The Arbroath Thread

[ExiledLichtie]

2 minutes ago, Bring Back Paddy Flannery said:

I am absolutely not reading all of that I’m afraid.

Now that is interesting.  So you have these very strong and mental opinions, based on no real information, and when people disagree with you, you claim to have "hit a nerve".

And yet, when someone takes the time and patience to try and educate you, you won't read it.

You are not coming across well here.

 

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

Just now, Tattie36 said:

Well you should and if you don’t then stop commenting on a situation you know f**k all about.

An absolutely disgusting comment to make towards a fellow football supporter who is showing genuine concern for a fanbase who are showing signs of losing the plot.

[1320Lichtie]

1 minute ago, Bring Back Paddy Flannery said:

An absolutely disgusting comment to make towards a fellow football supporter who is showing genuine concern for a fanbase who are showing signs of losing the plot.

I think you are pretty sound and I have maybe misjudged your posts but I am already sick fed up of hearing that we’ve got to big for our boots and what more could we want etc etc etc. Suppose there’ll be a lot more of that to come and when the day comes where we do return to L1, because it will happen at some point, I am sure there’ll be a wee bandwagon coming along to pile in on that too - even though that is definitely the way things were going if we never made a change.

[Tattie36]

2 minutes ago, Bring Back Paddy Flannery said:

An absolutely disgusting comment to make towards a fellow football supporter who is showing genuine concern for a fanbase who are showing signs of losing the plot.

I’m sure you lost the plot a little last season watching your club throw away the biggest league lead since fitba began. Must be tough.

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

1 minute ago, Tattie36 said:

I’m sure you lost the plot a little last season watching your club throw away the biggest league lead since fitba began. Must be tough.

Below the belt Tattie36.

[ExiledLichtie]

1 minute ago, Tattie36 said:

I’m sure you lost the plot a little last season watching your club throw away the biggest league lead since fitba began. Must be tough.

I think its a bit of weird jealousy.  The fact that he's admitted he's not interested in finding out more information shows he's at the wind up.  I wonder if these fans have started to see us as a "big club" to be targeted, rather than just one of them.   That would tally with the "too big for our boots" accusations.  

It feels more like an unnecessary inferiority complex rather than any arrogance from us.

[MazzyStar]

37 minutes ago, Bring Back Paddy Flannery said:

An absolutely disgusting comment to make towards a fellow football supporter who is showing genuine concern for a fanbase who are showing signs of losing the plot.

The Arbroath fans just don’t want to hear anything other than everyone saying how great Arbroath are. 

[TheRoundO]

We seem to be intent on winning the “Easiest fan base to wind up” award. Wind up merchants feast on fans of clubs in crisis- and we are.  

[SmokeyJoe]

1 hour ago, clashcityrocker said:

Of course he has left big boots to fill - along with Bert Henderson he is Arbroath's best manager for at least the past 50 years ( perhaps even longer).

Also, he played an important role increasing hospitality sales with his talks and season ticket sales and attendances increased following the success he brought to the club.

Dumbarton are the only other part time club to have stayed in the Championship for 5 years - I call that big boots to fill.

DC has also left the club in good, financial position and with 2 games in hand could potentially be siting mid-table or higher if we win these games (which I accept is a big ask, but certainly possible).

I am not convinced any new manager will reach the dizzy heights of success that DC achieved - but lets hope we get good applicants and the board get the right man.

Dicks no done all that himself yes he’d played a part but the board have done a lot of that work and bringing in people like Paul Reid etc 

[Anotherlichtie]

5 hours ago, JobbieSandwich said:

Dick Campbell has been the greatest Arbroath manager in my lifetime and I'd guess only Bert Henderson would be the only rival as the club's GOAT.

Other than a month long spell, things haven't looked good for the last 12-18 months. This is compounded by the fact it came on the back of our best season in 50+ years. I still think Dick had credit in the bank, so to speak. I have no doubt, if they want to, they'll turn up and achieve at another club.

I think it might also be worth having a look behind the scenes. There's no doubt since Mike Caird took charge the club has been run a lot better but is there a bit of bloat now? Could do with a bit more transparency too with board members that have linked interests outside the club. Off the top of my head I can think of;

Gary Moir - Moir Construction doing a lot of work in the ground. He's a fan so don't think it'll be dodgy.

Ewen West - Strathmore Events 'organising' our hospitality. 

Jonny Booth - In fairness, he seems to be pretty competent. However, it does seem convenient that the club did a deal with Astute to produce various items during Covid and Jonny finds himself appointed as a director at Astute shortly after. I also notice that another Astute Director has since been appointed to the club. He also runs a property business with his brother, Malcolm. He seems to have weaseled his way in with the bricks at the club as 'Bar Manager'. I think by Bar Manager, that means he can help himself at the hospitality/boardroom bar and get pished. I think I even noticed a tweet last week where the club declared him a 'board member', although I haven't seen anything official.
 

