THE CONCRETE ROUNDABOUT (TCR)

APL PREDICTION LEAGUE RESULTS & REVIEW – Northampton Town
Saturday evening at the APL office is one of contemplation for me, mulling over the days events, and just thinking what I’m going to say in my Sunday report.

Of course, as we all know the lights burnt long into the night at SMK, and sadly three men lost their jobs, and yes, I did say sadly. I can’t help feeling a bit sorry for Robbie and his team, nothing much really worked out for them, but I equally think that their style of management, or should I say man management, never really helped.

I’m not being smug when I say the warning signs were there long ago, and a few of us did point it out, many times, not only Filthy, but the source of many apiece of good information, On the Dot, who became the first casualty of the war and disappeared into obscurity after being told he was wrong about what was going on, but I’m pleased to say as the smoke was clearing last night, OTD has risen like a phoenix from the flames and is back on Twitter, and I would venture some of you owe him an apology.

I have to say I found the whole sorry saga very frustrating that many people could not see what was going on, and I would venture is still going on, but more on the elephant in the room later.

The writing for Robbie was on the wall many weeks ago, and I think many suspected the trilogy of games against Posh, KFC and the Wobblers were to be the defining moment. I think that the Posh result saved the axe coming down, and I suppose many of us felt that result could kick start the season, sadly not, the lack of ambition against KFC, whereby we set up not to lose IMHO, when we should have been taking the game to them, which made the Wobblers game make or break, and of course it was break.

Right cast your minds back to that famous video, what did PW say in defence of Robbie, we haven’t had the chance to play Osman and Chuks together yet, in some sort of a half arsed attempt to appease the gullible, and there were plenty, and still are, yesterday in the biggest game of the season so far, what did Robbie do, left Chuks on the bench to deny the Pete dream team formation, and not only that, one of our best players in recent weeks McGrandles is left on the bench, I was scratching my head in disbelief, and was probably not the only one.

I can’t be bothered to discuss the game, just watching replays of O’Toole grabbing hold of Chuks round the throat, makes my blood boil, the only thing I will say is I thought Marcus Tavernier had a good debut and put the performances of some of the others to shame.

For the record I didn’t want to get shot of Robinson, who by the way must be pissing himself with laughter, and probably equally saddened to see the club he loves torn to pieces. Many said that we were destined for relegation, and Robbie saved us, well to those people I will say, you don’t know what would have happened, none of us do, well unless you had borrowed a time travelling machine from Kingston. The net result was we ended up with Robbie Neilson and his team, and indeed you cannot argue about his first half season, we went up the table and into safety.

Many described it as Robbo’s team, and at the end of the season Neilson set about re-shaping the club, I agree some should have gone, Powell, Bowditch, Reeves, Martin, but the mistake was Potter, you may not like it, but the guy as described by Robbo was a Rolls Royce, and that is one area I think we haven’t had right all season.

Even before the season started, we had strange goings on just before the Hungary trip was to depart, Neilson put his foot down and some of our youngsters were ripped from their plane seats United Airlines style and replaced by even younger ones.

Then we had Ben Tilney who didn’t want to play football anymore, when only weeks before, the club floated a video of Ben in training who was obviously very excited about his prospects that season and that of the team, all very mysterious.

Of course, the cruncher came when Lewington was axed from the squad, and the bullshit video that followed, what was that line again, Lewie is free to train at MK, wrong he was banned from the training ground, Lewie has gone to Charlton to prove his fitness to Robbie, who writes this shit, its not even plausible, yet many just suck it up. My God there were so many rumours about this being rubbish, and this video floated, if you put in on film it would show to empty cinemas, oh hang on, they did put it on film, and I’m not even going to touch on the many other things that have circled like vultures over the club for months, each one has added to this situation.

It just baffles me, Pete has spoken, lets all keep sucking it up, but there are two sides to every story folks, or do we just condemn the prisoner on the evidence of the prosecution, and yes, I’ve spoken to Lewie for a good 30 minutes about what happened, the story differs from the official version, but I feel more comfortable making my mind up hearing both sides of the story.

