I think it’s safe to say we’re now relegated given our fixtures & the fixtures of the teams around us. Over the next few days & week a lot will be said about managers & team selection & the reasons we’ve gone down. I think the main reason we’ve been relegated is that the following have been our goalkeeping & defensive options - Radlinger, Collins, Walton, Cavare, Sibbick, J. Williams, Ludewig, B. Williams, Pinillos, Oduor, Sollbauer, Anderson, Diaby & Halme. Not only is there a lack of quality but also a massive lack of experience. If you go through all of them there’s only Cavare & Pinillos with any championship experience & they weren’t up to it. We’ve not had a settled defence, we’ve lacked quality there & we’ve got a group of defenders & keepers that have barely played for Barnsley never mind with each other before this season. I’m not saying these are all bad players but there was way too many young players signed in one go & thrown in at the deep end. I’ve no doubt many of them will have good careers, plenty of them have already improved a lot this season but it was too much, too soon. I never subscribed to the view that Stendel suddenly lost the plot & that he couldn’t organise a team. Trying to blood a new defence with inexperienced players is a difficult task, take out Woodrow, Mowatt & Dougall for several games & Brown for nearly all his championship games & it’s no surprise we were struggling initially. Things improved under Struber. I personally think they would’ve regardless of who the manager was due to the inexperienced players getting more games but I do think on the whole the diamond system he introduced was a positive for us & whilst I think players would naturally get better with games I think he sped up the process. I don’t know how he managed it but he seemed to get many players looking comfortable in many different positions. Woodrow was excellent as a number 10 until lockdown & playing Brown & Chaplin up top together got all our best attacking players on the pitch together & got us plenty of goals initially. My biggest gripe under Struber was that he signed Ritzmaier in January & gave him Mowatt’s position on the left of the diamond. Mowatt had been one of the leagues most creative players & it seems a massive waste him sitting in front of the back four playing the kinds of passes Aapo Halme can play whilst inferior players like Ritzmaier, Thomas & Bahre get to play in the creative positions. I can’t prove it but I do believe if we’d persisted in Halme or Dougall holding, Mowatt on the left, Woodrow as the no. 10 with Brown & Chaplin up top & pretty much any of our other midfielders on the right that we’d have a great chance of staying up. However, that’s not to say I think he’s done a bad job as I think he’s improved a lot of young players & many of them at the same time. It’s hard to blood a couple in a team never mind half your team or more. Now this next bit is probably a bit controversial & different to what many will be saying on here but I think the players on the whole have been outstanding. They’ve given their all every game & whilst they’ve put in a few shocking performances, such as Stoke home & away, Preston home & away & Luton at home I cant fault the effort of pretty much all the squad (Malik Wilks aside). I’ve never seen two centre backs make as many mistakes as Anderson & Diaby have yet they kept their heads up, kept trying to play out from the back & both improved. Aapo Halme’s first two games were atrocious yet he bounced back to be in my opinion one of our best players before Christmas & I think he’s been underused. The two Williams have done far better than I ever imagined they would at this level. I thought they might be completely out of their depth & shipped out on loan but they’ve surprised me. I didn’t think Jack Walton was good enough but he’s been superb since lockdown & Brad Collins has shown me he can be a good player for us. Jacob Brown only became a regular on the right 18 months ago & has made a huge step up from non league to league one right winger to championship forward & has done well. We’d all like him to be more clinical but the number of assists he’s got has been superb. Simoes has been a revelation, Styles & Oduor look great prospects & Palmer showed promise. Chaplin’s done well to say it’s his first season at this level & he wasn’t a top performer in league one. Woodrow got us a lot of crucial goals & Mowatt’s been our best & most consistent performer. Thomas, Bahre, Sibbick should all be better in league one & hopefully Schmidt will show us something if he sticks around. I reallly hope we don’t see players getting singled out for abuse once relegation is confirmed as I think they’ve all given their all & most have improved a lot. Ludewig & Solbauer have been excellent signings & it feels like what might have been with them two. Although it’s all doom & gloom with relegation looming we’re only 10 points or so off a comfortable mid table position. We’re really unlucky in that there’s no really bad teams this season & there’s not a lot in all the bottom half. In fact I don’t think there’s much of a difference in quality from 6th down. If we’d got them two in last summer or a couple other better / experienced players we could easily be sitting in mid table. Like last time we were relegated I see a lot of promise in this side & I see us been promotion contenders even without Mowatt & Woodrow who I expect to be sold as so many of our young players have been getting better as the seasons gone on & should excel at a lower standard. Ultimately I blame the board for the lack of experience & quality signed. I think they spent too much on quantity & I think it’s ridiculous that we’ve 25+ players who’ve started several games or more but I do think that if league one is able to start with fans we’re in a fantastic position to bounce straight back up. I’d keep Struber as although I often disagree with his team selection I think he’s improved a lot of the team & they all seem to follow his instructions & believe in his methods. I think we all need to remember that just because we think someone should be playing it doesn’t mean we would’ve got a better result if they did & apologies for the essay.