I don't know about anyone else but I think a rather large factor in our decline on the pitch has been this attempt at a 'hybrid' system. I can understand the thinking behind it to try and get a better quality player in but in practice, it's been a bit of a disaster. I can think of maybe 3 players that have come in and looked capable. Lewis Banks, Sean Adarkwa and Jermaine Hylton. Adarkwa was injury prone, Banks couldn't be convinced to stay more than 6 months and Hylton will probably be off in January. The surprising thing is we haven't tried this with local players from the likes of Dundee and Aberdeen.

Given the lack of results from these full-time players, you need to ask who is benefitting? The team aren't, as we've got progressively worse the more we've introduced them. The part-time players aren't because even if a player is good enough, they move on too quickly to really fit in. Given that these players are not local, they have to be provided with housing in order to make the move. It would seem that the only person actually benefitting from this hybrid scheme is the landlords of these flats being provided to the players. I wonder who that is.

 

Wow! That is a blockbuster of a first post. And one that the hierarchy at Gayfield will not be impressed at. 
 

Ewen West is a nice guy by the way.

[1320Lichtie]

1 hour ago, clashcityrocker said:

Of course he has left big boots to fill - along with Bert Henderson he is Arbroath's best manager for at least the past 50 years ( perhaps even longer).

Also, he played an important role increasing hospitality sales with his talks and season ticket sales and attendances increased following the success he brought to the club.

Dumbarton are the only other part time club to have stayed in the Championship for 5 years - I call that big boots to fill.

DC has also left the club in good, financial position and with 2 games in hand could potentially be siting mid-table or higher if we win these games (which I accept is a big ask, but certainly possible).

I am not convinced any new manager will reach the dizzy heights of success that DC achieved - but lets hope we get good applicants and the board get the right man.

You’re talking about pre June 2022 - nobody will repeat that - ever 

 

In more recent history and in the here and now he’s really not very big boots to fill at all - he’s been fkn hopeless 

Edited November 26, 2023 by 1320Lichtie

[Anotherlichtie]

A sad day but one that was overdue. Thank you Dick, Ian and all the coaching team for some memorable years. Myself and my father doff our hats to you all. 

[Hayshead2]

1 hour ago, 1320Lichtie said:

Of course you have hit a nerve. Arbroath fans and the club have been extremely patient with Dick Campbell - to the point where I’ve not seen anything else like it in football. I can’t remember a manager getting the backing and support DC has when he had done such a terrible job over such a long period of time. 
 

 

Summer 2022 we were in an incredible position. Had a solid squad of players. 
 

Then the fallouts and dressing room bust ups came. James Craigen, Nicky Low and Jason Thomson all left the club after starting the season off with us.
 

Craigen who would still be a good player for us right now and who scored against us yesterday left because he could not get a game in central midfield. At one point Luke Donnelly and a man named Daniel Fosu (will get on to that later) played centre midfield over the guy. 
 

Then Luke Donnelly left. Dylan Patterson left. Hilson was injured and Keiran Shanks could barely get on the park. We were left with a young striker we’d signed from the Highland League and Dale Hilson, a guy who worked his socks off but rarely ever scored. 
 

We signed the likes of Daniel Fosu, Kareem Isiaka and Deri Corfe to replace the guys that had left. These 3 were absolutely nowhere near it. Daniel Fosu by far the best of the 3. Deri Corfe is easily up there with one of the worst players I’ve ever seen play. 
 

These kind of signings had been the new way forward for Dick, we had already had a wee taste of them when we brought in Sam Ford and Michael Bakare. It was as clear as day Dick Campbell was on a mission to find his own Nouble. 
 

6/7 of the signings we made in the first half of the season were moved on in January 2023. They all got given a chance against Dunfermline in the Challenge Cup and they were 4-0 down at half time. Dick slaughtered them all after and that was that. The club actually had to put a recruitment team in place because of how shambolic Summer 2022 was.
 

Throughout last season, on plenty of occasions we played without a striker on the park. For the majority of the season we had no wingers or strikers except Bobby Linn. Bobby was put upfront on several occasions while we played 5 central players across the midfield. Bobby was by far and away our best player and biggest goal threat yet Dick Campbell did his best to try and not play him. He commented on how the fans singing his name when he was on the bench ‘got on his tits’ and that we should get a grip. I know fine well that Bobby would’ve been terribly upset with the way he was treated. It really was a joke and showed Dick at his stubborn best. 
 

Anyway as RL86 has mentioned we were not a functioning football team as we had no attack, we scored the least amount of goals out of the 42 teams. Kieran Shanks was moved on in January after rarely getting a chance and we were left with Dale Hilson and Sean Adarkwa. Adarkwa was a handy player but he was injured for the majority of the time so we were left with wee Dale Hilson chasing long balls and punts up the park. 
 

In the end Derek Gaston, Ricky Little and Tam O’Brien were standouts and we managed to grind out enough draws to finish above 2 terrible teams. 

