THE CONCRETE ROUNDABOUT (TCR)

Brentford are about to be bought in next few days. Attractive investment as current investors have played it well to get to where they are. We need to find a way to successfully complete that initial phase.

If that's our aim then we'd need to make ourselves sellable which means looking forwards not back. Not sure that being hated for no good reason is very attractive to potential investors.

I though this the other day. Not just about who does or doesn't buy us, but the players as well. Do they really buy into what us fans and to a lesser extent the club are selling. We are a franchise. One of the most hated clubs in English football, face it we are. Now whilst that doesn't bother us, does it bother the players? I can't imagine they are sold a dream when they are training on a school field and look at how much the club has fallen. They must all have opinions. They may get a lot of stick from their friends for being players of us and maybe they just see us as a stepping stone to bigger things. There must be a reason why we were destroyed by Crawley. I am hoping our biggest signing this summer is a sports psychologist as we desperately need one as there is something not right with their mindset when it comes to the crunch and really it is like fuck it they don't care (not my view, but do they really when they are shipping 5 goals against a team who finished 8 points less than us). I don't believe it is down to ability and tactics (though that is a factor). I have just been scratching my head as to how we were so abused in two games and why we continue to fail in the play offs with obviously different squads.

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It's the hope that kills you

It was clearly about tactics or rather our inability to deny them space, which they did to us. Football has stepped up in the last few years into keep shape and zonal marking, with still pressing and going one to one in your zone, with next player closed down by your team mate, without losing shape.

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Disclaimer: All my comments are my opinions unless stated otherwise. I'm just a fan following my club.

OK then but what about Bradford (who until they beat us 4-0 hadn't won at home since November) or Wimbledon who played us off the park and dare I say it deserved to win at their place. Or Mansfield at home, a home where we had only lost 3 all season and limped to a 4-1 loss. Or Doncaster who we never in our history have beaten away. Or Grimsby away where we were 2nd best to a team who were in a relegation battle at the time we played them. Crawley was probably a bad example, but there are so many others where we have struggled and we just shrugged it off at the time as "just a bad day at the office". It can't just be that. We had 14 bad days at the office last season. That is an horrendous amount to lose. I am not saying we are better and should be winning everything, I am not that arrogant, but should we really be humbled against some of these clubs? As people have said on paper this is a "good" squad, but something is really lacking and I just don't know what it is.

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It's the hope that kills you

We struggled because defensively we were poor. I not against Spirts pyschologist if we can afford one and the players should get counselling after that humiliation. However, the fact was after MW got beaten 3-0 agsinst Doncaster he said he was proud, not what can we do to stop it and the defensive rot set in

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Disclaimer: All my comments are my opinions unless stated otherwise. I'm just a fan following my club.

Wonder if will go back in for Ed Francis.... Gateshead turned down a bid in January, then he suffered a fractured skull. One year left on his contract, so will be a fee. Midfielder, who can also play in defence.

Paddy Madden signs 4 Chesterfield if ever there's been a thorn in our side over the years it's him...

But hated for mostly made up stuff, for an outragous FA decision not of our making and we were never asked.

also added onto the fact that it’s normally just the people who live in the online bubble who hate us, i live in aylesbury and i don’t know a single person who actually truly hates us, all the old blokes at work who lived well before wimbledon FC was moved always tell me “i actually like you guys and wish you’d do well”, my dad who used to go to wycombe games as a teen when they played leatherhead every other week now prefers us over wycombe. it’s just the cretins who spend every waking minute thinking about how they can use our name to get clicks and likes on twitter/X that make up the loud minority of hating us.

Also proves it when nearly every manager in their interviews before they play us rave about how much of a fantastic club we are, and that most players nowadays aren’t even old enough to remember the move, so i don’t really think that players are put off signing with us by the stigma around the club whatsoever