Venue: The Lamb Ground, Tamworth
Attendance: 1,232
Final score: 4-0
I'm actually rather thankful that I had to go down to London, and therefore missed what seems to have been an abominable lack of performance from the Imps, based on what I've seen and heard since returning.
The Imps finished the match with 10 men in an embarrassing rout, and never looked like fighting their way back into contention. The rot began in the 12th minutes when St Aimie rounded Anyon after being put through by a long ball. On the hour mark, Sinclair was given his marching orders for a trip on St Aimie and a name from the past - Iyseden Christie - slotted home the penalty. The final half hour was all one way traffic as Francis headed the third mere minutes later, before St Aimie got his second from close range in the 88th minute. The bad animal puns come thick and fast - City were lambs to the slaughter at the Lamb Ground. They put in a pig of a performance at Tamworth.
The cries for Steve Tilson to go are now as loud as they've ever been, and those who have defended him in the past, myself included, are now finding such a position harder and harder to justify.
The yoyo nature of recent performances and results make it difficult to see that the team is actually developing as they get to know each other, and the blame for that becomes more and more firmly planted on the shoulders of a manager who seems to have less ideas than anyone how to remedy the situation.
The problems with replacing him are twofold: firstly, if Tilson refuses to do the gentlemanly thing (which he seems inclined not to do), then vital funds will have to be spent paying him off, hampering the chances of the new manager strengthening the squad. Secondly, who on earth would the new manager be? It would have to be somebody who knows this league, and is a back to basics 'work them hard and get them organised and committed' type of manager. God knows who that would be, but if the board is going to make a decision, it must surely make it soon. Every game that slips by leaves us closer to being adrift at the bottom.
The freefall that the club is in is terrifying and the thought of us slipping down yet another level too horrific to contemplate, yet the silence from the club is deafening. It's as if the board is keeping quiet in the hope that things will magically improve. For a supposed community club, the lack of any real comment or passion from the board is starting to worry me as much as the on-field problems. It's as if the entire club is in some form of atrophy, and cannot jolt itself into decisive action.
I will actually miss the next month of games while I'm away in China, and to be honest I fear what the situation will be when I return. In a sad way, being away from matches for a few weeks will be something of a blessing - as much as I dearly love to see a revival, my biggest fear is that I return to a club in the bottom four, and with the same man at the helm.
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