Unlike the General Election a decision about who will be joining Darlington in the Conference next season will be made official this weekend. Grimsby Town, Barnet and Cheltenham Town are all in the firing line to slip through the League Two trapdoor, but fans of the Bees will be out in their thousands on Saturday at Underhill praying that the final whistle against already promoted Rochdale will give them something to celebrate.
A dreadful run of form at Barnet, one that has seen them pick up just four win bonuses since the end of October – combined with a surprise upturn in fortunes at Blundell Park – has put the club in a precocious position. They go into final day of the season just one point ahead of a resurgent Grimsby Town, who they lost to at the weekend, but the Bees remain firmly in control of their own destiny.
Victory against Keith Hill’s Rochdale will ensure Barnet retain their Football League status regardless of what Grimsby achieve. Even a draw, provided the Mariners do not beat Burton Albion away at the Pirelli Stadium, may be enough to keep the Bees up. However, defeat combined with a Grimsby win could be catastrophic for the club, but Benjamin Kentish, press secretary at Barnet Football Club Supporters Association, remains confident they will beat the drop.
“It’s in our hands and I’d rather be in our shoes than Grimsby’s because they have to win or they are definitely down,” said Benjamin. “A lot depends on Rochdale and Burton – both have little to play for and so may not be as up for it as our lads and Grimsby are.
“Rochdale have been on a poor run of form but they may want to end their promotion season with a bang, seeing as they have waited long enough for it! But we’ve got some really good players –as a team they’ve massively underachieved this season and are better than our league position suggests – and if Paul Fairclough can get them playing to their full potential then we should be ok.
“We were all hoping that the team would get the job done to secure our League Two safety at Grimsby last Saturday but despite our best performance for month we didn’t quite manage it. So now it all comes down to the last game of the season. I imagine many of us won’t be getting much sleep on Friday night!”
Barnet go into Saturday’s showdown having won just one of their past nine league outings and have failed to hit the back of the net in the last three. However, they couldn’t have picked better opposition if they tried. Underhill has not been a happy hunting ground for Rochdale – they’ve managed just two wins there in their history and since winning promotion their form has slumped dramatically with just one win in eight, including four defeats in a row on their travels.
Benjamin, 19, admits that he is nervous ahead of the game and concedes that relegation would be a disaster for the club.
“It would be an absolute catastrophe for Barnet FC. Unlike some clubs at this level we don’t have a big, developed infrastructure and relegation would be devastating. Our chairman said at a recent fans meeting that he’s not sure ‘how we’d be able to keep it all together’ financially if we were relegated.
“We’ve just spent £11 million on a fantastic new state-of-the-art training facility and no-one knows what would happen to that if we went down. That site also houses our youth academy, which only opened this season, and relegation would mean we would lose funding for that, so all the youngsters would have to be released and the academy closed after just one season.”
Relegation wouldn’t just be devastating for the club, it would also have a massive impact on the local economy. The chairman Anthony Kleanthous was fully aware of this fact and with the club sliding down the table, and being caught by Grimsby all the time, he took decisive action by axing manager Ian Hendon. Peter Shreeves, Lee Harrison and Mark Stein joined Hendon on his way out of the club as Paul Fairclough returned to Underhill and was charged with keeping them in the league – a move that Benjamin believes was the right decision.
“Some have questioned the timing of it – saying it should have happened a couple of months earlier – but as our chairman has explained, we all assumed we were heading for mid-table obscurity until Grimsby suddenly started winning and our form dropped. It was right near the end of this season that we got dragged into this relegation battle.
“I would argue that it was right to act before the end of the season because under Ian Hendon we did not look like winning a game any time soon – he was clearly doing his best and his commitment to Barnet was unquestionable but for whatever reasons the team just weren’t responding to him and whatever he tried, performances and results remained unacceptably poor.
“The decision to axe Harrison and Stein at first seemed like an odd choice but Paul Fairclough wanted a totally fresh start and you can understand his logic. I just hope it pays off!”
Barnet fans are sure to be in an emotional rollercoaster ride and Benjamin insists that they are doing everything possible to support the team.
“There’s been a concerted effort from Bees fans this week to do what we can to support the lads – and we’re hoping to fill Underhill with noise and colour in order to get behind the team. I’m sure there will be constant Grimsby-related updates going around the terraces and I will be checking my phone every so often but if we win then the Grimsby result becomes irrelevant so that has to be the main focus.
“All that matters is that Barnet stay up! Whether we do that by winning or simply as a result of Grimsby not getting the required result, I’m not bothered. All that is important on Saturday is that Barnet Football Club retains its league status because should we be relegated I would genuinely fear for the future of the club.
“We have a number of players capable of changing a game – Albert Adomah, John O’Flynn and Albert Jarrett all have the quality to do that and we’ll be relying on them to put in the performance of their lives on Saturday.”
Barnet’s destiny remains in their own hands but can they put in a performance and do what’s necessary to stay in the Football League?
· Calling all Barnet fans. How confident are you of getting the job done against Rochdale? How much would it mean to you to remain in the Football League? Who do you think could be your hero come 5pm on Saturday? Who do you blame for being in this position? Whatever your views I’d love to hear from you.
