lad in the England set up who can come on loan and play second fiddle to James, because he will 100% get game time in every match.

The fact we have played a million games hasn’t helped this at all. Hopefully this will calm down now and we can get people back fit.

 

2. The other point I wanted to mention was the reaction at the end of the game against Carlisle, and some perspective on this. In the Ale and Vale pod (which I love btw) they reported lots of pissed off fans and a bad reaction. Not the case. There was them at the back booing loudly plus a few others (minus Steve who was behind me, thanks for taking a picture for me and the missus btw!). Some people had had enough and left early. The rest stayed and clapped.
 

I can appreciate that we are nowhere near fills strength right now. If we were and playing like this I would be very worried. That’s why Cheltenham were so <ovf censored> at the start of the season. I do think our situation - amount of games and injuries - makes it a bit different.

 

I want it to be known that I am on the fence about Crosby. Not a happy clapper, nor a Crosby out man. He doesn’t help himself as much as some things can’t be helped.

Superb post

[Conrad]

21 hours ago, Bede said:

Great post once again Joe.  If I'd got more time I'd counter a few of your points but just a couple of thoughts:

1 - you say you're more satisfied with communication, yet felt compelled to write such a detailed summary.  Don't you think better communication during such a bad spell would have alleviated the calls for Crosby and Flitcroft and instill a little calm amongst a growingly disillusioned fanbase?  I've seen first hand fans fighting amongst themselves in recent weeks, such is the intensity and emotion of our current plight.  Fans are turning.  If ever there were a time for a club meeting with the fans, surely now would be it? The lack of leadership is astonishing, yet sadly totally expected by now.  Like it or not, Port Vale is a Football Club; a public heritage brand whose main customers have an incredibly vested interest in its performance.  You cannot treat it as a privately owned family business.  Yet they continue to do so.

2 - Supporters' Summit - I and many others were against this from the start.  From day 1 the club have pulled up the drawbridge of communications with fans.  They have systematically failed to properly engage with a healthy Supporters' Club - often organising things to conflict with SC initiatives, excluding them from supporter / club traditionally joint ventures such as player of the year, meet the manager events, Rememberance services etc.  They only engage in things they have complete control over.  They have cleared absolutely everybody out of the club that was BC.  Some clearing was inevitable and needed, but it went way too far and lots of bad blood has been created amongst people that went over and above during the club's hour of need on many occasions, but just got unceremoniously cast aside with no regard. 

Matt Hancock is an outright liar.  They have shafted the fans over the loyalty scheme because they got rumbled over the out-of-control backhanding of tickets amongst corporate.  Since they had to reign it in, corporate have bit back and so now they have withdrawn our previous points from last season in order to re-set it in favour of corporate, who were at a dodgy advantage in the first place - they were recently handed 50 points more than everybody else, I believe?  I called Matt out on this direct and he still tries to flip-flop out of it, despite me hammering  him with various pieces of evidence, which he could not defend.  I have an interesting meeting with him next week, and he'll be getting hammered once again.  I will not tolerate the club lying to the fans.  The Supporters' Summit is a total sham mate. We've just changed the Supporters' Club to a Supporters' Trust for this kind of thing.  Governed by the FSA, run open and democratically to represent fans.  The SS (LOL) represents nobody.   Let's have open debate.  The club as a whole take the fanbase for mugs.

3 - We're all fur coat and no knickers - image over substance.  Why did we spend 1.2 million to hold the Robbie gig?  We put seats into a stand we cannot use for a one-off gig, meanwhile we have capacity restrictions in place in 2 stands because the facilities are so bad.  That is totally inexcusible.  Imagine how far £1.2 million could have gone in fan areas.  The manner in which the regular fan in the stand has been ignored and neglected is abhorrent. They created a totally unneccessary furore over the switch from Bycars to Hamil, because again, they don't consider the fans.  (I agree with the move - but it was handled apallingly).  But we can't afford the going rate for strikers.  If only we were a football club first and foremost.

There is a lot of repair required between the fanbase and club right now.  You know things are bad when folk like Dicko throw in the towel.  You know all too well how it goes when fans lose support, and so does Carol; we're slowly slumping back to that and those impressive attendance figures are starting to dilute.  And they only have themselves to blame.  It takes years to build confidence, but only a season to shatter.  It's so easy for us as fans to resort back to 'typical Vale' when our hopes are built up and once again dashed, as they so frequently are.  They don't sometimes deserve the support they get, in my opinion.  

