Are we all in it together??

[billy]

After a 42 game slog over virtually 10 months Sutton United finished second - a wonderful achievement. They are then forced to take part in a farcical play off against a side they finished 12 points in front of and had beaten twice already.The fact that the rules are in place before a ball has been kicked do not make this right.The rules need changing , it worked ok the other way for over 100 years.

[davef]

I'm with Billy on this, can't stand play offs: never have and never will. Concept dreamt up by marketing men and bear no relation to the principles of sport and fair reward. And now the FA is considering lumbering nonLeague clubs with Premiership B teams. Clueless!

[Andy K]

For those who've not seen the article yet - www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/27289819

For any non league fan, this could be a disaster for the game in this country.

[bornatotter]

Aah yes, the perils of social media.

Back in the "good old days" after a disappointing result you would adjourn to the bar, have a moan over a few pints and a Castella, have a row about who should be shipped in and who should be shipped out before toddling off into the night and, other than the reporting in the old Herald, that would be pretty much it until you met up for the next game.

Now, with the instant gratification of social media you can vent your spleen and project your bile before the last notes of the final whistle have reached the car park.

As Frakey rightly pointed out on here some of those same Dover fans who were larging it on saturday were on social media sticking it into their manager and players pretty much up until the point they squeezed into the play offs right at the death. Football, hey?

Liverpool fans who a couple of weeks ago were living in dream land are now moaning their arses off after they threw away a three goal lead last night....and so on, and so on and so on....

My message to any players clocking this site is to bare in mind that a lot of the bitter frustration and disappointment they may have read was down to the fact that they, as a group, had raised our expectations by barnstorming their way through the second half of the season in such style.

As others have said, to have a long and brilliant season defined by one game that's like a ticket in a lottery is a painful experience.

For me, I just think back to that night in Bromley and move on from there.

See you on saturday night

[Del]

Who's Dos?


I'm still gutted!

[holmes]

The manner of 'that' defeat still hurts everyone (including the players), but learning the full extent of the injuries changes the perspective and, knowing this now, some of the critisism on here looks too harsh. Bitter as the pill is, it must be swallowed and dealt with. I'd like to think everyone is feeling a bit better by the 10th May so we can celebrate the achievements of the club this season, including the youth and reserve teams successes rather than dwell on one bad defeat.

I don't like the way football is heading. First the play offs, which make a mockery of the league standings at the end of the season, now we may have to endure B-teams playing at our level. What, isn't the Premier Reserve League competative then? This serves to further undermine non-league clubs and potentially drag vital funds away from clubs that are closely linked with community schemes like ours. The Dyke Commission, as it is named, has no concern for community or knock on affects on non-league football and has the rather singular aim of improving English talent. They therefore look to the continent, who have B-teams in their lower divisions, without an holistic approach. These countries have these B-teams because, unlike the UK, they don't have enough clubs to fill out these lower divisions. Here, we have an abundance of football clubs and an extensive and competative first team league structure going right down to county level. Not to mention the reserve leagues. The only benifits I can see is potential increased gates if Sutton play, for example, Crystal Palace B. However, that only benifits clubs at conference level and still potentially drags support away from lower levels which would be disasterous. Would it not be better to improve the youth structure and look at ending the myth that a foreign player must be better than a UK player? Maybe that's a start?

[Andy K]

As bornatotter says, Social meda can be equally a gift and a curse. Although with a lot writing you can get the genreal gist of things, sometimes emotion doesn't come through, along with intonation and body language, so you alway lose something by this. That's why to me, Dos's video manger comments are more gratifying to me than written words because there is no misunderstanding. We can all read words and read them the wrong way, but face to face it's a lot harder to do.

Come on, how many of us have read a posting/email/text message and taken it a way the writer never intended? It's easily done by all of us. I'm not having a pop at anyone here, just stating how easy it is to do, and maybe some of us (including me) should just have a bit of a longer think before we post.

[superus1898]

Finishing 2nd in the league is a great achievement for Dos and the club, everyone's going to be disheartened hours after the game but now we can look back and say it was a great season overall(cup and league run)

In DOS we trust !!!!!!!

[os]

I think its very true to say that people by nature always look for someone or something to blame when something goes wrong, even if it means logic goes out of the window.

Football is full of emotions and even our Dos is not immune to them.

We all hurt and reacte in different ways, but we will be back and we will be after that title.

[localboy86]

Thanks Dos for taking the time to write on the forum and thanking you also for a great season again in the Conference South and FA Cup - one that I've thoroughly enjoyed (minus the second half on Saturday).

