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If They Can, Why Can't We?
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Just a pub team.
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By:
Eric Hitchmo
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31/05/2010
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More On Dagenham and Redbridge
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"I watched on yesterday as Dagenham & Redbridge were victorious at Wembley and were promoted to League One. There were plenty of different feelings going through my head as line after line of media romanticism were reeled off regarding their achievement. We are all well aware that they are supposedly a ""pub team from Essex"". We know that they will play the likes of Sheffield Wednesday and Charlton. We know that they're a small club punching above their weight. As almost everyone connected with the media insisted on repeating such sentiments, I didn't know whether to be happy for them, jealous of them, admiring of their achievement, bitter towards them or just a bit resigned to the fact that a club smaller than us has overtaken us and progressed at a rate of knots. In short, why can't it be us?
It could well have been sooner too. Last season, their second in the Football League, they were only denied a playoff place on the last day in an all or nothing game against Shrewsbury. This year proved it was no fluke. What exactly have they done differently to us? What has catapulted them up to the higher echelons of the league and allowed them to sustain it? Could it simply be the fact that they've had a manager who has extensive experience of this level and knows how to get a team to perform at that level? The fact that this manager has used the loan and free transfer markets superbly, along with unearthing non-league gems like Paul Benson? Perhaps it is, because I can't see any other way. It isn't their crowds, it isn't a better ground, it simply seems to be down to what's happened on the pitch.
Now I've mentioned this many times over the last few months, but it seems the club have neglected what happens when eleven men cross the white line and focussed a little too much on building foundations. Whilst that is not necessarily a bad thing, as I do believe we will reap the rewards in years to come, to come so perilously close to losing it all through relegation was an oversight we should not be looking to repeat any time soon. I greatly admire what the club has done with The Hive, but the balance was wrong. Dagenham appear to have struck the balance well. They have developed their ground to a sufficient standard whilst maintaining a high standard on the pitch without major investment or breaking the bank. They've got it spot on.
So therefore it gives me hope that small clubs can do it. Look at two of the other teams in the Playoffs this year. Aldershot and Morecambe outfought so called bigger foes to gain their place on the Playoff stage. They are two more clubs who have overtaken us and struck a good balance having been promoted some time after us. So the hope is always there that maybe we can do it, but maybe that's why this disappointment is so intense when we end up in relegation battles or mid-table nothingness and they're up the top with something still to play for at the latter stages.
Something about me wants Dagenham to do alright and prove further that small teams can go up even further and compete. However I do have an overwhelming sense of wanting them to fuck it all up and come straight back down. That they punch a little bit too high above their weight and get sent straight back down. Perhaps that's the jealousy coming through. I don't want them to be enjoying big trips to massive clubs and winning at Wembley, I want it to be us. I don't think anyone could deny that sentiment.
I just want to see Barnet at Wembley. Is that so much to ask?"
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