Left Pie-On: September

Left Pie-On - shirt illustration by Adam Poole

We’re used to a fair few ups and downs, us County fans. As the most promoted and relegated team in the history of the football league, worshipping at the church of Meadow Lane is sometimes akin to what I’d imagine a bipolar sufferer goes through.

However, over the last few months there have been waaay more ups than downs for a change. After almost a decade where we spent a total of £10,000 on new players and barely managed a finish in the top half of the table, things have gone supernova and we are rich beyond our wildest dreams. It’s like someone has unlocked our cheat mode on Championship Manager, and given us unlimited amounts of cash – but it’s actually happening in real life! The club figurehead is now former England coach Sven Goran Eriksson, we’ve signed one of the most talented young goalkeepers in the Premiership in Kasper Schmeichel (pictured below left) and we’ve been linked with some ridiculous names like Roberto Carlos, Beckham, Figo, Nedved, Viera and… erm the ghost of Sir Stanley Matthews.

Kasper Schmeichel makes his Notts County debut against Dagenham and Redbridge. See full gallery.

The biggest name of those we’ve actually got in, however, is Sulzeer Jeremiah (aka Sol) Campbell. Here is a man who has won seventy-odd caps for England, two Premier League titles, four FA Cups and has never played outside the Premier League before. So it’s obviously something of a coup for us to get him on board! Also for those who think that because he’s about to turn 35 he’s past it, listen to Harry Redknapp describing him as still being ‘a top-six defender in the Premier League’ or read the stats of who was the second-fastest player in the whole of the Premier League last season – Campbell's top speed could see him run 10.1secs for 100m - just a tenth of a second slower than Brit Dwain Chambers ran at the World Championships. As you can imagine all this is a fairly incredible turnaround for a fanbase that are more used to their club signing non-league cloggers like Guy Branston (who admittedly had a good game against us for Burton on Saturday).

Obviously the money that Munto Finance are putting into the club and offering players to sign for us is a major factor and as fans we’d be idiots to pretend otherwise. But at the same time, players like Sol aren’t exactly short of a bob or two and the fact that he admitted to turning down higher short-term wages at Aston Villa and Ajax shows that he’s up for the challenge of playing for ‘Project Notts’ too!
 

Ben Davies celebrates his goal against Bradford with the rest of the Notts team.  See full gallery.

Another Premier League player who snuck into the Meadow Lane dressing room on transfer deadline day, without anything like the fanfare received for Campbell, was young Portsmouth winger Matt Ritchie. In many ways getting him on board is even more exciting a signing for us, particularly after witnessing the three crackers he scored against us while on loan to The Daggers last season. He’s fast, he’s young and he scored 13 goals from the left wing in 40 games last season. He should certainly add a bit more depth to our squad and free up the likes of Ben Davies (pictured right) and Johnnie Jackson (another recent signing from Colchester) to concentrate on battling for a place in the centre of midfield.

Despite the transfer deadline having now passed, I’d expect a few more signings to arrive at Meadow Lane over the next few months too. The loan window is about to re-open and players currently not registered with a club (like Figo, Nedved and Christian Vieri) are free to sign for a new one at any time. Not that we actually really need these ‘massive name’ players as the relatively unknown Ricky Ravenhill, Neil Bishop and Luke Rodgers have all looked class at this level so far. However, it’s clear that Munto want to raise our commercial profile across the world as quickly as possible and they are prepared to pay through the nose to do so. So if signing someone like Figo could get our shiny-brand-new Nike club shirt into sports shops in Madrid and Barcelona then who’s going to argue? Bizarrely splashing loads of cash in this example could make good business sense.

Karl Hawley takes on the Bradford defence.  See full gallery.

On the pitch, our home form has been solid, but our away form has been a slight worry. We started the season at the Lane by giving Bradford a good shoeing, with a 5-0 victory with goals from Ben Davies, Brendan Moloney and a Lee Hughes hat trick. Then we lost a tight Carling Cup tie against Championship side Doncaster 1-0, before going away to dirty dirty Macclesfield and putting four past them without reply. However, any League Two fan will tell you that Keith Alexander’s Macclesfield like a good scrap on the pitch and despite a good victory, we also came away with bruised ribs for midfielder Neil Bishop and a broken nose for centre-back John Thompson. Still, a better result than the broken leg they gave to Adam Tann last season…

Then we played Chesterfield away and lost a tight game against our fellow potential title challengers 1-2. I’m less gutted about the result than the way it came about. Any Forest fan will tell you that Jack Lester’s special move always has been that he’s good at winning penalties (ie diving). You love a player like that when he’s on your team and he very nearly did join us in the close season. However, his part in winning them two penalties in two minutes changed the game, despite a late reply from Mike Edwards for us. The twist in the tale is that the player who gave away the first penalty was our captain and Lester’s best mate (and best man) John Thompson. I wonder if they met up for a pint after the game?

After this we carried on where we had left off with a 3-0 victory against then league leaders Dagenham and Redbridge at home, with goals from Lee Hughes, Karl Hawley and Johnnie Jackson. The Daggers are a good side too (as their 6-1 and 3-0 victories over us last season testify), but following some resolute defending their resolve was broken just before half-time and the heads dropped as the second and third went in.Then we went away to Barnet and lost a tight game 1-0, after having what looked like a perfectly good goal ruled offside and having a blatant penalty appeal turned down. Still, good luck to the Bees and their manager Ian Hendon, who was a great full-back for us in the day. I'd take an educated guess that they'll be near the top of the table come the end of May.

Over the last weekend we fought a frustrating battle with Burton in a 1 - 1 draw at our place. Karl Hawley scored a lovely effort for the pies just after half-time, but the plucky League Two newcomers fought hard to get back into the game and were good value for their draw with a side that featured no less than five ex-Notts players (Shaun Harrod, Michael Simpson, Greg Pearson, Paul Boertien and the aforementioned Branston).

It's still early days in terms of the whole season and despite the frustration of dropped points, to my mind calls for Charlie's head (which have started on messageboards already) are extremely short-sighted. The combination of McParland, a longtime servant to the club and a wealth of knowledge on League Two, and Sven, a truly world-class football director, could be the dream ticket. But they need our support, not our criticism, and they need to be given time to get it right together.

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