I’m sure there are some that wouldn’t agree, but this club needs to right a wrong, I’m not suggesting we should draft Lewington back into the team, but whatever happened behind closed doors, it was handled in a disgraceful manner by the club, and I’m sorry that is as much down to Pete as Neilson, I understand he has to back the manger to some degree, especially when he so publicly proclaimed Neilson as the man he had been after for weeks and was to bring exciting entertaining football to MK, and no I’m sorry, I don’t believe he was the first choice either, but that’s another story.

Lewington a one man one club legend, needs to be brought back in some capacity, whether that’s as an assistant to the very likely interim Rubio, a defensive advisor, or simply as someone to sit on the bench in case we need him, and with suspensions looming closer for some of our remaining defenders, it surely makes sense, and reaffirm the values this club was built on.

As I’ve said before, the day it went wrong was the day we were promoted, I still believe the Dele money could and should have been spent on the team to some degree, and the plans for the fabled training ground reduced, surely a handful of pitches with the new facility would have sufficed at the start, and we could have built on that in years to come to come up to something like the original plan of about 20 pitches, why we need that many I don’t know, as I’m pretty sure that’s more than the likes of Man City and Man Utd, anyway that’s all pie in the sky at the moment as we seem to be no closer to be breaking earth at the new training ground.

I understand we missed out on Grigg, for an extra £200k, a man that could have kept us in the Championship, but of course we will never know the answer to that one, and of course we continue to stumble around the transfer market like a drunk with 2p in his pocket, hoping to pick up a discarded fag end on the floor at closing time. Our ambitions are admirable, but I’m afraid the overinflated view we have of ourselves is misplaced, and I don’t just excuse fans from that, as the regime is just as guilty, Neilson himself got sucked up by it, and ultimately his wild pre-season claims became his downfall as he had to re-adjust his target to a two to three year plan, personally I don’t put that just down to him, I think he was sold a dream, and it is just that I’m afraid.

As much as we should be eternally grateful to Pete for bringing football to MK, I ask when does that debt get paid, or possibly more accurately when do people think that Pete should sell up, that is of course we want the Winkie dream of Premiership football, Pete himself knows that is not possible under his watch, and if we are all honest we know that is not going to happen, as Pete is simply not in the position to fund that journey, that’s not a criticism, its hard fact, based on our transfer activity since our formation, but if he really does have those ambitions and its not just a season ticket selling ploy, the only way to achieve that is through investment in the team, not the continual stream of loans and free transfers, proper investment, something that cost us dearly when we got to the Championship and lost us a bloody good manager, and if not rectified more casualties will come and go, as future incumbents will have to work with a pittance.

I just wonder if the latest turn of events will make him revisit his ambitions, or tailor them to suit our pocket, could he satisfy himself that he has done as much as he can, and that he should console himself sitting on the Directors balcony as new owners invested to hopefully take the club to the place he had in his vision for the club all those years back, I guess its what you want, League 1 football with the occasion flirt with the Championship and League 2, or something much bigger, as they say you pay your money, you make your choice.

What now, well who knows, I’ve seen the latest betting and it’s the usual list of out of work managers, many outside of our pay scale, although I did think it funny that Darragh McAntony commented about the pay scale at MK, saying he could never pay those wages.

Possibly as I suggested Edu Rubio will take the helm as Interim Manager, especially as it’s the FA cup next weekend so that has bought Pete a bit of time, and we may have a manager in waiting in the stands, that is if we can interview someone quickly, stop them laughing at the transfer budget long enough, and get them onboard ready for the following weekend, and despite some thinking that we aren’t going to get anyone to come to this club in its current state, I think Andy Cullen and Pete will be knee deep in applications in the next few days, for me I’d take Phil Brown, mainly because I got sick to death at the amount of different spellings offered up by our fans of the last gaffer, and surely nobody could misspell Brown.

We turn the page, and carry on, players and managers come and go, that’s life, that’s football, but I would like to place on record my thanks to Mr Neilson and his team, the good times were far and few between, but you beat AFC twice and at their place, the Posh victory with 9 men, and the QPR cup win, but unfortunately it was a handful of diamonds in a sea of turds, anyway, good luck Gaffer, I for one will keep a watchful eye on your future career, and no matter how bad it seems right now, I’m sure everyone has learnt much, hopefully it will hold us all in great stead.

