When Hannah Dingley was announced as the new Forest Green Rovers caretaker boss late on Tuesday night some of the reaction on social media was depressingly predictable.
"Get that club in the bin," "the games gone," "weird football club," were the responses peppering the announcement that she had replaced former boss Duncan Ferguson on a temporary basis. This is to be expected. Some so-called 'fans' of our sport naturally fear anything new or different and may for some bizarre reason feel threatened by a women doing a job they have only seen men perform their entire lives.
Considering there are still those that won't even acknowledge the women's game, having a female manager organising a team of male professionals was always likely to be an alien concept to the ill-informed. But Dingley's appointment, even if only temporary, is long, long overdue.
