Our board of directors have provided an update to supporters as the 2023-24 campaign nears its conclusion.
We’d like to begin by thanking all our fans for backing the team in tremendous numbers home and away this season.
It’s disappointing that it’s now highly unlikely that we’ll be able to reward that support with the top-seven finish we aimed for, with performance levels and league position both falling below our expectations.
However, while we’re all dissatisfied with recent results and the outcome of the season, our analysis shows that performance levels over the course of the campaign have merited a much better league position – and therefore the improvement required for us to compete for promotion next season, as will be our aim, isn’t as large as the table would suggest.
When carefully analysing our performance levels over the long term, we use metrics primarily based on goalscoring chances created/conceded and the quality of such chances. These metrics have been proven to give a more accurate guide to the quality of a team’s performances than league position and, overall, they haven't been as strong as we’d hoped for this season.
However, they do clearly show that our performances have been good enough to earn a league position significantly better than the 16th place we currently find ourselves in, and we must therefore take this information into consideration when planning for the immediate future.
The metrics also show that our performance levels haven't changed significantly over the season. This may seem counter-intuitive, given the bad results we’ve experienced since the turn of the year, but we haven't been significantly outplayed by any team in that time and have generally created at least as many, and in some cases more, high-quality goalscoring opportunities than our opponents.
Due to the huge amount of luck and variance in results, we always try to look at the bigger picture. Many games have been lost due to fine margins and could easily have gone the other way.
Conversely, we had luck on our side on a few occasions at the beginning of the season, picking up better results despite not playing better or worse than we have done in 2024.
Clearly, our weakness this season has been the high number of goals we’ve conceded – but it would be unfair to blame this only on our defensive players.
Minimising the number of goals against us isn't just about defending our penalty area or reducing errors near our goal, it also requires the entire team to defend as a unit in order to prevent opponents reaching dangerous attacking positions in the first place.
Individual mistakes that lead to a goal are always most noticeable, but it's crucial that we improve all the aforementioned aspects of our defensive play.
As you would expect, Stuart Maynard and his team are working hard on this and we believe we’re on track to build a team with the right balance between attack and defence, which will concede far fewer goals and bring an improved level of performance next season.
We also look forward to the return of important players from injury, the coaching team having more time to implement their ideas and the arrival of new signings, with our preparation for summer recruitment already well underway alongside Stuart.
While we have ambitious plans to improve the club’s standing in the pyramid, these are long-term and based on financial sustainability and value-based decision making.
Put simply, our intention will never be to seek success ‘at all costs’.
Instead, we will continue our efforts to strike the correct balance between on-field competitiveness and financial responsibility in order to safeguard the club’s future, as well as to ensure we’re adequately prepared for the possibility of tighter financial restrictions being imposed by governing bodies in the future.
On the issue of sustainability, we support these words from the EFL which we believe will also resonate with our fans given the difficult financial positions the club has found itself in over the course of its history: “It has been clear that the English game needs a fundamental financial reset in order to be sustainable so that all clubs can continue to serve their supporters and communities long into the future.”
We feel our club has the potential to be a leader in achieving sustainable success.
As proved in last season’s incredible title battle with Wrexham, we know we can compete with anyone at our level regardless of budgets and we also have complete faith in our bespoke, continually-evolving data model – the efficacy of which will only be enhanced by our learnings from our first season in League Two.
Crucial to the club’s on-field progress is the development of our commercial revenues, which we’re pleased to say is on the right track thanks to the work of our chief executive, Joe Palmer, and his team.
Joe will soon be providing a detailed overview of the tremendous progress he’s overseen in his first season in post, including news of our commitment to significant further investment in infrastructure ahead of the new season.
We look forward to discussing our strategy in further detail with supporters at a post-season fans’ forum, details of which will be confirmed in due course.
In the meantime, we ask you to continue your brilliant support of Stuart and the team between now and the end of the campaign.
Chris Reedtz, Alex Reedtz and Richard Montague – Board of Directors