Ok mopping the tears away, its APL time, there were about 44 entries this week, many foretelling the end of a short and eventful era of Robbie Neilson, and out of the 44, 19 got amongst the points, just one, Scribble, predicted Gilbey would score the goal and gets 10 points, 7 people predicted a 2-1 defeat and get 5 points, the remainder predicted a defeat with the wrong scoreline and get 2 points.
The upshot of all that is, we have a new leader in the shape of Scribble, who becomes the first to break the 100 point barrier, so many congratulations on that Sir.

There were 67 points scored in this game.

That’s it for this week, the APL has a week off with the FA Cup next weekend and will return for our visit to Walsall.

Take care folks, COYD’s.

WellDon

The APL Hall of Fame
3 – MK59DON
2 – Southstander, Camdenite, Blodwyn, Scribble
1 – BertieWoostersDonsClub, mkdonsdan4, BuzzardDon, kempstondons6, ChaChaDon, Dazzerdon, epdon, Kowalski, Grundit, Sparky, Bloxham Don, Just A Don, Woburn, Peterr, Greg, APMKDon, Steampunk Don, Oldfarmdons, Fraser, FilthyDon

APL League Table 2017/18
107 POINTS - Scribble
97 POINTS – Southstander
96 POINTS – Camdenite
92 POINTS - SG19 Cowshed das Boot
91 POINTS – SteelbackDon
79 POINTS - Nobbydon
76 POINTS – Sparky
70 POINTS - FilthyDon
64 POINTS – Bill, Just A Don
62 POINTS – kempstondons6, Bloxham Don
61 POINTS – MK59DON, Woburn
59 POINTS – BertieWoostersDonsClub, Greg
52 POINTS – epdon, Oldfarmdons, mightydons
51 POINTS – familymkdonsfan, Fraser
49 POINTS – Blodwyn, silverous
48 POINTS – donnette, OldStratfordDon
46 POINTS – ChaChaDon
43 POINTS – D8DON
40 POINTS – chrisdon, Dons50
39 POINTS – mkdonsdan4
37 POINTS – Don gal, APMKDon
35 POINTS – TomMac&Ernie
32 POINTS – edmundpwb, WellDon
31 POINTS – Oldbloke, Bearhidesboy64
30 POINTS – Bex’s Dad, Third Team Lucky, DonsDuck
29 POINTS – OakeeDokee
28 POINTS – Dazzerdon, RussybCool
27 POINTS – Dunstable Don, Steampunk Don
26 POINTS – Kowalski
25 POINTS – Concretecowbelle
24 POINTS – BuzzardDon, Oldbloke
23 POINTS – Grundit
22 POINTS – Peterr
20 POINTS – leodon
16 POINTS – JackDon
15 POINTS – Matthew
14 POINTS – Scumarmy
12 POINTS - Alby
11 POINTS – Locutus
10 POINTS – Croydon, donmentor
9 POINTS – yorkie, MBenn90455, MKAylesburyDon, Zippy
8 POINTS – Cheffy1
7 POINTS – ExtraTime, MKBuffalo
6 POINTS – Dad_of_A _Don
4 POINTS – Zameen, Ten-Don, Adebayo Akinfenwa
2 POINTS – BetterCallSaul, DippyDon, Abritt 6564

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Read the MELTDOWN after every game, no bullshit, just giving it straight

Great write up as always.
But I’m not sure about your faith in our fans being able to spell Phill Browne

Have I not explained EPPP and minimum requirements in respect of the training ground before to you?

‘kin newbies...

I never expect to please you Cammy, I understand that, but why run before we can walk, as I’ve said we can build up to that, we have done without for years, so why not a a gradual increase year on year.

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Read the MELTDOWN after every game, no bullshit, just giving it straight

Just reading all that, any sympathy I had for Neilson losing his job has diminished. We don't know exactly what goes on behind the scenes, but it's fairly clear within the last 12 months that Neilson has been the catalyst for every point of controversy and the position we find ourselves in.

I wonder if Neilson is the real reason why Tilney was sent out on a season long loan rather than the rumour that he has lost interest in football.

I think Paul Brown could do a job for us aslo WELLDON

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Watching and moaning from the Balcony at Stadium MK since 2012
APL Prediction League Champion 21/22 season

It’s spelt Will Broon.

I can’t find OTD on Twitter, what’s his username?

2014MK1
@OnTheDot2018

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Read the MELTDOWN after every game, no bullshit, just giving it straight