When the fixtures conclude this weekend in the National League, Barnet Football Club will be potentially 180 minutes away from a return to the English Football League.
The Bees were relegated alongside Chesterfield in 2018 and with the Spireites returning to League Two as champions this year, it would be ironic if the same two clubs went up in tandem.
Only two years ago, Dean Brennan inherited a disjointed club from Harry Kewell. The Australian lasted just seven games before he was sacked. The club were in the bottom three without a win, with disgruntled supporters and a team low on confidence.
The season took on a look of grind, perseverance, and sheer determination to finish 18th in the final table amidst a squad full of injury-prone players and many lacking the quality for non-league’s top tier.
Defeats by quite a large margin were a common theme as Brennan struggled to field a side at times. 5-0 vs Stockport County, 6-1 versus Notts County, and 7-3 versus Dagenham and Redbridge were the stick-out results and supporters, at times, were quick to vent their frustrations.
With many players on two-year contracts, patience was the key last season in order to fully overhaul the squad this summer despite delivering a playoff campaign and an FA Trophy semi-final, Wembley twice within sight but double despair by mid-May.
The green shoots of recovery were beginning to blossom but ultimately, Barnet came up just short of any success. The side spent almost all of last season inside the top seven, a springboard for what has happened this year.
Despite Chesterfield enjoying a huge points advantage since the turn of the year, Barnet were locked in a title race until November, when the Derbyshire outfit upped the gears and powered off. However, the North London side maintained their own, featuring in the top three ever since, resulting in a play-off by missing out the eliminators.
Togetherness is the buzzword. Used from the beginning, but is believed from the boardroom down to those who pay their money to support the team, a manager whose office door is always open for a chat and an open invitation to watch training sessions.
The Irishman’s recruitment model has been to bring in players well-versed in his methods from his time at Hemel Hempstead and Wealdstone. He has blended players like Laurie Walker, Nicke Kabamba, and Jerome Okimo, enhancing them with the likes of Danny Collinge, Idris Kanu, Harry Pritchard and Dale Gorman.
The loan market has been used very effectively. Gatlin O’Donkor and Anthony Hartigan have contributed hugely to the season, the latter walking off with four awards out of five at the club presentation evening. Josh Keeley arriving from Tottenham Hotspur in goal has divided opinions among the fanbase, with many staying loyal to former number one Walker, both men capable of pulling out a match-winning performance.
The best has been extracted from Kabamba, almost 50 goals in his two years wearing the black and amber has put him in distinguished company in the club’s history books, with only John Akinde and Giuliano Grazioli to make the same mark since 2020.
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One of the other key components within the incoming strategy is signing players who have a history of completing thirty-plus games per season – Okimo, Pritchard and Kabamba recently passed 100 appearances for the club in just under 24 months.
Finding the next starlet to move off the production line is something for Barnet to exploit. Whether it’s finding a player released from an academy set-up but with the talent needed or trawling the lower leagues for a star, Brennan’s management team are on the lookout.
Ryan De Havilland was one such player, discarded by Fulham, moulded and nurtured at The Hive moving to League One’s Peterborough United last summer. Big things are expected for Collinge, Ade Oluwo and Callum Stead, the latter two arriving from divisions below but already making stellar progress.
The Bees will fall just short of 100 goals scored in the National League which is far removed from the 59 they managed two years ago while conceding close to the total that’s been put in the right end of the pitch.
Afford a manager time to implement a philosophy and the result everyone wants can be achieved with all pulling in the same direction. Constant change and a turnover of players are reasons why some clubs never fulfil the potential they have.
Football now is a quick fix and if not up to the task, move on and start again. It is one of the reasons why Barnet found themselves back in non-league football, but restart, reset and repair the damage, then dream about the return.