Football Season Review

If offered a 11th placed finish before the season, most Tranmere fans would probably accept that after seeing their side struggle over the majority of the previous campaign. But this season will actually stay in the memory of the Rovers' fans as a hugely disappointing one, due to the dramatic second half collapse the Rovers have had. Ronnie Moore's men started the season better than anyone could have predicted - they played some fantastic football, scored goals for fun, kept it tight at the back and were the runaway leaders of the division as a consequence, with their opening 12 games seeing them recording nine wins and three defeats. However, they started to lose their players, one by one, due to different reasons, and their results started to gradually deteriorate. Jean-Louis Akpa Akpro and Abdullai Bell-Baggie, who both impressed in the early parts of the season, both spent more than three months on the sidelines, playmaker Andy Robinson had two lengthy injury absences, skipper James Wallace got injured in November and missed the remainder of the season, while top scorer Jake Cassidy left the club following the festive fixtures, with Moore never managing to find a player that could reproduce his scoring input. As a consequence of all of these blows and the fact that the sides were seeing them as a big scalp due to their early success, the Rovers displayed relegation form in the second half of the season - the amount of points they collected early in the season kept them in the Play-off frame until the late stages of the season, but they lost eight out of their final 11 games, and ended up missing out on a top six finish. If Moore's men are to make the step up and make the Play-offs next season, they will need to secure a 20 goal a season striker for the entire duration of the season and will also need to have far more luck with injuries.

Player of the Season: Max Power