Brett Ormerod on Blackpool's relegation, Ben Mansford's exit & final game against Norwich

They gave it a right good go against Millwall, they couldn’t have done much more. It wasn’t the greatest start but it was a hell of a game.

You never get relegated on one game alone, it’s over the course of a season with points dropped here and there, the injuries, red cards and so on. It’s been a tough season.

The Millwall game probably summed up the season because they gave it a good go but it just wasn’t enough.

They got back into the game and scored a superb goal through Lewis Fiorini, but then they gave away the penalty which completely killed it.

It’s the hope that kills you, isn’t it? There was an outside chance they could take it down to the last day, where you never know what might happen, but it wasn’t to be.

It’s not the end of the world though. Blackpool will be back. It’s just important now they identify the right head coach and they could do with making an early appointment to give the new man the time to look over the squad.

Will Stephen Dobbie get it? Who knows. He’s certainly in with a chance though.

Even if they had won both of their last two games, it still would have been out of their hands mathematically, so Dobbs could only do so much.

He’s certainly done himself no harm, but it will be interesting to see what the club go for. The elephant in the room is Neil Critchley, isn’t it?

We all know the qualities he has, but would that cause too much hassle? His credentials are there for us all to see.

He was adored the last time he was here, he had a real rapport. But I’m not sure if the fans would be receptive to it given the manner of his departure.

The fans never took to Michael Appleton from the start and that made it difficult.

Critchley had his reasons for going, he wanted to go away and better himself. If he came back and hit the ground running I’m sure no-one would be saying anything, but that’s football for you.

It’s an important appointment, but it’s not just a head coach they need though, there’s some other big vacancies behind the scenes that also need filling.

There’s been a few departures recently, Ben Mansford being the big one the other day, so Simon Sadler needs to get someone in to sort it all out. It’s literally rebuilding from the start again.

There’s no reason why they can’t do it though, they’ve done it once before. Sometimes to move forward you have to take a step back.

Monday’s game against Norwich doesn’t mean a great deal. It’s all done for both teams so the pressure is off. Hopefully they can go out and play with a bit of freedom and send the fans home with a victory.

I’m sure Dobbs will be taking it seriously though because he might still have one eye on the job, so he’ll be wanting to win and impress.