We’re grateful to Joe Beardsall from the Red All Over Podcast for taking some time to talk us through a Barnsley season that currently shows three wins from 32 matches.

Could you put into words how bad the season has been?

It may not be Barnsley’s worst season in their history because we’ve had lower league challenges and the administration years but for a 29-year-old fan, like myself, it certainly feels like the worst season ever. It’s been a complete mess on and off the pitch.

Barnsley’s league results so far…
Cardiff 1-1 Barnsley Pack 54 — Sibbick 69
Barnsley 1-0 Coventry Frieser 39
Barnsley 0-1 Luton Bell 4
QPR 2-2 Barnsley Chair 76, Austin 90 — Frieser 16, Woodrow 29
Barnsley 1-1 Birmingham Styles 6 — Jutkiewicz 33
Bournemouth 3-0 Barnsley Zemura 8, 82, Solanke 46
Stoke 1-1 Barnsley Surridge 17 — Woodrow 38
Barnsley 0-0 Blackburn
Blackpool 1-0 Barnsley Lavery 32
Barnsley 1-3 Forest Woodrow pen 20 — Zinckernagel 61, Johnson 68, Grabban 81
Barnsley 0-1 Millwall Wallace 89
Reading 1-0 Barnsley Swift 77
Middlesbrough 2-0 Barnsley Sporar 20, Crooks 87
Barnsley 2-3 Sheff Utd Cole 78, Iseka 82 — Mousset 51, 53, Osborn 72
Bristol City 2-1 Barnsley Weimann 42, 45 — Iseka 28
Barnsley 2-1 Derby Adeboyejo 39, Iseka 50 — Baldock 24
Barnsley 0-2 Hull Honeyman 33, Lewis-Potter 75
Fulham 4-1 Barnsley Mitrovic 24, Carvalho 34, Kebano 72, Wilson 81 — Adeboyejo 78
Barnsley 0-2 Swansea Ntcham 74, Paterson 78
Peterborough 0-0 Barnsley
Barnsley 1-1 Huddersfield Morris 45 — O’Brien 33
Preston 2-1 Barnsley Browne 57, Johnson 78 — Woodrow 65
Barnsley 0-0 West Brom
Blackburn 2-1 Barnsley Rothwell 25, Brereton 65 — Morris 45
Birmingham 2-1 Barnsley Hernandez 34, Hogan 51 — Adeboyejo 87
Forest 3-0 Barnsley Davis 15, Yates 38, Johnson 75
Barnsley 0-1 Bournemouth Billing 12
Barnsley 0-1 Cardiff Ikpeazu 71
Luton 2-1 Barnsley Campbell 28, Adebayo pen 59 — Morris 44

I think people expected a drop off, without Ismael, Mowett, etc, but why has it gone off a cliff to this extent?

I’d be here all day trying to explain the long list of reasons why this season has gone so wrong but it started with the loss of Ismael and Mowatt to West Brom and the CEO, Dane Murphy, to Forest three big leaders at the club departing. Then, several other long-term staff left the club as well. Then we recruited a coach who was completely clueless and players who have had little or no impact so far. Injuries, a lack of communication from the club to the fans, mistakes on and off the pitch all leading to poor results and a horrible feeling around the club. The negativity has continued to grow, like a fire burning down a forest, it feels impossible to stop.

I've got to ask you about the game at ours, for the first half we still think you're the best team we played, should have been 4-0 up, but then tried to sit back, waste time, ended up with a 2-2. I bet that manager regrets that now. Was that first 45 mins just a complete one off?

That brilliant 45 minutes at QPR is talked about as pretty much the only decent 45 all season. Why it happened, who knows? We haven’t played like that since in any game so I think it was a fluke, just a random decent 45 where we were up for it and QPR started slow but then came back excellently in the second 45 as we went back to being rubbish. Certainly a one off because if we played like that consistently we wouldn’t be in this mess.

Zero new manager bounce. What do you make of the new guy? What's he changed?

Nothings really changed. I feel for the new gaffer in the sense he’s been put in an extremely challenging situation but no wins in 11 league games shows he’s just completely out of his depth. It’s not his fault for taking the job, it’s the boards for horrendous recruitment yet again.

What business did you do in January? What did you need to do?

We waited until the last day of the January transfer window to sign two loan players until the end of season, it hardly screams of urgency considering our current position at the bottom of the league. However, the two new lads do look like decent additions and have given us a bit of a small spark. Bottom line, we needed to replace Mowatt and bring in battling midfield leader and also another striker and we got two attacking midfielders instead. It’s clear our owners don’t care if we stay up or go down based on the latest transfer window.

Summer Ins >>> Aaron Leya Iseka, 23, CF, Toulouse, Undisclosed >>> Obbi Oulare, 25, CF, Standard Leige, Undisclosed >>> Josh Benson, 21, CM, Burnley, Undisclosed >>> Devante Cole, 26, CF, Motherwell, Free >>> Daniel Jinadu, 19, GK< West Ham, Free >>> Remy Vita, 20, LB, Bayern B, Loan >>> Claudio Gomes, 21, CM< Man City, Loan >>> William Hondermarck, 20, CM, Unattached, Free

Winter Outs >>> Toby Sibbick, 22, CB, Hearts, Undisclosed >>> Ben Williams, 22, LB, Cheltenham, Undisclosed >>> Obbi Oulare, 26, CF, RWDM (Belgium), Loan >>> Dominik Frieser, 28, LW, Released

Any player of the season candidates?

Player of the season is Carlton Morris. Might as well give him it now because he is the only one who is continuing to play well and carry us forward. A cracking lad, full of positivity, and you can see he gives it everything every time he puts on that Barnsley shirt.

Any hope at all of survival now?

About as much hope as seeing pigs fly and I’m one of the positive Barnsley fans! There’s some whispers of Neil Warnock coming in, I highly doubt it will happen but if it did, he’d give us a chance because the gap, crazily, still isn’t huge.

I see the same board that were getting praised for their U26 policy, scouting and signing during the play-off run are now copping stick, is it their fault? Is the exit of the CEO to Forest crucial in this?

The exit of the CEO was crucial, yes. Dane Murphy clearly was helping us off the field but he left in the summer meaning we had no CEO to sign the right players and recruit the right coaches. Instead, the task fell on the shoulders of our co owner, Paul Conway, and it appears under his watch we recruited a terrible head coach and several players who’ve added little to nothing to our team.

The owners’ policy of signing young players and using a spreadsheet to identify talent other clubs might miss has its positives, there’s no doubt about that but they lack the ability to adapt when it doesn’t work. It’s also been hindered by Brexit stopping us signing players from lower European leagues so maybe our policy has quickly become pretty useless as most of our players come from those types of leagues.

Whether it’s stubbornness, arrogance or a reluctance to invest a little more when needed, the owners have done nothing to give us a chance of staying up this season. As a result, fans want them gone and it’s totally understandable because all this could’ve been avoided with better leadership, a little bit of investment in the right areas and more of an effort to connect with the fans.

Links >>> Barnsley Official Website >>> Yorkshire Post — Local Press >>> Sheffield Star — Local Press >>> BBS Fan Forum — Message Board >>> Barnsley Chronicle - Local Press >>> Red All Over— Podcast

The Twitter @JosephBeardsall, @loftforwords

Pictures — Action Images

Action Images

TacticalR added 21:18 - Feb 11 Thanks to Joe. It sounds a mess, and also a warning of how quickly things can unravel. As things initially went well under the new owners it makes you wonder if that was just luck.
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