...club is probably us. If we'd saved ourselves on the last day of the season, it would created heroes who would have been enshrined in folklore and our psyche. Everyone would have wiped their memories clear of the dire performances leading up to the match which is what really relegated us.
It was easy before IOR, we'd been shite since day one of our excistence as a joke club, we accepted it, we knew our place.
However, after the arrival of IOR, we suddenly experienced what most other clubs experience and it felt good and suddenly ..... we had expectations. Once that happens, there's normally no putting the genie back into the bottle, but we seem to be drifting back to our old ways. Celebrating 'great escapes' was a sure sign expectations seeping away, especially when we should really have been asking how did we get in this situation in the first place.
We have dissent amongst fans, a restless bickering .... and all the time the season looks like we all booked on a cruise in the National League only to find out that when we got out of sight of land we found we'd booked for a cruise on the Titanic, without the lifeboats, the Captain had only ever sailed yachts on the park pond, the crew got sea sick and the owners had never seen a ship before they got lumbered with it.
Hate to say this, but we really do have to get our heads together and start and getting expectations back. Sadly, we don't have time now to see how things pan out, there was a time for that once but those days are gone, we don't have that luxury and the whole club structure should be rationalised to concentrate on the core business, drop the trappings and under performers and stop tolerating rubbish on the field.
Owners, managers and players are all transient, we aren't, we're here for life, we are the club.

You know times are bad when Snowy gets all nautical. It's a strangely reassuring way of predicting impending doom and misery that always cheers me up a bit.

He might be right about the expectations thing - a taste of honey is worse than none at all as the great Smokey Robinson once sang.

It’s only really bad when I slip sharks in.

in the early 60,s the only expectation and hope was being voted back for another season.

Hartlepool - always the bridesmaid , never the bride.

Bridesmaid? More like the old woman who sweeps up the confetti when everyone's gone.

To be fair, we peaked at being ushers and spent most of our history waiting outside the church while the priests decided whether we should be allowed in when we were clearly pissed.

I said something similar, albeit a lot shorter, a few year back.

I think I likened it to people taking smack for the first time and the impending descent into the dark world of drug abuse.

Anyone would think we won actually won something between 1999 and 2007.

Best not get too carried away with the revisionism. My best memory as a Pools fan is beating Northampton to win promotion in 1991 - I'd already been a regular at the Vic for almost 20 years and never really believed that another promotion was a realistic possibility.

Beating the drop with Ronnie was a long way below that but still a good moment, especially because relegation looked inevitable for so long. At the time it felt like a turning point after years of decline - and might have been if the new owners we got a couple of months later had been kosher and with a genuine investment plan. Instead we got Coxall and Goldberg...

Didn't know about the mural though. that's seriously OTT!

I never saw that as anything but what it was , a great escape, that was only at best going to be played out every season thereafter. The club has been in decline for nigh on 10 years now

Who said anything about winning something. To me it was just nice to actually be in the running and the feel good factor. We were in the room, not outside looking in with our snotty noses pressed against the window.

We might not of won anything but we went and had a bloody good go. We went to clubs way bigger than ours and beat a lot of them. We had no fear of the huddersfields and stokes of this world. Now we have a team petrified of the likes of dover.

In the pre IOR days we had low expectations and teams of often mediocre talent with a sprinkling of brilliance or giant killing every now and then to keep us happy, I don't recall effort or heart ever being in question, maybe I have forgotten.
In most of the IOR days we were competitive, had some really good talent at times, we were after all unbeatable, we went to Cardiff and but for..............8 minutes was it could have been in the Championship. I am of course only remembering the highs the last few years under IOR, we're now reverting back to our norm without necessarily moderating our expectations.
Since IOR left we have been robbed twice and been relegated, we have appointed a relatively inexperienced manager, have a relatively inexperienced chairlady, have a team of limited talent, minimal heart and between them have no idea what to do.

The only positive is there are about 3000 fans who go to games, about 1500 more than was attending when IOR came along

Kinda makes you wonder why we wanted IOR out in the first place.. but hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Unless the fanbase sees serious action being taken to turn the current depressing situation around we can kiss goodbye to crowds of 3k as the season will be regarded as effectively over before very long and fans will vote with their feet, season tickets or not.

Aunty Pam May have our money but 3P sales (Pints, Pies & Programmes) will take a hit. The terraces will inevitably be sparse for the traditional worst Saturday of the season on Saturday week against Maidenhead. Should the unthinkable happen in this weeks Tin Pot cup game the gaps on the terraces and stands could be equally embarrassing.

No one wanted IOR out, they left due to other circumstances. We were left with Uncle Ken as baby sitter in a sort of limbo.

The Sharks have arrived

Ior under Larsen were wonder days for Pools. Don't make the mistake of confusing them with IOR under Hodcroft in 2008 onwards.

I did refer to him as the 'babysitter'.

The club needs a thorough review of it's business model, not an acceptance of legacy practices.
Find out what the core business is and concentrate everything on that. If it doesn't produce anything from revenue to future players, discard it for now.
Run the place like a business, the time for sentimentality has gone.

this

Pools have a business model?

This !

[attachment=0]untitled.png[/attachment

Never been a better time to get one.