The current stats you display of our rise cannot also be taken without the context against such a low bar of comparison of the last 20 years, when we have been ran by outright conmen.  To rise above those levels aren't much to write home about.  However, it is important to acknowledge that we are probably at our nautral level right now, if you take historical standings into consideration.  I certainly aren't expecting to be flirting with Championship at the moment - we're light years away from holding our own there.  It's absolutely no use having 'Championship Ready' corporate facilities to watch league 2 football.

Despite those negative points above, I appreciate and agree with plenty of your posts - I respect yours and your dad's views highly.

I'm not Crosby out, yet.  And I'm certainly not Carol out - her intentions are not of the same ilk as the three previous incumbents.  But I'm not happy either.  I find myself saying this all to frequently: I expected so much better from this current regime.  Without the fans, this club is nothing.  A sentiment that the Shanahans have never quite grasped.

I'm interested to see what happens in the coming months.  Ian Donaldson has reared his head again on Twitter and Synectics has undergone a restructure.  Is change afoot?

Bede, what do you mean regarding Dicko throwing in the towel.

[Bede]

2 minutes ago, Conrad said:

Bede, what do you mean regarding Dicko throwing in the towel.

He’s completely disillusioned with the club, so much so that he intends to step down as vice chair of the supporters’ club and is considering no longer running the coaches after this season. 
 

He’s been very up front with his feelings on social media and, despite being in regular direct contact with the club, still feels, like many of us, that the fans are not treated with the honesty and respect that they should be. 

[Conrad]

17 minutes ago, Bede said:

He’s completely disillusioned with the club, so much so that he intends to step down as vice chair of the supporters’ club and is considering no longer running the coaches after this season. 
 

He’s been very up front with his feelings on social media and, despite being in regular direct contact with the club, still feels, like many of us, that the fans are not treated with the honesty and respect that they should be. 

Bloody hell, didn’t realise that.

i know Dicko quite well and he’s got black and white blood, the last person I would have expected to give up.

[corbanlovesvale]

11 hours ago, [email protected] said:

Doom merchants out in force. After watching the Vale for over 50 years through reelection to scraping the bottom of the league. Small gates old railway stand has anyone got millions for new players or buying a new stand No. Are we in the bottom 4 of this league No. Look at Exeter or Cheltenham anyone swop places with the No. Cut out the pessimistic tone it's boring and in some cases unwarranted. 

Know how you feel.  Stopped posting on here as the venom from some is unbelievable.  If the vale were in the conference I would be there watching them.  If you support your team its through good times and bad times, after 50 years plus this is still a good time look where we are ?  Can understand to a certain extent to the moaning but if you are not happy with the club find another team to support.  This is the last time I'm posting on here.  UTV and KTF 

[WV]

26 minutes ago, corbanlovesvale said:

Know how you feel.  Stopped posting on here as the venom from some is unbelievable.  If the vale were in the conference I would be there watching them.  If you support your team its through good times and bad times, after 50 years plus this is still a good time look where we are ?  Can understand to a certain extent to the moaning but if you are not happy with the club find another team to support.  This is the last time I'm posting on here.  UTV and KTF 

Just block the few who must be heard every single time we concede. The forum is much more pleasant then.

[Guitar Ray]

4 hours ago, Bede said:

He’s completely disillusioned with the club, so much so that he intends to step down as vice chair of the supporters’ club and is considering no longer running the coaches after this season. 
 

He’s been very up front with his feelings on social media and, despite being in regular direct contact with the club, still feels, like many of us, that the fans are not treated with the honesty and respect that they should be. 

I think you’ve hit the nail on the head in your second paragraph, “social media”.  He should just pack in social media rather than the Vale and he’ll find himself in a whole lot better place in terms of any disillusionment.

[Hoppers]

28 minutes ago, WV said:

Just block the few who must be heard every single time we concede. The forum is much more pleasant then.

It will be - there will hardly be anyone left 🤣🤣🤣🤣

[Hot Rat]

51 minutes ago, Guitar Ray said:

I think you’ve hit the nail on the head in your second paragraph, “social media”.  He should just pack in social media rather than the Vale and he’ll find himself in a whole lot better place in terms of any disillusionment.

Thats the problem with social media, it breeds an expectation of immediate gratification, be it information or the appreciation of/response from total strangers...