Should he stay or should he go?

JM in his interview has it all wrong, he said how the team fed off the crowd! It should be the crowd that responds to what goes on during the game. When they started to play some football in the second half the crowd were up for it. It has to start on the pitch.

It's a yes from me. We are in a relegation battle and I've got no idea where our first win is going to come from.

McCarthy says he sets us up not to lose but we are woefully thin on the ground in terms of defensive players and the squad looks threadbare already. If we are going to be reliant on Joyce, Chappell etc then we are doomed. Desperately need another centre back and full back which should have been addressed months ago.

I take it that in terms of stats that McCarthy has the worst win/loss ratio of any Chester manager now?

What's the point Billy. Nothing I can say will make any difference to you or those of you who have made up your minds

No from me.

I respect your opinion Richard but can you elaborate on why you think he should be allowed even more time to get it right? I've no agenda, I'm just curious as you must be the only one to come on here and say that.

Hi Richard, for the purposes of some balance, I for one would be grateful if you could elaborate on your reasoning why Mr McCarthy should be retained as first team manager , given your knowledge of the inner workings of the Club.

I think the argument for keeping him is that we've just signed 7 or 8 new players and a new manager would have to work with JM's signings.

But this doesn't present a big issue for me. The recruitment looks pretty solid to me, we've got a very decent first 11. It's the way they are being asked to play that is the issue here.

Nail on head. There is definitely a mid table first eleven at the football club, yes we are thin on the ground numbers wise but it's without doubt the tactical side holding the team back unquestionably.

It's a No from me.

I've come to a similar conclusion too. He is a smashing bloke who cares a lot about our club, but he can't manage a football team properly, such as not handling criticism, doesn't know the right tactics. Whilst I think he should no longer be our manager, I would still like him to remain at this football club because he knows what we are about. Some of his strengths are analysing, mentoring players. He even studied psychology at uni. These things aren't really suitable when managing a first team, however if he was to help out with Calum, or be a coach, the players would learn a lot off him. Simply over-analysing the opposition isn't right. You need to figure out the strengths and weaknesses about your own team before analysing the opposition.
As much as I like McCarthy as a person, the last 7 months have been really frustrating, even for me as I have attended all 18 home games and share the frustrations of fellow supporters. I think it is time to make a change, and appoint someone like Hill, Askey, Bignot etc. who know the league inside out, before it gets too late. I would like McCarthy to stay here, but in a different role as nothing is improving on the pitch right now.

No. He should stay. I am optimistic. Football is a game finely balanced and we could easily have won 3-2 yesterday. Then we would have been in the top half and above Wrexham. Didn't work out like that.
I won't convince those who want him out, and I won't be convinced by them. But everyone should keep the debate free from personal abuse. Not needed. Not wanted.

He’s not turning this around, his relationship with the supporters has deteriorated so much that there’s just no chance it can be repaired. He’s said that he’s not going to change his approach so the booing when defending a corner won’t stop, the gesticulations from fans urging us out of our own half won’t stop, the groaning whilst we sit deep won’t stop and McCarthy will probably just turn around and have more and more altercations with the fans that are left voicing their displeasure. How can you live like that?

McCarthy has always had a cautious approach but it’s gone to an extreme now. It’s different to last season, up to a point we were doing well and accumulated a number of points close to what was apparently his target from the beginning. The pressure was off and he started tinkering, none of it worked and the player’s confidence ebbed away. We still scrambled a few fortunate wins away to get us over the line. Now he’s openly admitted he’s setting us up not to lose rather than to win, he’s now viewing draws as wins so when are we ever going to win a game of football when we’re not managed to try and do so? You can just see a million miles off that the plan is to draw as many as possible and nick a few wins from somewhere to scramble up to 50 points again. I can tell you now, it won’t work and even trying it will knock hundreds of more supporters away who will find something else to do on a Saturday afternoon and get out of the habit. Once they’re gone and have gotten used to not going then it’ll be very difficult to get them back. Also, if you’re a fair-weather fan who just fancies taking in a couple of games during the season, would you really be itching to get down there after seeing such negativity from him on the back page of the Chronicle or Leader?

I’m sure he’s a nice bloke but you can’t just have a job because you’re nice and work hard, you’ve got to be good at it and surely everyone can see now that he just, well…isn’t.

Quite simply his position has become untenable and yesterdays attendance should be seen as major worry for the club. On the pitch, it is the same tactics and negativity as last season, and ultimately that has cost us the game yesterday. The biggest issue is the relationship with the fans has been permanently damaged now and
I feel a new manager is needed to galvanise the dwindling fan base. Also we can't ignore the fact that we are in the relegation zone and we don't want to leave ourselves with too great a mountain to climb. Relegation would be a catastrophe for the club and I don't ever see us bouncing back from it.

We will hit 1500 for Macc purely because of the number of away fans that will come for that one, but I can see nothing other than another game on te back foot, probably losing.

Interesting proposition and I certainly agree with the principle but it's very doubtful he will agree to such a move. Shame as in other circumstances I think it will work, but I can't see him sticking around in any capacity should he get the chop.