Football first and foremost is a competition. It’s entertainment that we love to watch, be that live in a stadium or on the TV. But when that competitive edge goes, what then?
It’s predictable, it’s dull and it’s boring. The outcome rarely changes, and the entertainment value drops to zero unless it’s your club hoovering up all the trophies on offer.
That pretty much sums up the Premier League doesn’t it? And for a few years in a row, it’s engulfed the National League as well. Not so much the trophy part but the predictability of sides at the top, some of which has been caused by the bottleneck of two up and two down but this season we’re in for three months of the very best.
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Even before the season began, despite Barnet being named as clear favourites for the division, it was reckoned to be a far more open race than at least the last two or three years.
And that’s how football should be, despite it’s growth into the monster it’s become at the top levels. Some teams will always have an advantage, be that bigger revenue streams, an endless production line of talent to sell and reinvest, some even a decent manager and team on the pitch.
That’s always been the case but the gap between the financials gets bigger every single year if you aren’t able to close it out. No fault of any club or owner, deeper pockets aren’t the luxury for all.
Quite comfortably there is a three horse race for the title, Barnet, Forest Green Rovers, and York City are the contenders. The first two were very much expected to be in the mix, the latter I had mixing but not at the very top table.
Now I’ve known Adam Hinshelwood for about nine years in all, a great friend and an outstanding coach whose achieved a lot already and no doubt much more to come.
What he has done there at York to transform them from surviving on the last day of last season into potential title winners is nothing short of remarkable, not even a season’s gap. It’s almost ridiculous when you put it like that, it shouldn’t happen. Or should it given their ability to go out and spend almost whatever they feel?
Rovers like City have unlimited financial resources at their disposal and that showed in their summer recruitment campaign. Players brought in from League One and Two clubs ready for an assault on an instant return to the Football League.
A wily manager in Steve Cotterill brings even more experience and realistically given their power many have said ‘finish above them and you win the league’. That could well be true, their style isn’t fantastic and happy to let the opposition have possession, scoring goals other than in the last few minutes including stoppage time is running the risk of not picking up enough points along the way.
And to Barnet. Leaders going into the weekend on a 14 match unbeaten run, four points clear of Rovers and six in front of York, respectively one and two games in hand for those teams.
Their budget is reasonable but not in the same class as these other two sides and have to box clever instead. Top scorers in the division and creators of many chances per game they will feel they should have both more points and more goals.
There is a distinct possibility that it comes down to goal difference, currently Barnet are six goals better off than Rovers and two better off than York which shows it’s pretty tight and could well be the decider.
York and Barnet clash next month at The Hive, not a chance it’s a title decider in my opinion, but it will go some way maybe to enhancing the chances of one or the other.
Up and down the country when you filter through the non-league pyramid there are races like this to be found, not to mention those with play-off aspirations or fighting against relegation.
There are times when football forgets where it’s supposed to rank in the grand scheme of things, we’re all not naïve enough to think everything remains the same for ever but if you have no competition then what do you have? A monopoly.
