THE END OF AN UP AND DOWN SEASON: FORWARDS EFFORTS SPOILED BY REARGUARD'S TACTICAL WEAKNESS
WHAT OF THE FUTURE ?

Promise, despair, crisis, and recovery. Exeter City, during the season just ended, have experienced all these. Promise was the keynote of the campaign's opening. It usually is, of course. Hopes of a successful time were encouraged when the City went to Ninian Park and shocked the critics by beating Cardiff City there on the first day of the season. Then a tragic blow befel the club. Bob Wallace, dour, fearless, determined and able full-back, was stricken by an illness from which he died. Thus a grand sportsman, a conscientious servant of Exeter City, and a credit to his profession passed on. September came and went, and the City were still in a fairly good position in the League. Optimism continued to visualise a return to successful times. But success in the League demands not only the dash of a sprinter. Staying power and judgment are required as well. The City could not sustain their early efforts and a black month of October saw the ground record go.
RE-ELECTION BOGEY.
Neighbours from Torquay dealt another body blow to Exeter when they won what, from the City standpoint, was a best forgotten Cup-tie at Plainmoor. Anxiety deepened into despair as matches were lost and Exeter's League position gradually became serious. An application for re-election was just around the corner for Exeter City. The end of the Grecians as a Football League club was more than a possibility, for those people on the inside knew quite well that another application for re-admission would certainly, or almost certainly, be turned down.

Crisis followed crisis when Captain Hunter, the Chairman of the Directors, sounded his warning that the club may have to put up the shutters. The position was indeed desperate, and there were fears that the reactions upon the players would result it more defeats which would have made the City's plight hopeless. But to the credit of the players concerned they buckled down to it and staged a come-back which lifted Exeter City to a position of safety and, at any rate, had the effect of temporarily easing the tension. Recovery was never more necessary than it was at the beginning of April.
DEFENSIVE WEAKNESS.
The past cannot be undone. There are, however, lessons needing to be learned from what has gone before. All who have followed Exeter City regularly this season are able to recognise without difficulty that the defence has given away too many goals. Week in and week out it was a case of two, three, and sometimes
four against the City rearguard, and the efforts of the Exeter attack were being spoiled with exasperating frequency. The goals which Bowl and company were getting were in vain, so many were the concessions at the other end of the field. Lesson No. 1 therefore is that for the greater part of the term there was something wrong somewhere with the defensive tactics. Although Brown was made the scapegoat it was by no means certain that he was the chief cause of the trouble. It is probable that the weakness was not so much individual, as collective. As a knowledgable defender and a student of tactics Brown is the best full-back on Exeter City's books. Where the City rearguard failed was that there was not enough dash and determination, and the point which emerges is that any future defenders to be engaged should possess speed, powers of recovery, and resolute qualities.

BETTER BLENDING OF AGES NEEDED.

Lesson No. 2 is that youth and age were not correctly blended. The policy of attempting to play safe by signing too many men of known football ability but past their prime was followed and acted upon to extreme lengths. It is not a question of decrying the experienced player. On the contrary, a good "has been" is preferable to a "never will be." There is, however, such a thing as a happy medium which, although calling for breadth of vision and discernment in spotting talent capable of making the grade, is possible of successful attainment. A leavening of seasoned experience is desirable, maybe it is essential, but it must only be a leavening. It is a fact that clubs like Exeter City have to reply upon one or two periodical transfers to balance the budget. Young players in the making are the ones who command the money. Lesson No. 3 deals with support, and whilst every sympathy must be accorded to those who willingly shoulder the burden of trying to make League football pay its way in the smaller centres of population, the plain fact remains that a winning team above all else is necessary to draw the crowds. Pious appeals will not achieve it, neither will all the talk in the world about the ethics of sportsmanship. Professional football is a highly commercialised undertaking, and rightly or wrongly, there is a substantial body of "fair weather" supporters who withhold their patronage when the team is going through a lean time.

• The official figures for Exeter City's twenty-one League games at St James's Park show that they were witnessed by an aggregate of 130,007 spectators, an average of 6,190.
• The highest gate of the season, and it is one which gives a fair idea of the potential support upon which Exeter City can draw, was at the first League match of the campaign when Ipswich were the visitors to St James's. The attendance on that occasion was 9,800 exclusive of season ticket holders. Subsequent attendances dropped at times to about 4,000, which proves that the support "barometer" has a moral.

WHAT OF THE FUTURE?
Difficult days are ahead. Close season calls have to be met. Al1 credit is due to the men whose unenviable job it is to meet them. To those sportsmen who are bravely trying to keep the Football League flying in Exeter go the sincere good wishes of everybody genuinely interested in the club.

ITEMS :- Retained players 
Exeter City are offering terms of re-engagement to the following twelve players:-
Church (goalkeeper),
Halliday, Little (backs),
Walker, Bamsey, Angus, Fellowes, Shadwell (half-backs),
Riley, Rich, Bowl, Ebdon (forwards).

On the open-to-transfer list are Brown and Liddle.
Free transfers have been granted to Pollard, Turnbull, Bussey, Clarke, Coles, Barnes, Blore, and Mellish.

Barnes is already fixed up for next season with Clapton Orient.
The former Exeter City outside-right, W. Coulston, is transferred from Barnsley to Notts County.

• The Bob Wallace Memorial Fund realised the sum of £129. 16s. 3d., including £64. 19s. Od. collected at St James's Park, £44. 48.9d. collected at Home Park, and £10. 10s. Od. from Plymouth Argyle. Stan Hurst is on Brighton's transfer list at £100.

Exeter City Players
APPEARANCES IN LEAGUE MATCHES
By Position

Goal: Church 38, Blore 4.
Right back: Brown 28, Halliday 14.
Left back: Little 25, Clarke 16, Wallace 1.
Right half: Walker 25, Shadwell 15, Angus 1, Bussey 1.
Centre half: Angus 27, Fellowes 15.
Left half: Fellowes 27, Angus 10, Walker 5.
Outside right:Rich 26,Turnbull 9, Bussey 2,Riley 2,Southcombe 2,Ebdon 1.
Inside right: Bussey 16, Riley 16, Ebdon 4, Turnbull 4, Bowl 2.
Centre forward: Bowl 40, Clarke 2.
Inside left: Ebdon 37, Riley 5.
Outside left: Liddle 15, Millar 9, Sutherley 9, Rich 6, Riley 3.