Andy Warren reminded me in the East Anglian Daily Times that it was the presence of our owner that has made all the difference this season and here’s the reason why. If you recall, earlier in the campaign, owner Marcus Evans made it a habit of talking to the players before they took to the field. He was not present for our last two defeats but attended all the others when the Blues were winning games, playing well, and picking up points. Coincidence? Perhaps not.
I have it on good authority that his conversations were not always about the niceties of the beautiful game but he also communicated a message in the form of a thinly veiled threat, that if they had any intention of parking their bus here, then what they did on the pitch would decide their futures. He wanted to impress upon them the need to perform week in and week out, and due to this Coronavirus pandemic that was destroying so many peoples lives, footballers were not immune to it.
A lacklustre display against Doncaster saw us fall to our heaviest defeat of the season and another lifeless performance against Lincoln City on Saturday has got us all wondering what is going wrong. Could it be that the absence of Marcus Evans has had a detrimental effect on the squad – or has Lambert taken his foot off the gas just because the owner is currently out of sight?
Against Lincoln, we were toothless going forward. OK, we had the bulk of possession but we did very little with it, and our distinct lack of autoschediasm meant that we became boringly predictable throughout. Football is essentially a simple game, and if you don’t shoot you won’t score. And yet, all we seemed to do was pass the ball around in pretty triangles most of the time, without ever being a serious goal threat.
I do hope Evans is back tomorrow, as Town take on Gillingham at Portman Road. Whether he is nothing more than a lucky charm as Warren alluded to in his article, or perhaps something more sinister, it would not do us any harm to see the owner looking on. After all, isn’t that what owners are supposed to do?
