The Solid Foundations of Success

As Crawley hammered the final nails into Orient’s season, thoughts turned immediately to next season. These weren’t calm thoughts about strategic plans for the future but angry and frustrated people voicing concerns that next season might be lost even before it has begun. Even Danny Webb, who has attempted to spin positive lines in even the most difficult circumstances, felt moved to challenge whoever is currently running the club to back him. I got the impression he felt he no longer had anything to lose. Speak out and face the sack for stepping out of line. Keep schtum and he could either be out of a job when his contract expires in the summer or find himself as a manager with no players.

Regardless of whether Webb’s pleas get the desired response, the 12 June court date hangs heavy over the club. No player in their right mind would commit themselves to a club that could feasibily no longer exist in three month’s time if they have a better offer elsewhere. But if Orient go have a future and whenever that future starts, a major rebuilding exercise is required. Forget about instant returns - it may take some time to lay the foundations before building for success.

Francesco Becchetti’s impatience with managers at the first sign of trouble has been well documented. What of the players themselves?

Since Becchetti, who has always been closely engaged in first team affairs, took over at Orient, 77 different players have made league starts for the club. 61 of those players have been contracted to the club, with the remaining 16 loanees. That is 21 more players than in the last three years of Hearn’s reign, almost an entire squad of players.

It was always said that Russell Slade’s sides were slow starters to the season. It was an unfair criticism of a manager who found himself rebuilding during most summers. It was no coincidence that when he had the most continuity between the 12/13 and 13/14 seasons we made a flying start and ended at Wembley.  In the Wembley season only 24 players made starts. Only 6 of them were permanent new signings. Were it not for the circumstances that led to Slade fielding 5 different goalkeepers that season it would have been even fewer.

2014/15

By contrast, Becchetti dismantled the ‘squad with no future’ instead of building on the successes of the previous season. In his first season in charge 31 different players made league starts. 12 were inherited from the play off season, 12 were signed and 7 came in on loan. Slade’s new players struggled to find their feet at the start of each season. In Becchetti’s first season we never got off of our knees as the team was constantly changed and was never given a chance to gel before the season ran out and ended in relegation.

2015/16

Only 7 players from that first season returned in 2015/16. 3 of the play off squad (Cox, James and Baudry) and 4 of the 12 new signings made in the first season (Wright, Simpson, Pritchard and Cisak). Orient were in contention for the play offs for most of the season but the longer the season went on without breaking back into the play off places the quicker the merry go round went again. By the end of the season at total of 33 players, 7 of them loanees, had made League starts. 14 contracted senior players made their debuts during the season and they were joined by 5 youth team players taking their first bows. Once again, the team wasn’t given an opportunity to gel but the relative stability before Ian Hendon was sacked at least prevented us from sinking into a relegation battle.

2016/17

The lessons weren’t learned though. Of those 14 players signed in 2015/16, only 6 of them stayed and made starts this season. Two of those players were Sean Clohessy and Sammy Moore, who were both deemed surplus to requirements early in the season. Dean Cox, the last remaining member of the play-off squad, was also gone just over two years after the Wembley final. Alex Cisak is the only player still at the club who has started in each of Becchetti’s three seasons.

33 players have made League starts for Orient this season so far, a third of them recent promotees from the youth team. Even if some of those youth team players had been blended with a few more senior players during the January transfer window the chances are that, as was the case in 2014/15, it was already too late for them to develop any sort of team chemistry.

What chance?

There is no doubt that most if not all of Becchetti’s managers would feel that they weren’t given a proper chance to show what they could do. The players could justifiably claim the same. ‘Permanent’ players that have started league games under Becchetti but have since left the club were given an average of 23 starts to show their worth before they departed.  That includes that nucleus of 12 players from the play-off squad, who on average went on to make just 22 further starts each.

And it’s got worse rather than better. 11 senior players have made their debuts for Orient this season. They have made an average of 18 starts each, less than half of the games. By the end of the season a significant majority of the squad will have started less than half of the league games.

For any club to be successful it requires stability. That goes right from the boardroom, to the managers and the players that are on the field. And it may require patience from fans as well. Chances are we will be starting from scratch again at the start of the season. We should have learned by now that we will go nowhere but backwards if the next batch of players and their manager aren’t given a proper chance to develop and build.

Where did they play?

Goalkeepers – 5

Right back – 7

Left back – 8
Centre backs – 13
Right wing – 5
Left wing – 5
Centre Midfield  - 16
Strikers – 18

The team with the most appearances

GK:         Alex Cisak

DR:         Nicky Hunt

DL:          Shane Lowery

DC:         Mathieu Baudry

DC:         Tom Parkes

MR:        Gavin Massey

ML:        Dean Cox

MC:        Bradley Pritchard

MC:        Nigel Atangana

A:            Jay Simpson

A:            Ollie Palmer

 

Remember them? The team with the least appearances

GK:         Adam Legzdins

DR:         Neal Eardley

DL:          Adam Chicksen

DC:         Alan Dunne

DC:         Jean Yves Mvoto

MR:        Ulrich N’nomo

ML:        Calaum Jahraldo-Martin

MC:        Michael Petrasso

MC:        John Lundstram

A:            Kevin Lisbie

A:            Scott Kashket