In the first of his new regular columns, James Rhodes considers how far Walsall Football Club have come over the last few seasons;Over the last few weeks and months, many Walsall supporters have been portraying a negative attitude towards the team, and the season as a whole, this has also been amplified as our play off charge has now ground to a halt, giving many license to brand the season as a failure.
For me personally the season has been a great success given the fact we lost 40 goals in Will Grigg, Jamie Paterson and of course Febian Brandy, who has since returned on loan. Just think, with these 40 goals we would've had 85 goals, as to date we have 45. This would surely have cemented us a play-off spot. But the league this year has been somewhat unpredictable so who knows.
That said, at the start of the season many bookmakers had us as favourites for relegation, something that for me is now a distant memory from the Chris Hutchings and Martin O'Connor days of Hoof ball.
We currently sit 10th in Sky Bet League One, and this season has been another great one for the club, with a team that is still a work in progress, I'm sure you’ll agree. Credit to Dean Smith and the back-room staff for what they have done for the club. We're back to playing nice football and are going in the right direction.
The club announced an operating profit for the year ending 31st May 2013 of just over £23,000 (£10,000 in 2012), recently, the club announced record 'Early Bird' season ticket sales, and have negotiated various playing and coaching staff deals over the season, which will offer some security as the side heads to 2014/15.
All of this combined gives us a platform to build on into the next campaign and beyond, and who knows where we might go from here on in, given the recent progress, surely the players are even more hungry for success.
All we can do now as supporters is; remain positive, support the team in the remaining few games and push on to secure another top ten finish and rebuild for next season.
By: James Rhodes.
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