FC Halifax Town: Chairman determined to see Shaymen bounce back

David Bosomworth is determined to see FC Halifax Town bounce back after the disappointment of their relegation to the Conference North.

The club were relegated last weekend for the first time since Bosomworth became chairman in 2008, following three consecutive seasons in the National League.

The Town chief admits Darren Kelly’s short but disastrous spell in charge caused lasting damage to the team’s campaign, but is convinced the club can recover from relegation.

“I just feel totally flat, totally deflated,” he said.

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“We knew it would be difficult against Macclesfield and I thought we’d have to win the game.

“But we’re the ones who’ve come up short, which is very disappointing.

“Everybody would say hindsight is a wonderful thing.

“The regret is that, with the best will in the world, the appointment of Darren Kelly didn’t work out.

“That’s no disrespect to him. But results speak for themselves and we only had one league win at Altrincham in that time.

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“You could say ‘do you have regrets when we lost the semi-final against Gainsborough in the Conference North play-offs?’, but we bounced back after that and we have to do that again.

“It will be a tough division but we have to galvanize ourselves.”

Bosomworth says the club let survival slip through their grasp with defeats against Aldershot and Kidderminster after hauling themselves out of the drop zone.

“We finished fifth and ninth the two seasons before, but we made a horrendous start,” he reflected.

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“Then we also had a poor set of results after we appointed Darren Kelly.

“In trying to rectify that, we appointed Jim Harvey and we saw a resurgence.

“I felt the quality of the players within the squad was very good but the way we were playing, the structure and the team cohesion just wasn’t there.

“Then we had a great run and had got ourselves out of it, only to then fluff our lines against Aldershot and Kidderminster.

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“I think that would have had it done and dusted and we wouldn’t have needed to go to the last game of the season.

“When you get to the last game, anything can happen and we’ve been on the wrong end of it.”

The Town chairman praised the level of support at The Shay last Saturday, with nearly 3,000 fans turning out for the game.

“The crowd were tremendous,” he said. “The fans turned out in numbers, there was a great atmosphere in the stadium and I’m just so sorry for them.

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“Had we done the business it would have been a real party at the end of the game.

“The stadium was buzzing, the clappers were banging away.

“As much as we want to go to Wembley, for me there will be a hollowness about it now.

“I wanted to remain in this league and I’m sure I speak for everyone when I say that.

“But it’s no good feeling sorry for ourselves. We’ve got to pick ourselves up and go again.”

Bosomworth feels the club are in a god position to do that.

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“Financially and organisationally the club is strong,” he added.

“We will approach things in a professional manner.

“We have to sit down and consider everything.

“There’s a lot of things up in the air - the manager and the squad - but we have to do our best to keep the players we want to keep.”