I wish I could say the same thing about Berwick Rangers FC.
It was only a matter of time before Michael Renwick was shown the door and indeed he was, after a thrashing from Raith on 19th April. It was the night of Gary O'Connor's Testimonial Quiz Night when the news filtered through via the players in attendance. There was almost a massive sigh of relief by the players and the fans there that night.
In May we heard of the appointment of Alan McGonigal. Who? That was what most of us said straight away. I had never heard of the guy, although I don't follow Junior football at all. A friend of mine who does follow it said he was highly rated at Camelon and given the success we had with John Coughlin, most fans were more than willing to give Alan a fair chance. Although I suppose any new manager should be given a chance really.
He brought with him a glut of new signings from the Junior ranks. I must admit I do remember thinking at the time it was just too much. When Coughlin bought Junior players in the Summer of 2005, he kept a core of senior players too. Football at our level is all about balance. Whether that be balancing the books, balancing success on the pitch with a structurally sound club or balancing young players with more experienced guys.
In came Mark Lunn, Ryan McGurk, Steven Kiczynski, Jamie Ewart, Peter McMahon, Graham Guy, John Dillon, Craig Anderson, Steven Bonar, Fraser McLaren, Jim Lister, Darren Gribben and David Grant. Andy McLean made the step up from the reserves along with Chris Anderson. The likes of Tommy Lennox, David Greenhill, Stuart Callaghan, Andy Howat were retained, alongside our most senior players in Ian Little and Robbie Horn.
Grant McNicoll and Gary Wood both decided not to sign contracts. Grant joined Arniston and Gary is rumoured to have joined the Police force.
We basically started the new season with an entirely new side. I only saw one pre-season friendly so the game against QOS in late July had me, and a few others, wondering who all the new players were. QOS did very last season and they had qualified for Europe this season, I didn't think we'd have a hope in hell. We didn't, they ran out comfortable 5-1 winners.
A week later we hosted Shire and put in a much improved performance with Darren Gribben and John Dillon putting us two goals up before they got their consolation. We lost at Ayr that midweek before travelling to Montrose to get a point out of a 1-1 draw. Right up until that point I thought we had a chance of doing something this season.
The cracks started to show and Dumbarton took advantage on 16th August with a 2-1 win. We then travelled up to Coatbridge on the Bank Holiday weekend to witness a shambles of a display, Albion winning 2-0 when it could easily have been much more.
A 2-2 draw against Forfar a week later breathed a little bit of hope back into the side. We had a week's break for Scotland-Macedonia which gave us a chance to re-group, but an awful game at Cowdenbeath on Saturday saw us lose 2-1.
So that's where we are just now. It's not been a great start, the next few games are going to be crucial. We have Stenny on Saturday, more on that tomorrow!
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