You've had my support from your first season here back in 2008 and I'm already looking forward to the start of pre-season and 2014/2015 with yourself at the helm.

[markf]

I more than welcome Dos's intervention on here. He must have been seething at some of the posts on here and the unfortunate language some of them contained. If none of the players turned up on Saturday I wouldn't blame them.

We lost one bloody game and the whole world went mad on here. The "where we went wrong" thread was totally unnecessary and I'm glad it has been removed. As I stated in it, one of the posts was a complete joke and failed to comprehend the significance of the change in playing personnel made around Christmas and the massively positive effect they had on the team's showing. To me, it insulted Dos and questioned his ability as a manager.

We finished 2nd in the CS, just a few points behind a massively spending club. Dos cut our budget by around 30% during his changes and the vfm he attained after was incredible.

We were all disappointed with the result on Saturday but as I said in the main match thread, much of the reaction was well over the top and it is hardly surprising that Dos felt he had to post on here. I'm just glad he hasn't decided to up sticks and move on. Fortunately for SUFC, he is bigger than that.

I think some of the posters need to take a good look at themselves and calm down a bit before heading for the keyboard. Football is full of highs and lows. We had so many highs in 2013/14 and very few lows. I've enjoyed it immensely and look forward to next season after a re-charge of the batteries during the ever shortening summer break which will of course be punctuated by the World Cup.

Thanks for posting Dos and putting a few people straight. And thanks to the players for providing such brilliant entertainment, endeavour and commitment to SUFC.

[smudger70]

Second in the league is a fantastic achievement. Paul Doswell is a great manager and we are lucky to have him: I am sure that there are plenty of Conference clubs who would happily sign him.

In terms of the Dover match, my only complaint was the way our support was outsung by Dover.

[Millsy]

May 6, 2014 19:08:00 GMT billy said:

May 6, 2014 18:27:14 GMT smudger70 said:

Second in the league is a fantastic achievement. Paul Doswell is a great manager and we are lucky to have him: I am sure that there are plenty of Conference clubs who would happily sign him.

No one will give you an argument there as all you say is undoubtedly true. However , the paying public are entitled to express their opinion and anyone could be forgiven for getting the hump about Saturday's performance.

Carte blanche?

The internet, social media, forums etc. (particularly twitter - and there aren't many that would expect me to criticise that) have perverted or enlarged some people's sense of self-entitlement in my view. A lot of self-moderation seems to get replaced with self-importance or "entitlement".

I'm not referring specifically to the matter at hand or particular individuals, an example would be some of the tweets directed our way following a Surrey Senior Cup match this season from some opposition supporters.

[ambertaff]

The very sad part of all of this is that the "feeding frenzy" reaction to last Saturday is, in my view, at least partly a result of the successes achieved. An ex boss of mine (who went on to become a very high profile football CEO in the English game - I'm not going to name drop) said that once you create a track record of excellent performance - and then, for whatever reason, something goes wrong, you tend to get more SH1 than if you had a much more mediocre record in the past. OK, this was to do with selling companies and not football (my ex boss then changed industry) but I think the lesson is the same.

It is probably extremely cold comfort to say that the multitude of ill considered comment was a function of the team's and the management's success, and in no way excuses what was said, but had we not done so well up to the playoffs, then the reaction may not have been what it was. Success breeds expectation, and when expectation is not met, it becomes far too easy to indulge in unconstructive criticism. Collectively we owe an apology to Dos and the team, but I hope that there is at least some appreciation amongst players and management alike (who definitely do not do it primarily for the money) that part of the reason for the reaction to Saturdays game may well have been the superlative standards that they had achieved up till then.

[baboonfish]

I can fully understand PD's anger at the comments, and I hope he didnt take seriously even 1% the joker who was calling for a 'change' (good luck finding someone even half as good who essentially manages for nowt). Football fans are by and large a hopelessly unrealistic bunch of never staisfied myopic partizans. I consider myself very objective and pragmatic yet I was spitting bile on Saturday, so disgusted with the performance was I. Its great that PD took the time to defend the lads and explain many of the mitigating factors and injuries that we just werent aware of.

I think it was the manner of the defeat was so hard to take, and its understandable we were mostly very upset - if we had lost by one goal or one dodgy decision I dont think anyone would be pointing the finger at the team. It just wasnt Sutton out there, it looked like a shell of a team, beaten as soon as the 1st goal went in, and this is what raised the anger levels to beyond acceptable. Now we know there was a lot more to it and thank you, it helps us all move on and put this behind us. As has been said 'no one died' (only hopes and dreams were temporarily stunned)