The Championship ends here..........

Who can forget that tuesday night. 20th April 2010. Scunny vs Reading. 5299 people inside Glanford Park. Reading go 2-0 up with 18 minutes left. The Iron miss a host of chances to get back in the game. A Garry Thompson shot is spilled by Reading keeper Adam Federici. Gary Hooper smashes home the loose ball. Game on ! 8 minutes to save their season. Jon Forte heads a ball down in the box in the 89th minute. Local boy done good Matt Sparrow pops up, in the right place at the right time, to score the scruffiest of equalisers. 2-2. Glanford Park is rocking ! The Iron are staying in the second tier of football for the first time in 47 years. The final whistle is met with the most amazing pitch invasion the ground had seen since the 99 play offs. Players on the shoulders of fans, photographers looking for the perfect picture, jubilation !
Fast forward 12 months.........
Gary Hooper is now a few games away from the Champions League football with Celtic. Matt Sparrow has just won another League One winners Medal, to go with the one from his time at Glanford Park. Nigel Adkins isn't far behind Sparrow on his way to the Championship, and possibly the glory of the Premier League with Southampton. Former fans favourite Paul Hayes warms the bench for a Preston team destined for relegaton along with thie Iron
Monday 25th April 2011. Millwall the visitors to Glanford Park. fans hoping for the kind of game seen two weeks earlier, when league leaders QPR came to town and where shown how to play football by a team on top form. Things seemed well before kick off. The players looked like they were fired up, the fans were singing, a decent crowd inside the ground, this was going to be it. Everything was riding on this game. Win and we would go into the last two games with a chance of staying up, lose an thats it League One football next year. You could say a make or break game for the team. It was and we were broken !
From the kick off you kind of knew it wouldn't be our day. Not many times have i seen us play towards the terrace in the first half and win, and today would be no different. I thought that, after only getting a few minutes in our draw at Coventry, Michael O'Connor was sure to start, seeing him on the bench was a bit of a shock., bringing Joe Garner back into attack would surely give us an extra spark up front though. The passion of the QPR game was sadly missing. It was all too easy for a stubborn Millwall defence, the only real chances for us being a Michael Collins shot that was nearer hitting the corner flag than the goal, and a Marcus Williams effort that was easily saved by Lions keeper David Forde. Millwall took their opportunities well. Young striker John Marquis getting the better of Eddie Nolan from a set piece to stab the ball past a shocked Joe Murphy. No shock that they had scored, more of a shock that Nolan has struggled so much after signing permanently till the end of the season. His full time signing was greeted well by the fans, after he played so well on loan from fellow strugglers Preston, but since the appointment of Alan Knill he seems to have dropped behind Andy Hughes in the pecking order. After a terrible mistake for Marquis' second goal he was hauled off to spare him more embarrasment. O'Connor came off the bench with Collins moved to right back. After his recent good form i think the fans were expecting him to change the game, his few good passes weren't enough to turn things round. The only spark came after Garner was hauled down in the six yard box by Tony Craig. Not surprising. A clear penalty. The games began as O'Connor picked up the ball. Garner wanted the spot kick but the Northern Irishman would not give up the ball. O'Connor clearly wanted the goal, maybe he's after taking club top scorer honours from the now departed Martyn Woolford. Garner looked more than annoyed with his team mate and had to be puleed away by other players. O'Connor smashed the ball into the roof of the net but chose not to celebrate too much, probably realising that the game was slipping away from his team, along with their Championship status. Manager Alan Knill came out after the game and told it how it was. "There has got to be some changes – this squad has under-performed not just now and again, but consistently."
After a poor season Knill seems to know who he wants out of the current squad. The likes of Josh Wright, David Mirfin and Joe Murphy look most likely to leave. Wright hasn't done well since Ian Baraclough left as manager, Murphy is at the age where he needs Championship football, Josh Lillis is the perfect replacement for him, the only problem being the need for a good back up. Mirfin would be a loss, but Michael Raynes can easily fill that gap in League One alongside the fantastic Michael Nelson. If Eddie Nolan leaves we need a good quality right back to fill that gap, whilst a left back is also on the shopping list. Mark Duffy has stepped up well from League Two, more than replacing Martyn Woolford as our best wide player. Ramon Nunez will probably be too expensive to buy from Leeds so aa attacking left sider will be required. The central midfield spots could be sorted with Sam Togwell and Michael O'Connor, if he stays with us, best siuted to that role. Up front has been the season long problem. Chris Dagnall was brought in to replace Gary Hoopers goals but has struggled without a big forward next to him. A Steve Torpey style player may be what we need to get the best of the former Rochdale man, or we could try and steal Chris O'Grady from Dagnalls former club. Bobby Grant was brought in from Accrington, after scoring a few screamers in League Two, he has struggled a bit with the two league step up. Next year could be a big one for Matt Godden, he needs a few goals in pre season to get the attention of Knill and earn himself a regular spot, be that on the bench or f he's lucky in the team. All round we need more attacking threat. A team that lets in a lot of goals needs to score a lot or they will drop through the leagues like stone. Knill's team next year will have to be a lot better than the current team, seeing the last six games we know at least that anyone who doesn't give 100% for the team will be out of the door.
It was sad to look around the stands and see fans leaving after 60 minutes, by full time a lot of people had left their seats to beat the traffic. Only a few bored looking kids in Premier League shirts were left, with dads who wouldn't leave early, this is their team and they were with them till the end. I hate it when supposed fans boo their team off the pitch, a few dissenting voices at the final whistle were drowned out by the appreciation of the real fans who were proud of what their team had achieved in the last two years. Some of the defeats along the road were hard to stomach but starting with the play off win against Millwall, beating Newcastle at GP, beating Sheff Utd away on two occasions, away trips to St James' Park and The Hawthorns, wining 1-0 at arch rivals Hull, beating QPR 4-1 at GP are all things that even the most optimistic of fans wouldn't have seen coming a few years ago, when we were a Steve MacLean goal away from going out of the league and into football oblivion (much like our friends down the M180). We as fans need to remember the highs as well as the lows, thats what football is all about. Some people will support their team through thick and thin, some only want to be their for the good times. Inevitable relegation League One will show us our true fan base, if we start next year well no doubt the crowds will rise and the town will be buzzing again. Now though we have two games left in the Championship, we need to see what the players who will be here next season can offer us and who will play their way out of the club.
Next year will be massively different to this. We'll be in a different league, we'll have a few new players, we'll enter the FA Cup at round one, we also get the joys of the JP Trophy. One thing is for sure though, with Knill at the helm a return to the Championship could well be on the cards, i hope...........