One down, still far to go
17/12/04 | by Alan Fisher

I really wanted to take a step back from the Kinnear-bashing and wish him well after stepping down as Forest boss. And after reading the comments on the official Forest site (which I now suspect were ghost-written) was starting to pen something along those lines, but overnight – perhaps predictably – our former boss has come down with another nasty case of verbal diarrhoea.

The fans, who were "magnificent" yesterday, now appear to have both "short memories", as well as living in the past – not quite sure how to reconcile that. I find it unfathomable that Kinnear harps on about the supposed pressure of former-players and fans to live up to the past – nobody has EVER, to my knowledge, suggested that Joe should get us a European trophy. In fact, most supporters and former players alike were somewhat more realistic in our chances than Kinnear himself. Aside from the "serious about promotion" PR stunt, it was Joe who said he’d consider anything less than the play-offs a failure. So if judging him by the standards he publicly set for himself is living in the past, so be it!

On the flipside of this, it seems that Joe’s sole justification for his continued role of Nottingham Forest manager was based wholly on his own past, which whilst impressive – considering the circumstances he worked under at Wimbledon – is still the past. When judged upon his current performance it seems that he has a very loooooong memory, whilst us with our short memories can only consider things like being in the relegation zone, losing to teams like Gillingham, capitulating to Derby, all that seems to run through Joe’s head are his ‘glory days’ at Wimbledon. And don’t even get me started on the plethora of patently incorrect stats he comes out with, I’m sure it’s been covered amply both by myself in past ramblings and other writers!

Okay, so that’s my Kinnear-rant over. It’s a shame you couldn’t have left with a bit of dignity, Joe – but perhaps (as with issues like team selection, etc), it was a little overly optimistic of me to expect you to. Now he’s done what I wanted and resigned I no longer have the energy to try to keep up with his media diatribe, so will draw a line under my interest in the man and wish him the best – seriously Joe, have a rest, because you don’t look well.

The leaking of information suggesting that the planned protests on Friday hurried up the backroom "decision" to manufacture Kinnear’s "resignation" is interesting, and it’s a real shift of the perception of power at the ground. By the mere suggestion of a protest of significant number we have succeeded in speeding up a decision that was probably to be made anyway – obviously this was designed to prevent a protest with global coverage via Sky. The board has exposed itself to perhaps not being as impervious to our opinions and protests as was once perceived – if we can unite behind a realistic cause then people stand up and take notice.

Which means that the board need to state what their true ambitions are for this club. Does Mr Doughty simply see us as a plaything in his business empire or does he truly want to deliver top flight football to us? Now the normally passive fanbase is becoming volatile we mustn’t lose sight of the fact that not all of this club's problems stopped at Kinnear. That’s what they want us to do, and there will be a calm now for a while at least – but if our fortunes don’t improve, I don’t think it will be the manager's head that future protests will be calling for (unless we appoint Carlton Palmer, I suppose!).

Now, of course, the biggest thing we have on our agenda as fans is to back the team, as vocally as possible, and to support Mick Harford in his role as acting manager. He’s not my first choice, but then it’s not my decision to make – and he deserves a chance to be backed by supporters. As far as I’m aware the protest was to oust Kinnear, which has been achieved, meaning we now need to back the team 100% and do our part to give the players some confidence in an unsettling time for them. Mark Arthur said to the radio this morning that he didn’t envisage a permanent appointment this side of Christmas, so whether you secretly fantasise about Clough, Pearce, Laws, Megson or whoever taking the helm, for the next few games the fans MUST demonstrably back Mick Harford and the team to try to start to put this sorry season right. Starting with the Leicester game:

MICK HARFORD’S RED 'N' WHITE ARMY!