Get Off His Back

I have to admit to being a little concerned today. I went to sleep last night believing it was the 14th August and yet today I woke up and realised it must be at least Christmas because some kind people on the web sites have told me that the season is over and we are heading into the Conference. Sorry to all the people I forgot to wish Merry Christmas too and bigger apologies to all the family members whose birthdays I missed. Please accept my humble apologies. But by the sound of it I am glad I missed the 20 odd games they must have been dreadful.

It was only when I turned on Teletext just now and realised that it was indeed the middle of August that I took stock again and wondered what all the fuss was about. I double checked the league table and, yep we only have played three games, of which we have lost two. One against the pre season favourites and one against the current league leaders. I rang the football league and eventually spoke to a very nice young lady who informed me that the league season was still 46 games and it hadn’t been reduced to just three for teams that play outside of England or some other silly rule that I missed in the summer. The table again confirmed that we had only conceded three goals in three games so none of the matches had been changed to 6-0 or anything catastrophic. So I asked myself what all the fuss was really about. And I failed to answer the question.

The best I could come up with was that this season didn’t start the same as last season and certainly not the way that we all hoped it would. But thats fine, over half the clubs in this division probably haven’t had the start that they wanted but none of them are calling for their manager’s head are they? I read much about the long ball style that people predicted the day Kenny was appointed. The same long ball style that was denied by those that knew Kenny best and people who also know plenty about football. Maybe we will play a more direct type of football in some games but I have certainly seen games where the long ball style is non existent. Comments that are backed up by fans that have seen most of pre-season and games this season as well as people with vast football league experience. I laugh even more when people say that we will just hoof it up the pitch – sorry folks but my version of hoofing the ball has never been played by anyone. Of course, the debate about long ball intensified when Jackett mentioned ‘Power and Pace’ – clearly that means something different in my mind to what it means to some – Power and Pace =long ball? Still cant see it myself – someone explain that to me.

And while you are at it explain why there are calls after three games to change the manager? I just cannot understand it. I remember playing a game ‘three and in’ when I was a kid in the school yard – is this a new version ‘three and out’ By my reckoning that will be 8 managers by Christmas and that doesn’t allow for any cup run. Hmm, that makes sense to me. Not. You can also imagine managers queuing at the door for their three games can’t you – I’ll have the run in October – Southend, Leyton Orient and Darlington sounds good to me.

Come on people, get a grip. We have managed to play about 6% of our season and have about 4% of the points required for the play offs. Hardly catastrophic now is it. Kenny Jackett has assembled his squad over the summer and he is working with them. He has proven (Roger, Roberto) that he will make unpopular decisions if he sees a benefit and he has also proved that form players deserve their place in the side. Of course he will make mistakes, it is ludicrous for anyone to think otherwise but he appears to be capable of learning from them and moving on. Moving on – now there is a statement that some could take heed over.

I wonder sometimes what people think the life is of a manager. What criteria do they want for him to survive his first six games – six wins and nothing less? Kenny Jackett is new into the game but he is talked of highly on the professional circuit. And despite the results there are professionals out there that have opposed us this season that have seen a marked improvement on what they saw for the last 6-8 months of last season. To a football fan that believes otherwise you may not want to hear it but the professionals in the game know best.

To those that don’t think Kenny can take this club forward have your opinion by all means but the least you can do is give the man a chance – Swansea City deserves that much respect as a minimum.

Kenny’s here to stay and I still think he can turn this around. The club may have it’s faults elsewhere but on the pitch we are heading in the right direction, I’m quite confident of that. Sadly for some they cannot wait.