Pre-Match Thread Southend United v Altrincham, Now 27th February 19:45

[Chris Powell's mate]

I wonder what Alty's manager's input was at the inspection. On one hand if the pitch had been declared playable that £5,000 wouldn't have been wasted, on the other it seems he'd have had to play a weakened team and his club would have had to row back on it's rant!

Have done some extensive homework on this, and unless they were staying in Claridges, it wasn't £5k.

 

[cerbera45]

If we thought the pitch was playable - why did we call in the alternative ref for a pitch inspection at 10:30 versus just waiting for the appointed match official to turn up?

like a GP's second opinion you mean? ;-)

 

[Holy Joe]

like a GP's second opinion you mean? ;-)

We don't normally have a pitch inspection because we know the pitch is playable. According to the club the pitch was playable, so why have a pitch inspection - there must have been some doubt?

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

So to summarise:

Friday

Local Ref: Holds call with both clubs re: pitch inspection.
Alty: See the weather and games getting postponed, including ours on the Tuesday. Have some knocks from their game on Tuesday and want a postponement. Think that's a cert if the pitch is checked Friday. Pressure ref and Southend to agree to postponement.
Southend: Haven't played our Tuesday game but determined to get Saturday on and have plans in place to ensure pitch is playable. Assure ref an inspection totally unnecessary.
Ref: Finds a middle way - morning inspection at 10:30 am. Nobody happy.
Alty: Because this means they need to travel and possibly even play the game, but they fume all the way here, determined to pressurise the ref into a postponement.
Southend: Because at that early hour the pitch will not be representative of how it will be at 3pm. Nevertheless, we'll be working hard on it from the wee small hours, confident we can get it sufficient to be approved by the ref at 10:30 am.

Saturday

All three arrive at Roots Hall - Alty are here having travelled the night before, so they are on the spot to give a full opinion. The Ref meets the two managers on the pitch.
Southend: Proud of our efforts, 'nothing to see here' Kev says, expecting the match to be waved through without a hitch.
Alfy: Still fuming at having yesterday's plan kiboshed because Kev wouldn't agree the early postponement, and because as a result they have needed to actually come to Southend for the scheduled fixture. Determined to be shock and horrified, concerned for player welfare, threaten the referee that 'on his head be it' if he allows the match to go ahead in such atrocious conditions.
Ref: A bit of wee comes out. Then he postpones as that seems like the safest option where everyone is criticised except him, and he can toddle off free of worry.
Alty: Pleased with the outcome, determined to throw **** at Southend to a) obscure their own murky motives and b) because they are still sore that they didn't get everything they wanted right from the off.
Southend: ****ed off doesn't even come close. All the overnight efforts - which had been successful - were wasted when a spineless ref was bullied by someone called Phil Parkinson (sounds familiar). Decide to spend all day training all over the pitch and flood social media with this, to allow the public to determine for themselves whether the pitch was safe and therefore who might have been behind the game's postponement.

 

[Chris Powell's mate]

So to summarise:

Friday

Local Ref: Holds call with both clubs re: pitch inspection.
Alty: See the weather and games getting postponed, including ours on the Tuesday. Have some knocks from their game on Tuesday and want a postponement. Think that's a cert if the pitch is checked Friday. Pressure ref and Southend to agree to postponement.
Southend: Haven't played our Tuesday game but determined to get Saturday on and have plans in place to ensure pitch is playable. Assure ref an inspection totally unnecessary.
Ref: Finds a middle way - morning inspection at 10:30 am. Nobody happy.
Alty: Because this means they need to travel and possibly even play the game, but they fume all the way here, determined to pressurise the ref into a postponement.
Southend: Because at that early hour the pitch will not be representative of how it will be at 3pm. Nevertheless, we'll be working hard on it from the wee small hours, confident we can get it sufficient to be approved by the ref at 10:30 am.

