This is great!

PORT VALE: 'THE WORST BUNCH OF PLAYERS I'VE SEEN AT PORT VALE IN 17 YEARS'

09:40 - 22 October 2007

Coach Mark Grew blasted Port Vale's players for their lame display in Saturday's 3-1 defeat at Leyton Orient ... here is what the temporary assistant manager had to say, in full

I've just told them they're a bunch of gutless, spineless ... the worst bunch of players at Port Vale I've seen in 17 years. I'm not trying to kid any fans, or whatever - they are gutless.

They defend, played all right in the first half, get the goal and then we concede one, and then we just pack it in. To me that's spineless, no question.

They did it in the first half, but they've got no bottle. As soon as it gets a little bit hard and we concede, some of them hide - well, I'm saying most of them hide.

Some of the players were commenting 'these (Orient) are s**t', but I said before we start saying that, let's do it after 90 minutes, not 45. Some of them were commenting, 'they're crap'. They beat us 3-1, so what does that make us then?

I want to tell some home truths. There's too much being heard about how we're trying to do this or that. In the end, the players that are here at the minute are nowhere near good enough to survive a league down, never mind this league. So I'm telling the truth.

I don't know (what can be done). I wish I was a magician. I wish I could get rid of them, but I can't. Unfortunately there are some on bloody good contracts, so there's nothing I can do about it. If I could I would, believe me - I would say most of them. There's not many I would keep, anyway.

I've had enough of it. I want to see the chairman on Monday morning. Seventeen years I've been associated with this club, and I'm embarrassed to be associated with that bunch. I'm not sure I want to be involved any more. It's easy on the training ground when there's nobody watching you. They're bottlers, spineless. Whether you're playing on a football pitch at home or away, it's still a football pitch. You're getting paid well - a bit of passion, a bit of pride, that's what I got brought up on. Some of these are not for me. They pick their money up, go home and that's it. Three or four of them were all booked up for a night out in London. Maybe they were thinking about that, I don't know. Dean's got his future to think of, I've got mine. To be fair to the board, they've been good to us, they've given us time. At the end of the day it's all about results. We have a great relationship with the board, but there's intense pressure for them. I understand that, Deano understands that.

But there's nobody who's got more passion than me, Dean and Martin, and Andy Porter, the kit woman, kit man, the staff upstairs. Unfortunately the ones who we need to have it haven't got it, and that's the players. They come in, they pick the money up, they go home and that's all they're interested in. Not many stop after training if you don't ask them. I've had enough. I don't know what I'm going to do. What can you do? We've spent afternoons and mornings practising things. When they cross that white line, that's their livelihood, they've got to produce. If they can't do it, they shouldn't be in the game. I've just told them honestly in my opinion what I'd do if I was them, I'd get to college and learn a different trade quick, because when a new manager's coming in, that (team) will be wiped out if they can afford to do it. That's my opinion.

Posted By: Larry Hagman, Oct 22, 14:43:48