The system upgrade was a source of deep, personal, and profound excitement. It had given me a new vision, a new sense of purpose, a new long-term project to get my teeth into. But in the short-term, in the harsh, unforgiving, and deeply pragmatic world of a lower-league promotion race, it was an irrelevance. And we were in trouble.
The victory against Salford City Amateurs, the glorious, heroic, and emotionally draining pinnacle of our season, had come at a cost. A huge and deeply damaging cost. We had invested so much, physically, mentally, and emotionally, into that one, single, ninety-minute battle, that we had nothing left in the tank. We were a team running on empty.
The aftermath was a brutal and humbling lesson in the cruel and deeply cyclical nature of football. After the high comes the low. After the victory comes the hangover. After the miracle comes the mundane. And we were about to be plunged into a deep, dark, and deeply demoralizing slump.
