The Voodooguru

You know its a great signing when all the jambos at work are gutted to the point that all the usual guff is coming out. Like.... He looks good at amateur level but won't have the heart to make a pro. Or He has robbed town with a massive up front fee and double what haven could afford in wages. Even blew barrow out of the water. Or He has an underlying injury so is just getting a payday before he packs in. Superb!

Maybe jumping the gun but by the comments on twitter it looks like we have retained our North East contingent when they are talking about travelling together in a big bus.

Jeez the knives are out a bit early after the season we have just had aren't they? What exactly do you all want them to say? That they are sitting on their hands doing nowt and waiting to see what players are left so we can get them cheaper, or working as hard as possible to get the best squad they can to survive in the Champ. Our club obviously have a strategy of how the squad is being built and how they think they can maximise the interest in the club during the off season to build up for when next seasons shirts & season tickets are announced. My guess would be they will step up with a number of re-signings, and new signings to get the interest bubbling along ready for when the season tickets and new shirt are announced to get some money turning over before Xmas. Yes it was surprising to see empty columns in the LoveRL article, and even more surprising to me that a couple of clubs look done and dusted, but the season hasn't started yet so keep the toys in the pram a bit longer kids.

Just been looking at the loveRL page about the ins & outs in the championship for next season. I know it will be in hand but we really have some catching up to do as some clubs look like their squads are about done! Think ours will look a lot better after this week.

As others have said Jake just didn't leave it all out there for us, so he won't be much of a miss. McNally at Rochdale & Beharrell to Dewsbury ( cant believe he's only 27!) Both will leave big holes in their old clubs squads.

I'll set off with Kyle Amour & Jarrod Sammut, bring Jimmy Graham out of retirement for a season as he really does need to play in a town shirt. Then maybe he can persuade Jimmy Maloney to give it another year before his French retirement. I'm sure Les can find the money from somewhere, then a few more young lads like Ethan Kelly etc that the old heads can give a season of learning to. Go big or git yam

Yeah it's easy to predict that we will be favourites to be relegated, especially after losing two good players, I fully expect we will be the bookies favourites too. But nobody knows what our finished squad will be, so it's a bit of a moot point until all the squad is in place. The bookies I think made us forth favourites last year, and If you compared our squad last year to Barrows who would have put us a percentage from a cancelled covid game from winning the title outright? I'm sure if we get the players to compete in the champ Chris will make sure the lads cause a few surprises.

Will they not? Shame! In all seriousness though I'm surprised by that, had a helluva season and thought they'd get the reward. If its true Barrow are doubling their wage bill they should get a good team together. But as has been said, they should have walked the league last season. Some at work aren't keen on Cresta so I suppose the pressure will be on. Can't wait already!

The Haven boys think they have signed him. Its gonna be a tough off season for Chris & the BOD getting the quality in so we can finish out of the relegation fight. Barrow will spend big as they are already showing, Haven will have money to spend with finishing in the play offs and losing their best player. We have probably been promoted a year ahead of schedule so it will be good if we can fend others off and add to what we have in place. I'm sure they will get it right though.

Just watched the match back, and apart from the annoying commentary of making up names it was just as good again. The defence was awesome, we had all their moves covered especially on our goal line. Fitzy was like a machine in both attack and defence, but nobody had a bad game, every single one stood up and left it all out there. What a day, and now we have won I'm so pleased we did it this way instead of winning the league. The club had a bumper pay day to cover some of what was lost with covid, the bar ran dry on the pop side, and we all have special memories of a fantastic day at DP. All the BOD, staff, volunteers doing the extra covid stuff on top of what they already do, Chris, the coaching team, and the players deserved that day for everything they have done. I honestly had no expectation this season with so many young lads from the community game, up against some expensive & experienced teams. But what a season and although we had a wobble with injuries taking its toll and players leaving, it all come good in the end. UTT!

WOW, WOW WOW! Awesome! Thank you Chris and the lads for a very memorable day. Hats off to Chris as he nailed the tactics and the lads were almost faultless. Emotional to say the least and thank God for predictive text as I'm sorry but 15 hours on the keg makes it hard to see. Up the town.

Good luck boys, let's smash them!

I think its because we had a second chance against Keighley with the nerves and expectation but this is the big one, and there will be a very big crowd as there's a buzz in the air. I even know some Haven lads coming down to watch as they want our derby back on the calendar and know how good it will be to have all 3 cumbria teams in the championship, so fair play to them even though they deny they will cheer us on lol. UTT!

At least I'm not the only one I'm not gonna be sleeping by the weekend, Will just have to resort to drink!

I also think disciplined line speed will be crucial to stop their big lads getting a roll on. They caused us all sorts of problems when they got a quick ptb and got a roll going.

Aye I think we are gonna have to agree to disagree on that one Silverfox. A few years ago a watched an England football match and was relatively close to the brass band, and as it was football and a full stadium I couldn't move so had to sit and suffer, it totally spoiled the game for me and they could all play their instruments. I'm all for atmosphere, and the best I remember is at during our halcyon days of Peter Walsh's blue & white army, and during the derbies with Haven around the same time. It doesn't need someone to bang a drum a dozen times and follow it with "the Town", "Haven", "Cougars" or whatever. I'm with David M on sticking the drum sticks where the sun don't shine!

No we definitely do not! There's nowt more annoying than some git banging the same effin tuneless beat over and over.

Thanks Johnny, I stand corrected. Just don't be flashing your fat wallet at our best players

To be clear before Johnny has another meltdown. I have no axe to grind with barrow winning team of the year & pleased they have been promoted. I am shocked Chris & Brad didn't win an award though. Obviously my view is through tinted glasses and it doesn't necessarily mean that Anthony Murray & the young lad didn't have good seasons. But I thought Brad would be nailed on for young player of they year, the other kid must have been phenomenal. I had no expectation at the beginning of the season with so many young inexperienced lads coming into the team, but to almost win the league and might still be promoted, I struggle to see what more Chris could have done. There are obviously different views out there from the other coaches but I think NW finished roughly within a couple of places where I expected, did they punch that much above their weight? I'm not taking anything away from Murray, and obviously Chris can do no wrong for us, but that's a head scratcher for me. Nevermind the best award would be promotion. UTT

Oh ffs sorry Johnny, that's me put in my place. You missed out supplying players to other teams so you can have a party too. I'm sure I didn't give the others their correct titles either. Maybe you could correct me on those?

Barrow team of the year, Massam won player Murray won coach. What a surprise!

Looking back it was a very risky by JD to do a short kick off at the start of golden point extra time, if Keighley had got the ball they would probably have made enough yards in the set of 6 to have a shot at a DG. But ultimately he rolled the dice to positively try and win and it proved the right decision. Think my heart rate still hasn't returned to normal! That was a very disappointing day, I was sure we were gonna win that day. We were talking to Stacky's dad in the stadium so I'm thinking it was a decade ago 2011.

Fantastic result today, especially in the first half. But it wouldn't be Town if they didn't shred our nerves to bits. Oh man I couldn't believe we didn't even attempt a DG, I was begging for one with 20 to go as it was only ever gonna be a last minute draw. That apart credit to the lads as it was a great game, and hopefully it will give them all the confidence to finish the job in a fortnight in front of a bouncing DP. UTT!

BBC have already decided we have lost tomorrow as they have us playing NW Crusaders on 3rd October on their website! Maybe theres only 20 on the list because we have signed James Graham for a couple of games and are waiting with the big announcement before he's added to the squad, I'm sure that video was taken in maryport.........

let's just hope that was a one off then! At least we have a good standard of referee for a change, and coming from higher leagues will allow a quick play the ball.