APPROACHING Christmas, we find ourselves dangerously close to the bottom of the league, on the back of a run of five consecutive league defeats.

Rather than being up the creek without a paddle, it’s more a case of being up the creek with plenty of paddles. The problem is that too many of the paddlers are paddling against each other or bashing each other with their paddles.

Unhappy rumblings are in the air and fans are making up their own minds about what is going wrong on the pitch. All of it is speculation, which is the diplomatic word for guesswork. What fans can see is that the internal dynamics within the team are creating a side which is dispirited and falls apart under pressure.

What happens next? The optimistic camp, my natural home, says it will come together and we will emerge as a happy, functional, co-ordinated unit, weaknesses and all. The new broom has swept clean, and the January transfer window will strengthen the team. The pessimistic camp, densely populated this week, says that that we are doomed, as always.

Against Rochdale last Saturday Rhys Healey was given a deserved start, but we paid a high price. The shape of the side was out of kilter, and the Sears/Healey combo never clicked. Long before half time Rhys’ body language had tell-tale signs of frustration, which was fully understandable. I had a horrible feeling that he was going to chase after someone in frustration, and earn himself a red card.

By the end, there were several disconsolate figures out there in the middle, some expected, some surprising, all long past the stage where they cared enough to get themselves sent off. That was a damning indication of low morale and an absence of self-belief.

Rochdale worked hard, with a solid shape and a bit of flair at the sharp end, where it matters. For a big, tough Northern team, they had an tendency to hit the deck at the slightest contact, and two of their goals came when we were suckered into fouls, firstly by Cole Kpekawa, and more obviously by Kaspars Gorrks, to concede a penalty. Both times Rochdale were looking for the foul, and we duly obliged.

But make no mistake, their 4-1 win did not flatter Rochdale and there could easily have had more goals, aided by a poor display by Sam Walker when we needed it least.

You can make a case that our confidence is so low that we can’t withstand setbacks. How do we get back on track? We need some great man management, the subtle balancing act between two-way respect and reward, and a way to restore the optimism we were all feeling very recently.

We need to rediscover the defensive solidity we saw at places like Walsall, Scunthorpe, and Swindon just a short while ago. The side we saw then could dig in and defend compactly, frustrating teams by co-ordinated team effort. Fans couldn’t care less who the faces are, so long as the results come. There was no enjoyment in the players’ work out on the pitch on Saturday, or in the stands, and low morale in the workplace is always a killer. That’s what needs to change first, for us to turn things around.