By Nathan Jackson
May 18 2010

Richard Butcher returned to the club for a third spell at the beginning of the season, but he never replicated the fine form he had enjoyed in his first two spells and found himself completely out of the picture under Chris Sutton, even being loaned to Macclesfield.

During the Keith years I would go as far as saying Butcher was my favourite player. He was a brilliant midfielder who could not only set up good goals, but also score brilliant goals. Along with Dean Keates' free kickagainst Bury, Butcher's goal at Mansfield in 2003/4 was my favourite goal watching the Imps.

However, as much as I get sentimental about Butcher's first two spells at the club, that's all that prevents me from writting a scathing review of his 2009/10. I feel he was only ever brought back to this club for the sentimentality reasons and that Jackson only did it to try and win back the fans. Not that it was Butcher's fault of course, I'd have jumped at the chance to rejoin a club whom I'd had three complete seasons at.

It's hard to really pinpoint what has happened to Butcher. Was he only good because of Keith Alexander? Was he suited to the long ball game? It's just hard to pinpoint exactly why Butcher just didn't click this season. He was barely even a shadow of the Butcher that excited me all those years ago, but I hope this one bad season doesn't tarnish people's memories of his contributions to the three Playoff seasons that he was here permanently.

He's not a bad player in the slightest, but he makes no impact on the game whatsoever and could best be described as a passenger, which is unfortunately not what we need.

The Players of 2009/10 : Richard Butcher

Discussion started by theimps.ka (IP Logged), 18/05/2010 13:20

theimps.ka
18/05/2010 13:20

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