When the old guard clashes with the new, supporters of clubs like Leyton Orient are often shown to be hypocrites, complaining on the one hand about the condescending attitudes of the fans of ‘big clubs’ towards us whilst viewing with disdain the teams seen as lower down the football food chain than us. On one hand we will complain about the facilties (unless they are SO bad that it has its benefits – such as Barrow’s open air toilets). On the other we look forward to visiting them because it is somewhere new to tick off the list, a new badge of honour. And without fail we expect the Os to win. Why shouldn’t we, we’ve been a league team for over 100 years, there is nothing these upstarts can teach us about winning professional football matches.
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| Steve Evans : Lovely bloke |
And yet, since 2001 Orient have a worse win record against the 19 teams that have been promoted from the Conference than against all of the other sides. We still look forward to playing 6 of those teams for the first time - the romantic trip to Wimbledon, the away days at Morecambe and Accrington, the chance to plant a metaphorical blow on Steve Evans’ chins at Crawley. But over the last ten years Orient have won 30% of the games they have played against the 13 other new boys compared with 34% against other teams. We also have fewer defeats against the new teams than the rest, as we have managed to rack up the draws at an alarming rate.
It shouldn’t be a great surprise because over the last ten years teams promoted out of the Conference have notched up 4 automatic promotions and 12 play off appearances (3 of them successful). That is set to increase with Crawley heading League Two this season and Shrewsbury, Burton and Torquay United all in the hunt. Of the teams that have been promoted to the League since 2001 Boston United and Chester City are the only two teams that couldn't stay there and fans of both teams would blame the the backroom turmoil that would have sunk any club rather as the reason for their demise. Boston were eventually demoted out of the Conference due to their precarious financial position after being relegated back down and Chester sadly went out of business last year.
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| Sean Thornton |
The big success story is clearly Doncaster Rovers. You can tell what a tangled mess Doncaster became before their resurgence just by looking at their Wikipedia entry. Two short paragraphs cover 1879 to the early 1990s and the majority of the article covers the last ten years! They were a sorry mess when they visited Brisbane Road in 1997 and were thumped 8-0, the team literally containing pub footballers (not Sean Thornton, he was to come later). They have built on their 2003 promotion back to the League with two subsequent promotions. 23rd place in the Championship may be uncomfortable but not many would trade for where they were just 10 years ago. Yeovil Town, Carlisle United and to a certain extent Exeter City have also managed to consolidate places in a higher league after their initial promotion.
Of course there are two different types of club that have come out of the Conference. Stevenage have more in common with the likes of Wimbledon (who were one of only 7 teams in admitted to the league via the election system between 1950 and 1987) than they do the Doncasters and Carlisles who dropped out of the league largely through maladministration, to return stronger and better run. Like Wimbledon (and before them, Hereford who managed one season in what is now the Championship before sinking back down again in the 70s) Stevenage have clawed their way through the non-league system. Like Wimbledon they also play a ‘distinctive’ brand of football. However, whereas you got the impression Wimbledon were a team of thugs who just enjoyed kicking people for fun, Stevenage are proponents of that oxymoronic term for almost cheating, “professionalism”.
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| Westley: Being a winner is all in the mind |
Manager Graham Westley will stop at nothing to try to gain any small advantage for his side against the much bigger clubs they face. This includes flying in the face of common expert opinion by holding lengthy training sessions in morning and afternoon sessions. There probably isn't a sporting psychologist that Westley hasn't studied and tried to introduce to his players. And his players heads are filled with in-depth analysis of their opponents, no keeping it short and simple. I grudgingly admired the way Stevenage played in the first league encounter at Brisbane Road. In the first half they were able to negate an Orient team that started well but were disrupted with constant stoppages and petty fouls. In the second half Stevenage took charge and their constant running and the pressure they managed to exert were reminiscent of the way that Peterborough played last year. 0-0 wasn’t a bad result, especially since it came in the middle of what was to become a 13 match unbeaten run for ‘Borough’.
But it was Orient who were to end that run against a surprisingly lethargic home side on Monday. Stevenage didn’t come close to displaying the sort of finesse shown by Lee Cook when he curled a left foot shot past Chris Day for his first Orient goal. This was a much more bruising encounter than the game in October, Stevenage relying on brute force, their more redeeming qualities almost entirely absent. Yet, as is so often the case, when Orient stepped up to meet the physical challenge they were instantly penalised by the referee. It came to a head when Ben Chorley was sent off before half time, apparently on the advice of the linesman. It was a bizarre decision, Chorley guilty of no more than pushing Chris Beardsley to the ground after tangling in an aerial challenge with but the linesman, standing behind the incident, was convinced he had seen an elbow and the red card was shown to the Orient centre back.
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| Darren Sheldrake winning more friends |
Referee Darren Sheldrake was never completely at ease with having made a decision that incited lengthy protests from the Orient players and officials, based on the advice of his linesman. When late on in the game, with the Os still clinging to their lead, substitute Chuks Aneke raised his boot to challenge for the ball, catching Terrell Forbes on the side of the head, Sheldrake immediately reached for his red card to exact some kind of justice. In truth were it not for the Chorley sending off Sheldrake would only have booked Aneke because it wasn’t a malicious challenge by any stretch of the imagination. With each team down to ten Bostwick came close to levelling things up 5 minutes from the end but as his shot flashed over Stevenage’s last chance was gone.
On this evidence Stevenage are unlikely to achieve their 3rd successive promotion, there are too many teams with far greater resources around them. It is hard to imagine that any team will emulate Wimbledon and make it all the way to the Premiership. Someone may come along and throw money at a medium sized club and achieve success, indeed Dave Whelan already has, at Wigan but without that sort of injection you can't see a team like Stevenage sneaking up the league. But these clubs also have a habit of hanging around, fired by a team spirit and local support that is missing at many jaded league clubs. So best be prepared for even more tight games finishing in frustrating draws, starting on Saturday away at 2004/5 Conference Play Off winners Carlisle United.
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