By voluntarily relinquishing the Manager's job at the Poppies Morrell has managed to eek a smidgen of decorum out of this whole, sorry situation. Everyone from Imraan down must have known the Morrell wasn't up to the job when the appointment was made - ably borne out by his 7-match tenure.
But what possessed Imraan to employ him in the first place? Friendship for one we suspect. It's not everyone who gets sacked and subsequently re-employed twice! Perhaps like the rest of us, Imraan hoped that Morrell's preferred football style, allied to Nicky Eaden's steadiness would give us the best of all worlds. Smooth, slick passing Morrell football when moving forward, grounded by a sure Eaden defence when under pressure. A sound enough theory, which was soon unceremoniously put to the sword by gleeful opponents.
At Conference North level Morrell's teams played with a dominant swagger. Teams were routinely played off the park. The supporters of Clitheroe still shiver at the mention of the Poppies! Why was Morrell so good then and so bad now? Well, back in the Conference North days he had by far the highest budget in the division, was in charge of the only full-time team, and yet, still couldn't win the league. His expensively assembled side more often than not played plenty of pretty football, but too often failed to actually defeat far inferior sides. They played with a puffed-up swagger, but little heart. Good when the pitches were dry and the weather warm when you could stroke the ball around with your shirt untucked, but missing when it was time to roll the sleeves up on a midweek trip up t'north in January.
It became clear then, and clearer since, that Morrell's teams have little in the way of work ethic. Even though his Conference North team were the only full-time team in that division they never once appeared fitter than the collections of postmen and publicans who made up our various opponents. This season the team has looked sluggish and at times downright unfit. One senses that not much hard work goes on in a Morrell training session. Or discussion of tactics. Or formations. We heard a quote from David Bridges that moving from Stevenage to Kettering was like going from a army camp to a holiday camp. Looking at where Stevenage are in the footballing world and where we are, I'm not convinced being in a holiday camp is such a good thing. We're paying these guys good money, we want them to work hard!
His biggest supporters will always cling to the accepted position that Morrell is a good spotter of talent. This may or may not be the case. In his first stint he brought in the likes of Westcarr, Boucard and Howe, but did these appointments need a keen, talent-spotters eye, of just Imraan's chequebook? Westcarr and Boucard were acknowledged talents going seriously off the boil, whilst Howe was scoring for fun at Bedford. All were obvious and available at the right money.
And, for every quality player he brought in, he bought in some real dross. Patrick Peter anyone? Or pick any of the several tricky but useless wingers he tried out, or perhaps the defensive linchpins of McKie and Koo Boothe. Neither of whom are ever going to become footballers at any level where jumpers aren't used for goalposts. Their continued selection back in 2006 effectively kept us down in Conference North.
And what talent has he unearthed for the 2011 vintage? For every Jifil there's a Pifil. We've managed to lose fighting midfielders like Challinor and Solkhon for anonymous shirt fillers like Meechan, and a succession of unfit loanees. And then there is Navarro, who might have looked OK had he joined us from Matlock rather than Madrid! And Nathan was back again!
Far too many times Morrell plumped for the same type of player. Flashy but empty. Good at juggling the ball or backheels, but not so hot at tracking back. Often it seemed Morrell chose ethnic diversity and tricky names for the tannoy announcer ahead of boring journeyman who could simply do the required job.
Morrell's successor has a big job in front of him to lick our flabby under-performers into shape. It might be too much to hope for another Cooper or Law to get Imraan's "You're Hired", but the next man in the Poppies hot seat may need to ruffle a few feathers and put a few noses out of joint to get us to be competitive in this division. Some of our players won't like hearing a few home truths, and some will soon be deemed surplus to requirements. No doubt they'll take solace by bleating on Twitter as they are shunted out....
This first, historic season of squatting at Non Park was always going to be interesting. Now it is likely to become even more so.
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