Saturday

All three arrive at Roots Hall - Alty are here having travelled the night before, so they are on the spot to give a full opinion. The Ref meets the two managers on the pitch.
Southend: Proud of our efforts, 'nothing to see here' Kev says, expecting the match to be waved through without a hitch.
Alfy: Still fuming at having yesterday's plan kiboshed because Kev wouldn't agree the early postponement, and because as a result they have needed to actually come to Southend for the scheduled fixture. Determined to be shock and horrified, concerned for player welfare, threaten the referee that 'on his head be it' if he allows the match to go ahead in such atrocious conditions.
Ref: A bit of wee comes out. Then he postpones as that seems like the safest option where everyone is criticised except him, and he can toddle off free of worry.
Alty: Pleased with the outcome, determined to throw **** at Southend to a) obscure their own murky motives and b) because they are still sore that they didn't get everything they wanted right from the off.
Southend: ****ed off doesn't even come close. All the overnight efforts - which had been successful - were wasted when a spineless ref was bullied by someone called Phil Parkinson (sounds familiar). Decide to spend all day training all over the pitch and flood social media with this, to allow the public to determine for themselves whether the pitch was safe and therefore who might have been behind the game's postponement.

Like the narrative, and not in the slightest biased, lol!
But if @LBBlue has got the right template then this is interesting:
"Liaise with Managers BUT the decision as to whether the match is played is yours." The 'yours' being the official.
If he was local, would it be reasonable to suggest he would be favourable to Kev's overtures, and if he really wanted to avoid criticism, remembering both teams are there, and fans have already left, couldn't he just pass the buck to the match official for a later inspection?

 

[jackj13]

Like the narrative, and not in the slightest biased, lol!
But if @LBBlue has got the right template then this is interesting:
"Liaise with Managers BUT the decision as to whether the match is played is yours." The 'yours' being the official.
If he was local, would it be reasonable to suggest he would be favourable to Kev's overtures, and if he really wanted to avoid criticism, remembering both teams are there, and fans have already left, couldn't he just pass the buck to the match official for a later inspection?

I think this is the uncertain bit where nobody knows the whole story. Obviously we thought it was ok. But the local ref, clearly thought there was no way it could be playable or improve enough in 4/12 hours.

Quite a lot of information not in the public to this whole situation I feel.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

Like the narrative, and not in the slightest biased, lol!
But if @LBBlue has got the right template then this is interesting:
"Liaise with Managers BUT the decision as to whether the match is played is yours." The 'yours' being the official.
If he was local, would it be reasonable to suggest he would be favourable to Kev's overtures, and if he really wanted to avoid criticism, remembering both teams are there, and fans have already left, couldn't he just pass the buck to the match official for a later inspection?

Biased? We know the following:

Alty issue strongly worded statement on Friday, after the call with the ref and SUFC, saying:

A pitch inspection will take place at Roots Hall at 10:30am tomorrow morning ahead of our Vanarama National League game against Southend United at 3pm.
We’ve been in continuous dialogue with our hosts over the last few days requesting that a decision be made prior to the team and numerous supporters departing today. All feedback prior to this point has been that there is no threat to the match due to the weather.*
We are dismayed to learn late this afternoon, hours into our journey**, that there is now an inspection tomorrow morning at 10.30am. Not only will a postponement lead to wasted costs of almost £5,000, but the timing of the inspection will be made at a time when supporters will have departed on trains or on the coach which is departing Altrincham at 8.30am for what is arguably our longest journey of the season.
We kindly ask the National League, as they rightly obliged us ahead of our postponed home match against Dorking Wanderers in December, to put protocols in place for these decisions to take place before teams and supporters travel given the expense involved for all parties.

I'm suggesting that suggests they wanted a postponement. What other 'early decision' could be taken ahead of the overnight frost the night before the match? Had Alty seen our pitch on the Friday?

* Alty are crystal clear that SUFC's position all along, consistently, is no inspection needed and no postponement needed.

** This was when the call was with the ref - which Alty were on, from the bus. Parkinson was sore already because Kev hadn't agreed to support the postponement call, which meant they needed to get on their bus and leave in case the match was played.

No. I don't think this is biased, its simply joining the dots between the various public statements - its blindingly obvious what the sequence of events was! Parkinson is a lying **** I'm afraid.

 

[kentblues]

I think this is the uncertain bit where nobody knows the whole story. Obviously we thought it was ok. But the local ref, clearly thought there was no way it could be playable or improve enough in 4/12 hours.

Quite a lot of information not in the public to this whole situation I feel.

Given the divergent views the obvious thing would have been a later final inspection by the match referee. Mystery why that didn’t happen. Suspect Alty were very keen to get it cancelled and were in the officials ear. Only thing that makes sense of it to me. Afterall, if both sides were keen to play why on earth wouldn’t you have a later inspection?

Anyway done now. You always hope learnings follow but they never seem to.

Look forwards not back I guess.

 

[Cricko]

I think we are done now with this topic.