Season Review: Intro

You'll no doubt have noticed, with a tinge of sadness, that our League One Low-down series has finished.

So it's now time to begin our next bespoke collection - and it's time for our Season Review series!

So we'll be doing a month by month: August through to May - chronically all the key moments that contributed to the Iron's 2010/2011 season.

This obviously means we'll be analysing everything that culminating in our relegation - finishing 24th in the process. Sadly...

So we thought we'd start with an introduction - mention all the plans, and talk about the Iron's Pre-seasons

Dreams & Expectations

Well, the Iron had just survived in the Championship for the first time since 1963 following pulsating football and out-scoring the opposition on enough ocassions to turn 20th.

Fans knew it was going to be difficult, but 21st or higher was an absolute dream and going to be held as a huge success by Iron fans.

Good football preferable of course!

Transfer Activity

The Iron were certainly busy, but you couldn't really class it as a good summer for the Iron.

Hooper, Hayes, Williams, McCann and Sparrow all left North Lincolnshire.

The £2.4m deal to Celtic was the last one - )with the rest out of contract), but losing the other 4 to Preston, Reading, Peterborough and Brighton were certainly much more frustrating.

Indeed - the departure of Hayes for the second time seemed to be much grieved, given no-one wanted to see him leave: but it managed to happen anyway.

But Michael Collins, Bobby Grant, Chris Dagnall and Eddie Nolan were brought in to try and plug the gap.

However, it remained to be seen whether the recruits from Huddersfield, Accrington, Rochdale and Preston respectively would be enough for the Iron.

Final Summation

It certainly wasn't a great pre-season for the Iron.

They'd so far managed to keep hold of Nigel Adkins, despite him having reportedly interviewed for the Crystal Palace job.

And despite encouraging friendly results and good momentum - it was the transfer front that really hit home.

Seeing 5 key players, including the deadly duo of Hayes & Hooper depart was a real nail in the coffin.

Especially when you consider that without the shed-load of goals and assists provided: not only would they Iron have gone down, but they'd have been relegated by miles.

But the Iron fans hoped and prayed that despite all the above - they could pull off the impossible once more!