Murray

By Mill House
December 8 2014

Apart from feeling generally embarassed it's difficult to know what to think about current affairs at the soap opera known as Victoria Park ..

The initial reaction is to feel very sorry for Paul Murray who was always a consumate professional on the pitch.

His team were on a hiding to nothing against Blyth Spartans. With a bit of luck their excellent first half play could have produced one or two more goals, and it was very unfortunate that the officials were unsighted when the ball crossed the Blyth goalline in the second half. 

It was also just sheer bad look that Dan Jones slipped when he did.

Murray was also hidebound in his selection by players who were cup-tied or injured. If he was to be judged then surely it would be on league performances -  so his sacking came as a big shock.

We will never know the full reason as Ken Hodcroft and IOR are very professional in the way they handle these "human resources" issues. They also tend to not have knee jerk reactions, which makes the weekend's affairs all the more unusual.

You cannot criticise the managament for not being positive in their actions, and it is now apparent that they are not prepared to allow the club to sleepwalk into relegation. A few of us were having doubts.

Their next act in appointing the new manager could well be one of the most important in the club's history.