Fan Blog, Headley's Blog
With all respect, it’s time to go
Published by Simon Head on February 10, 2010
I’ve been a supporter of Mark Stimson throughout his tenure as Gillingham manager, but I think the time has now come for him to hold his hands up, say he’s taken the club as far as he can, and walk away.
Stimson arrived at the club in difficult circumstances and had to deal with a squad of players who, in many cases, were either too old or too lazy to justify their inclusion. A long period of flux followed where players gradually left and were replaced by the only players we could afford, many of whom were non-league recruits.
Predictably, despite a noticeable improvement in attitude, the players weren’t able to adjust to the two-division jump quickly enough and Gillingham were relegated. Some blamed the manager and his new players, but in my view the damage had already been done. Looking back it seems the rebuilding was almost certainly undertaken with League Two football in mind. Survival would have been an unexpected bonus.
In League Two Gillingham under Stimson looked a far more cohesive unit. Clearly benefiting from an early start to their pre-season training regime, Gillingham started to nick points at the end of games, rather than lose them. It was a clear sign of major improvement from the Jepson era. The team looked fit, hungry and had a real will to win.
And after a superb away win at Stockport in The FA Cup, Gillingham’s season kicked into top gear. They gave Aston Villa a real game in front of the ITV cameras, then embarked on an impressive run that led all the way to the playoffs and a Wembley final, won by Simeon Jackson’s thumping 90th-minute header.
But back in League One things haven’t been quite so rosy. A 5-0 win over old rivals Swindon on opening day looked good for the season ahead, but it proved a false dawn.
Gillingham’s away failings, so prevalent in our relegation from League One two years ago, returned once more. Sixteen matches (including 15 in the league) played, no wins.
With Gillingham dropping ever closer to the drop zone and with no discernable sign of improvement, Stimson called for reinforcements and chairman Paul Scally loosened the purse strings. Four new faces arrived, only for two of them, striker Rene Howe and winger Tristan Plummer, to get crocked. Bad luck for Stimson, who had seen an earlier loanee, Scott Vernon, ruled out after just 42 minutes in Gills colours at stadium:MK.
After some tough encounters there was hope in the form of a trio of fixtures against fellow promoted side Brentford and strugglers Tranmere and Yeovil. These matches, said Stimson, were winnable.
But Brentford took advantage of a generous referee and even more generous defending to thump the Gills 4-0 at Griffin Park.
And last night at Priestfield, Gillingham crashed to a gutless 1-0 defeat to Tranmere Rovers, arguably the worst away side we’ve seen at Priestfield all season and the club with the second-worst away record in the division (no points for guessing which side’s record is worse).
The Gills haven’t won in their last nine games. They haven’t won away at all in Season 2009/2010 and they have just lost two so-called ‘winnable’ matches. They now sit fourth from bottom, in the relegation places.
As concerning as the results are, there are other factors, too. I now have serious doubts over Stimson’s recent treatment of players.
He signs James Walker and says he can be a regular scorer of goals at this level. He picks him at Brentford and, in a 4-0 defeat, the new striker misses two very good chances. The very next game he is benched.
He says he wants to see Stuart Lewis taking League One by the scruff of the neck, then doesn’t pick him.
He sings the praises of teenagers Tom Wynter and Jack Payne, then less than a fortnight later drops both of them.
In his interview after the Brentford defeat he openly criticised his players, while claiming his preparations for the match were of ‘almost Premier League level’. It smacked of buck passing and I was worried how the team would react. The reaction last night was all we needed to know.
The team looked off the pace, their heads were down – in short, they looked beaten.
In a match against the worst travellers they’d meet all season, they didn’t look remotely up for it. That’s a major issue. Lack of talent is forgivable, lack of fight isn’t.
Also a major issue was the tactics employed by the manager. One up front in a must-win game? It left me stunned. Granted, there were three creative players in midfield, but one was an off-form Curtis Weston, who has been almost completely dropped as an away player, while another was a young player still trying to break into the first team, Luke Rooney.
But none of them were playing alongside Simeon Jackson.
Instead our pint-sized striker was left to try (and he did try) and deal with our “Hail Mary” approach to providing him with service. The long hoof from the back was there for all to see – and, of course, it didn’t work.
After the Brentford defeat, Stimson had the opportunity to field a positive, attacking, lineup and really have a go at a side who had won just twice on the road all year. It was screaming out for an attacking approach, yet he went for a conservative selection. In the eyes of this fan at least, he bottled it.
Right from the start Stimson has had to deal with fans who never wanted him at the club in the first place. “Non-league manager, non-league players” was a common statement from some fans who simply didn’t rate, nor want, him at the club.
I’ll admit I was underwhelmed by his appointment, but I thought he did a decent job in getting us back up to League One. Sure his job was helped by other clubs’ misfortunes and points deductions, but, under his stewardship, we’d started playing good football, with a united, committed set of players and we earned our promotion through the cut-throat system of the playoffs. He deserves great credit for that.
However, in League One it has been a different story and he appears to have no answer to our away form, while our home form, once the bedrock of our success, has also started to disintegrate. Throw in the public criticism of his players and it all adds up to the situation we have now – a demotivated team, bereft of confidence, playing in front of a demotivated set of fans, some of whom have turned to abusing both the manager and certain players. The tipping point has surely been reached.
The fans chanted for him to go last night. Some chanted abuse. I’ll never agree with abusing a manager or a player, especially one of our own. Nobody deserves that, no matter what you think of the man or his ability to do the job.
But after giving him a fair chance to prove he can turn things around, I do agree that now is the time for him to go.
Many of our squad are out of contract in the summer and making a managerial change now would give the new incumbent a fighting chance of keeping us up, while giving him the opportunity to run the rule over the players currently on the books before deciding who stays and who goes in the summer.
Previously I was prepared to give Stimson more time – but it has become clear that he has not only lost the confidence of the fans, but it seems he may also have lost the confidence of the players. And when that happens, you’re on borrowed time as a manager.
I appreciate the work Mark Stimson has done at Gillingham Football Club and I commend him for the way he built a new side from scratch under difficult circumstances and steered it to promotion in his first full season as a Football League manager. But I fear that, based on the team’s performances of late, that sunny summer’s day at Wembley may prove to be as good as it’ll get for Gillingham under Mark Stimson. I think he’s taken the club as far as he can and we need someone new to build on his team’s promotion in an attempt to prevent last season’s successes going to waste.
With all respect, it’s time for him to go.
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