Well, it is all over. The Fat Lady has sung and amazingly we stay up !-) To celebrate our amazing escape, I have created a Great Escape section dedicated to that incredible match against Plymouth Argyle which saw us stay in Division 3.
On the issue of the complaints by Hartlepool and Scarborough about the signing of Jimmy Glass after transfer deadline day, there is a special dispensation for goalkeepers, it being recognised as a specialist position. If a team is left without a recognisable senior goalkeeper after deadline day (for whatever reason) then one can be brought in. Our position was that our second 'keeper was out injured for the season and Tony Caig (our first choice) was sold to Blackpool. We got Knight on loan from Derby, but he was recalled because of their injury problems. Consequently we were granted dispensation to bring in Glass. Admittedly, it was a bad move to only bring in a loan keeper, but we were left in the position when Caig decided he wanted to go. Allegedly, Scarborough are appealing that the dispensation shouldn't have been allowed, but it was, so that is all there is to it. If they had won their match, they wouldn't need to appeal. Peterborough had a goal disallowed against Scarborough yesterday, we had one disallowed in the first half against Plymouth yesterday. You could go on and on about this incident or that incident, but over a season these things balance out and at the end of this season, we stayed up and they went down. I would be just as philosophical about it if it was _us_ that had gone down, but luckily it wasn't.
I seriously doubt that Knighton will sell up and go. He is a business man and he is more likely to try to get the club back to a position where he can sell it at a profit. The only way that that is likely to happen at the moment is if a fan (or group of) made the bid. Knighton, his wife and son all work at the club and draw salaries. How likely would he be to find a business opportunity elsewhere where this would be the case? Also, he owns other property around Carlisle, although this is all rumoured to be up for sale. Finally, the current "inside" story is that they plan to move the pitch to line up with our (new) East Stand during the close season and that next season there won't be a stand open at either end of the ground. This would save on stewarding and policing costs and would reduce capacity to below 10,000. But then again, how often have we had that many recently?
Looking on the bright side (hah, if it wasn't so sad, that would be funny) there is always next season in Division 3 and we can but hope that we do better.
| RIOA Index |
Editorials | Email the webmaster |