Despite all of that, myself and so many others said we achieved our goal and it was a success to stay up. I have mentioned how I had said that if we had got relegated last year I would still want Dick to stay. 
 

Then in we go to this year. 
 

First thing’s first, we started off the season with the news Keaghan Jacobs had re signed. A guy who was clearly absolutely finished and still plays no real part. 
 

Then the trialists started rolling in, I have lost count of how many we had. But we were told that they’d been extensively scouted and that they’d all be good enough to play for Arbroath. Wow. What an absolute embarrassment some of them were. It was as clear as day Dick was still trying to find his Nouble. 
 

Every single one of them bar a young lad Jess Norey and Turan were moved on. A total waste of time. 
 

We signed well in certain areas and we have built up a good group of players but if you read this thread back everyone was saying we needed a left back, a holding midfielder and some defensive cover. 
 

This has not happened. We have been scrambling about like a pub team in an effort to put together something that resembles a football team on several occasions already this year, players playing out of position because of how unbalanced the squad is. 
 

Im not sure how well you know these players but for one of our League Cup games we had a back 4 of

 

Keaghan Jacobs - RB

David Gold - CH

Ricky Little - CH

Scott Stewart - LB

 

It has been embarrassing. In recent weeks we’ve had a tiny squad with injuries yet Dick still sent Joao Balde on loan, a guy who has shown some promise, because he wanted to play more. There are so many cases of things like this. It’s bad bad bad management. 

The team do not resemble a football team. They do not look like they’re playing for Dick one little bit. It looks like a very bad environment to be in. You will have seen your team in a similar state at some point you know what I mean. 

Do not sit there and say that this is anything to do with us being too big for our boots, I was extremely upset at seeing them leave I wanted them to do well and I’ve backed them as much as I possibly can along with so many others. 
 

But their race was run and things needed to change. 

A Great post. 100% spot on.

[mo83]

Be interesting to see how this pans out as certain posters on here over the years have been telling us Mo fan's  SP will be the next manager once DC had left.

DC has now left the building rightly or wrongly it's now time for the AFC board to find a replacement.

 

[Tattie36]

43 minutes ago, mo83 said:

Be interesting to see how this pans out as certain posters on here over the years have been telling us Mo fan's  SP will be the next manager once DC had left.

DC has now left the building rightly or wrongly it's now time for the AFC board to find a replacement.

 

It’s very interesting and I suppose it all boils down to Petrie’s thoughts and ambitions. It’s already been established that he wants to stay part time and there aren’t many, if any part time teams that would be a step up from where he is, aside from Arbroath. So the big questions are - is he happy at Mo? - I’m sure he is; does he feel that he’s taken them as far as he can, on and off the pitch? - Possibly; does he fancy a new, bigger challenge? - again possibly.

The reality is that Mo are probably at the limit of their potential, consistent top half of L1 and a realistic chance of the promotion playoffs every season. Arbroath on the other hand have become (for now ) an established championship club with huge advancements on and off the pitch. He would have a much larger budget to play with and he’s remembered very fondly by our support so there would be no anti Mo sentiment. There’s also the situation where, if he came and failed, there would still be a queue of part-time teams willing to give him a job.

Just might not fancy it though and think it’s too much of a risk. If i was the Arbroath board then I’d be throwing the kitchen sink at trying to get him. Then again, maybe he’s not even in their thoughts?

Edited November 26, 2023 by Tattie36

[May Rckinnon]

Tbh, as a forfar fan I do think Arbroath needed a change.

Same thing happened at station park, Dick should've left after we lost the playoff final against alloa, instead he wanted to try for promotion again, we were shite, he was sacked.

Forfar fans will tell you he shouldn't have gotten his jotters, but that's because Bollan was his replacement. His record was worthy of the boot.

DC is very good at what he does, but he has his limits. Once his core band of players leave or are past their best he struggles to replace them & then suddenly nothing is his fault. 

Like some have said already, he should've gone in the summer on a relative high, but again, he never knows when the job is done.

[lichtie23]

Malcolm, sellers and Liam Craig in charge 

[Tattie36]

5 minutes ago, lichtie23 said:

Malcolm, sellers and Liam Craig in charge 

Jesus I was panicking for a minute there until I read the club statement. 

[clashcityrocker]

So, are the players going to turn up on Tues night, put in a good shift and win the match with a nod and wink to DC or are we going to get another lacklustre performance - with the right attitude its a winnable game which would lift us to 6th in the league !

 

[Lichtielegend]

I'm not sure Petrie would be that tempted. He's got a good thing going at Montrose and might consider it a risk not worth taking.

 

While I think with one or two signings we can do enough to stay up, there is clearly signs that the squad needs a bit of a rebuild over the next two years. Our back line is showing a few creaks, especially as we're struggling to get a consistent back 4 on the pitch. We've never replaced Chris Hamilton in midfield or Nicky Low for that matter. Upfront, we're just unable to keep the ball up the pitch and because we're playing it long all the time, our midfield are spending so much time just doing shuttle runs up and down the park.