Quiet satisfaction at a job well done
Some, like Bristol City and Cheltenham Town, will see that as a massive disappointment, albeit for very different reasons, while Swindon Town and Yeovil Town will view it as a sizeable relief.
Compared with the 2006-07 season, when both Bristol clubs and Swindon were promoted and Yeovil reached the play-off final, this season is limping to a close. The sports desk telephones are quieter as our clubs avoid the gaze of the national news-gatherers.
City are 12 points adrift of the Championship play-off places, Rovers 15 points off the League One shake-up, while Swindon and Yeovil are safe, and Cheltenham and Hereford already relegated.
But while Gary Johnson, Paul Trollope, Martin Allen and Graham Turner reflect on what might have been, one man who will be delighted to head into tomorrow with nothing riding on his team's fixture is Terry Skiverton.
Like Danny Wilson's Swindon, player-manager Skiverton's Yeovil avoided relegation to League Two with a positive result last weekend. Unlike Wilson, though, Skiverton is a managerial rookie who was in charge of a team for only the 15th time.
He inherited a broken team when he took over following Russell Slade's mysterious exit in February, but quickly set about rebuilding after the hurricane of the previous manager's departure.
Two points from his first six matches prompted cynics to suggest he had bitten off more than he could chew, especially as his side's defeats during that period included a 4-0 drubbing at Leeds United and an even more alarming 5-0 loss at Slade's Brighton & Hove Albion.
But the turning point for Skiverton arrived immediately before, and then during, the 0-0 home draw with play-off-bound MK Dons in late March. Skiverton borrowed the promising Andros Townsend and Jon Obika from Tottenham Hotspur, and re-signed Chris Weale on loan from Bristol City. He also managed to coax the best out of the talented Lee Peltier and, seemingly from nowhere, began to reunite a dressing room that had appeared on the verge of civil war. Victories over Swindon and Northampton – both secured thanks to goals from Obika – made Yeovil believe they could beat the drop, before further clean sheets in a draw at Stockport and 2-0 win over Millwall completed the kind of run that did not look possible immediately before Skiverton took over.
Defeats against Cheltenham and Hartlepool provided brief concern, as did the 2-0 lead already-relegated Hereford stormed into at Huish Park last week. But when goalkeeper Weale ventured forward at a corner and headed an injury-time equaliser, it was as though Skiverton and Yeovil's luck had finally turned.
Last weekend's 1-1 draw at Tranmere, coupled with results elsewhere, staved off the lingering threat of relegation – an achievement Skiverton tellingly described as the "proudest moment" of his career.
Simply by taking over the reins at Yeovil when he did, Skiverton made a significant statement about his character. The easy thing to do would have been to politely decline chairman John Fry's invitation, instead preserving his guaranteed status as a Huish Park legend.
The captain when Yeovil won the FA Trophy, Conference and League Two titles, Skiverton's place in Glovers folklore is assured. Yet often we have seen players become managers at clubs where they have achieved so much, and a failure to deliver the same goods in the tracksuit as they did in the playing kit has seen their halo slip. Brian Tinnion failed in the Ashton Gate hot-seat, Alan Shearer is on the verge of overseeing Newcastle United's relegation from the Premier League.
But Skiverton, a Huish Park servant for a decade as a player, assessed the risks and, perhaps with his heart slightly ruling his head, stepped into the firing line. Once there, he dodged the bullets and guided his beloved club to safety.
With a full pre-season to shape his squad and his playing style, who knows what he can achieve next season? He has already shown he has the heart and personality.
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