Mark Carruthers: Can Marc Nash restore Blyth Spartans’ lost aura?

There is something about Blyth Spartans’ famous old Croft Park home that can satisfy the needs of any football romantic.

For me, it remains one of the most atmospheric homes of football across the North East Non-League scene, and history just oozes out of every single part of the ground.

With the North Sea breeze and fret rolling around the stands, the floodlights streaming across the pitch, and all four corners of the ground roaring their support behind the men in green and white, it is as close to Non-League perfection as one can get.

In all honesty, once my media career comes to an end and the baton is passed to the next generation, it is likely to be my regular home on Saturday afternoons and Tuesday nights, such is my affection for the club that handed me my first chance to dip my toe into the journalistic waters. 

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Despair

You can almost sense heroes of the past, such as Alan Shoulder, Terry Johnson, Brian Slane and Robbie Dale were gradually writing their names into tales of glory with their exploits on the hallowed turf.

Yet in recent years, those tales have not been tales of glory. Those tales have been ones of woe, despair and anguish as the Croft Park faithful have been subjected to one of the most depressing periods in the club’s long and proud history.

Since Spartans were denied a place in the National League North play-off semi-final by a controversial equaliser and an agonising penalty shoot-out defeat at Altrincham in 2019, the club has been saved from relegation twice by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, suffered two consecutive relegations, gone through two takeovers and now sit firmly in a battle to avoid a third relegation in as many years.

Poor decisions have been made with alarming regularity, managers have come and gone, expectation and belief has plummeted, and apathy has set in.

Defeat has become an unwanted yet regular and almost expected visitor to Croft Park. Spartans, sadly, have lost their aura.

Croft Park

Escapism

Now, the club should not simply live off the tagline of FA Cup giantkillers, nor expect the modern-day player to appreciate or have knowledge of the history of one of our most famous clubs.

But players should be made to realise what they are representing when they walk out at Croft Park and what is expected of them.

They are representing a town regularly beaten down by outsiders, where the industries it was built upon have been stripped away, along with the dignity and values they brought with them.

For some, Spartans has been their life for many a decade, their release from the difficult times the town has fallen upon and a form of escapism.

A town built on hard work and sheer graft and commitment expects the same of a football club that has been at its heart for over 125 years and those values are expected to be at the core of the men that wear those famous green and white stripes.

For a depressingly long period of time, visiting clubs have arrived at Croft Park, not fearing what will await them, but expecting to simply collect all three points with the minimum of fuss.

Daunting

That is not the Blyth Spartans I remember and it is not the one that will represent the club if their latest managerial team get their way.

I’ve always expected a Spartans side to be gritty, aggressive, playing on the edge, going at the opposition full throttle and making a trip to Croft Park a daunting prospect long before the whistle is blown.

That cold North Sea breeze should not be the only thing sending a chill down the spines of opposition players.

I spent a recent home defeat against Northern Premier League East Division rivals Heaton Stannington stood alongside former Spartans striker Anthony Woodhouse, and we discussed the unquestionable potential that still remains within the club.

Despite these desperate times, there is still a modicum of hope and an ounce of belief that better times can return. 

Albeit both were hard to see when I stood alongside supporters in the old Fed Shed that night.

Some of the aura Spartans possess showed itself in an unexpected place when Heaton Stan manager Dean Nicholson explained what it meant to ‘come and win at a place and against a club like this’ in his post-match reflections on a quite frankly bonkers 90 minutes of football where defending was a theory at best.

Promising

Woodhouse, coincidentally, is now back at his former club after being named on the coaching staff of new manager Marc Nash, who has quickly set about dismantling the squad he inherited and appears to be piecing together a side that can restore pride and dignity.

To be brutally honest, despite the initial wave of optimism, Nash and Woodhouse are facing an uphill battle, and Spartans are firmly in the midst of a relegation battle that, if not fought successfully, would see the club slide into the Northern League just seven years after that National League North play-off defeat in Altrincham.

Spartans have been fractured for too long – but I honestly believe Nash and Woodhouse are the right men to carry the club forwards, having witnessed their achievements over a decade spent in charge of the likes of Whitley Bay, North Shields and Newcastle Blue Star.

Crucially, given their past and current involvement in the club, they understand what is expected of them, and that message will be relayed many times over to the squad they are carefully piecing together.

Time is in short supply and an improvement is needed quickly to avoid the unthinkable – but the early signs are promising and there is a need for togetherness as Spartans look to arrest their dismal slide down the Non-League system.

READ MORE: Mark Carruthers: Why attitude, not ability, makes or breaks young players in Non-League