(Carl)Isle of Dogs

16/03/2025 11:12

Well, we had to win this one, didn’t we?

Actually, don’t downplay our result yesterday. We were playing against the strongest team in the whole EFL, after all.

As in, they’re holding up the rest of the 91 Club…

It sounded less comfortable than it needed to be, and you can’t blame people for being a bit apprehensive beforehand.

But right now – a win is worth six points, regardless of who you play.

After what’s been a pretty shite couple of weeks, we’re back in third in this tightest of all promotion races.

Even though Port Vale have a game in hand (I can’t be arsed to find out who it is) I’ll take that after what has felt like a relentless grind.

I think we all would have preferred not to head up to Cumbria yesterday, or in general, but we did and the 511 of us up there can be satisfied with our day.

It helped that Maycock found the net after a couple of minutes, with a decent strike, even though we weren’t particularly much cop for the rest of the first half.

When Smith put us two ahead, it should have led to a 3 or 4-niller, but it doesn’t quite work like that.

Them getting a goal back made it a lot less pleasant, and it’s always worse following it from afar rather than being at the game.

But we held on, perhaps a bit more comfortably if one is looking at it in the cold light of day, and that’s far more important than anything else.

And I have to say, games against these kind of teams are a lot less easy than you think they should be.

If you doubt this, find a Bradford fan this morning and ask them how they got on yesterday.

Carlisle are fighting for their EFL lives, and as we should all know from our own relegation battles, you scrap, brawl, nibble and bite at anything that gets you out of the shit.

It’s worth reading the Carlisle forum this morning, as it sounds like some of their players are telling their fans to literally fuck off.

It’s the familiar tales of their recruitment finding shit players and those with even more shit attitudes.

And if you need a reminder what a good job JJ and Cope have done in the last couple of years – remember, we were similar to Carlisle not so many moons ago.

This division is no slam dunk, even for the promotion chasing sides. But one now senses we can draw a line under the last month at least.

It might be a cliche, but the season properly starts next week at home to Barrow.

There’s only one midweeker I can think of (Swindon on 1st April), and while we have Easter to contend with, the fixture list won’t be a cause of death.

Walsall and Doncaster are undoubtedly biggies, and Port Vale/Grimsby might be the decisive fixture(s).

It sounds daunting, although a legit promotion contender should be competitive in those games, but we’ll have some time to rest now.

We can work on things in training again, and to make sure the likes of Stevens rediscover some form.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the amount of games in the last couple of months has seen us dip.

Against Cheltenham last week, we looked like a team out of sorts, and I think we’re simply knackered.

One can argue that JJ doesn’t rotate enough, although when he does he seems to get slagged off for that too.

I’ve just read his post match comments, and I get the feeling he’ll be glad to have full weeks on the training ground.

Because this is the biggest run of games for quite a while. And for the first time since 2016 we’re actually looking to push upwards.

While typing that out, I realised the Wombley season was nine years ago. We got from the CCL to the EFL in that time.

I’ve also realised that up until last season, it’s been mostly shit in that period for us. We never really prepared for life in L1.

And if I’m being honest – should we go up this season, I wouldn’t put it past the club to cut the budget.

But I still want us to get through these next nine cup finals, and get promotion.

I don’t buy this whole, “the best thing would be to lose in the playoff final” bollocks that some have been coming up with recently.

Us getting relegated from L1 remains a wrong that needs to be righted. It might have happened anyway, but the way we went about it still sticks in my throat.

If we’re successful this campaign, then the summer will be great. And I think we’ll make a better fist of it the second time round.

We’ve got to get there first, and there’s still a long way to go.

There’s been a few times recently where I don’t think we’re good enough to even be in the playoffs, let alone top three.

However, that’s exactly where we are at this very moment, and obviously we must be doing something right.

We’re undeniably out of form, the last couple of weeks especially have been a struggle, and there’s no guarantee we’ll start winning again.

But everyone in the top eight has a chance. And we’re one of them…