McDonald heads for Oyston talks and hints he'll quit Pool

A spineless display from McDonald’s men saw them crash 5-1 at Peterborough, conceding four goals in 12 minutes late in the game. The scoreline was irrelevant as Fleetwood’s 2-0 win over Crewe confirmed Town’s survival at the expense of their Fylde coast neighbours, regardless of Pool’s result.

After failing in his task to steady the ship and avoid successive relegations, McDonald revealed he could step down.

He said: “We’ll see where relegation leaves me. We’ll see if I walk away. We will see in the next couple of days which direction the club wishes to take. I have a meeting with the chairman on Monday and we’ll see what happens.

“We’ve just been relegated as a football club, so we have decisions to make. I’d imagine the chairman will be saying a lot to me and I’ll say a lot to him. We’ll see what the chairman has to say.”

It’s been another shocking season at Bloomfield Road, McDonald working against a constant background of off-field drama and calls for the Oyston family to sell the club.

McDonald found himself in the thick of the mess and has seen supporters turn on him in recent weeks as one point from their last six games fired Pool towards the drop.

And for the first time McDonald apologised to supporters and admitted his team has been way off the mark all season. He said: “I apologise to the fans for the whole of the season, not just the last game.

“We’ve not been good enough for the whole season and that shows why we have been relegated.

“I told the players they embarrassed me, the football club and themselves in that second half. It wasn’t just about Sunday – it was the rest of the season.

“When results showed it wasn’t in our hands we gave up. The players have let themselves and everyone down. We are all gutted.”

Jacob Blyth’s 16th-minute goal gave Pool the lead and briefly raised spirits – as it remained 0-0 at Fleetwood – but by half-time Town were two up.

McDonald said: “We took the lead and played reasonably well, but we came in at half-time and people told us the score at Fleetwood. That was probably to blame for our second-half performance.

“Mentally we are very fragile and that showed.”