Blog: Mark Jones' Walsall FC review of 2012

January

It's hard to remember too much about this time last year. We totally failed to build on a fantastic Boxing Day result; we were awful at Bury at the start of the month, then drew some games and were awful against Snotts County at the end of the month.

Best Bit: Super Jimmy Walker breaking Colin Harrison's all-time appearance record. Legend.

Worst Bit: Setting the tone for the year by tossing away a two-goal lead at home to Bournemouth.

Player of the Month: Jimmy Walker

February

Just when things were looking very shaky indeed, we suddenly started to keep clean sheets, pulled off back-to-back wins in 6 pointers against Wycombe and at Scunny and realised that the boy Flo was a bit special.

Best Bit: The Belgian's winner at Scunthorpe.

Worst Bit: The last minute penalty disaster at Oldham failing to rescue a point. Unlike an Alex Nicholls spot kick, I thought we were dead and buried at that moment.

Player of the Month: Flo Cuvelier

March

The crucial month of last season, our record was W2 D5 L1 but we kept the points ticking over and come the final reckoning those 11 gleaned were huge.

Best Bit: The midweek win over Sheff United; closely followed by a fine midweek performance away at Sheff Wendy that deserved a win.

Worst Bit: It should have been conceding a late equaliser in Play Until You Score Time at Hillsborough; but going from 2-0 up with a quarter of an hour left to 3-2 down at Rochdale and seriously not knowing whether to laugh or cry as Andy Butler made it 3-3, that takes some beating.

Player of the Month: The returning Emmanuel Ledesma

April

Ultimately all you really need to know about April is we stayed up. On reflection the win over Chesterfield at the start of the month was crucial. We played some good stuff without reward at Champions Charlton, got out-muscled and out-thought by Tranmere and what was going on at Exeter is anyone's guess. At half-time against Huddersfield there were more than a few goldfish impressions going on but then Flo settled the nerves, we could have won it and the news from elsewhere was good. Sorted.

Best Bit: Huddersfield at home. On the pitch. We are staying up.

Worst Bit: The second half at Exeter (I refer you to my previous comment).

Player of the Month: Flo Cuvelier

May

We only played one game, but beating MK Dons is always fun. A pretty decent end of season party for a fairly rubbish season.

Best Bit: Seeing the plastic MK fans streaming out early.

Worst Bit: Realising that the battle for 19th spot is fairly empty way to end the season. It wasn't always like this.

Player of the Month: Will Grigg

June

Players left, some good some bad, and it became obvious that we would have to get used to loads of new faces in the squad come August. Again.

Best Bit: Danny Welbeck's goal against Sweden.

Worst Bit: That point in extra time when you realise it's going to penalties and your team always mess up penalties. Walsall fans know the feeling, Engerland fans know the feeling, those of us who have the dubious fortune of following both teams feel it exponentially.

Player of the Month: Pirlo

July

Players left, some good some bad, and it became obvious that we would have to get used to loads of new faces in the squad come August – again. But at least we got Flo back on loan.

Best Bit: The Olympics

Worst Bit: Realising that the ownership and rent situation weren't about to change for the 12/13 season is enough to dampen any feel good factor.

Dude of the Month: Bradley Wiggins

August

With the Olympics still providing a stunning spectacle full of tremendous feats of sporting excellence, the Mighty Saddlers got in on the act and actually went and won a cup tie. For the first time in yonks we looked forward to a cup draw and a visit to a Premier League ground. OK, so it was QPR and OK they still wiped the floor with us, but it was fun while it lasted.

Best Bit: Andy Butler's late winner to sink 'promotion hopefuls' Notts County.

Worst Bit: The opening-day defeat to Doncaster which highlighted the gulf between the two clubs - something which would have been unthinkable a decade ago.

Cult Figure of the Month: Dean and he's Holden and he's No.5

September

I sometimes wonder if I'd imagined September - good weather, great results and truly some of the best football played by a Walsall team since Alan Buckley was manager.

Best Bit: It was nearly all good but James Baxendale's stunning strikes against Pompey and Preston, Georgie Bowerman's goals against PNE and the late winner at Bournemouth all deserve a mention.

Worst Bit: That September ended.

Player of the Month: George Bowerman

October

No wins in seven games. We were unlucky (Orient), careless (Carlisle), sloppy (Vale), robbed (Shrewsbury) and all of the above (Crewe). But by the end of the month we seemed to be visibly losing confidence and tactically things were starting to go wrong.

Best Bit: The result was awful but our following for the live televised game against Town was superb.

Worst Bit: Hard to call between the final whistle signalling the first defeat in East Wales for about five decades, Crewe's inevitable but undeserved, gut wrenching late equaliser or seeing Port Vale miss five penalties and still knock us out of the JPT.

Player of the Month: Flo Cuvelier (once more)

November

Meltdown. Total and utter meltdown. And it went deeper than just winless games eight to 14. There were performances that were little more than shambolic and it was increasingly hard to work out what the players were actually supposed to be doing.

Best Bit: In November? Behave.

Worst Bit: The fact that being 4-0 down at home to 10-man, second from bottom, Scunthorpe wasn't the lowest point tells you everything. The Lincoln FA Cup defeat in front of 1,414 home fans was as bad as anything I've experienced in nearly 40 years as a Saddler.

If it doesn't act as the catalyst for the long-overdue regime change at the club then I genuinely fear there will be many repeats of November.

Player of the Month: Not awarded

December

The 'spirit' of November carried on with a debacle at Coventry in a comprehensive 5-1 defeat. Then we managed to snatch another two-all draw from two goals up against a Yeovil side who didn't even need to try. Then just when we thought it couldn't get any worse, it didn't.

Best Bit: Winning again on Boxing Day.

Worst Bit: Cov was bad enough but the FA Cup third round draw gave the mid-table Conference side, that knocked out the mid-table Conference side that knocked us out a plum home tie.

Player of the Month: Febian Brandy

January 2013

Two wins, two clean sheets, six points and we currently sit mid-table.

Best Bit (so far): A fine finish by Pato against Stevenage.

Worst Bit (so far): How could they go and sack Mr Stale before he'd had time to finish what he'd started?

Player of the Month (so far): Adam Chambers

I honestly thought Deano was finished on more than one occasion before Xmas but he has orchestrated a mini-revival, so fair play to him. Of course it could still go disastrously wrong (see the October/November entries) but we are in better shape than 12 months ago and light years ahead of where we were in January 2011.