Thursday night's fans forum at Darlington didn't achieve anything other than to confirm what many supporters have suspected since the play-off final defeat at Wembley: Quakers are a club in turmoil.

Since that Wembley loss to Peterborough, the club has slipped down the league and has never replaced the quality players who were a part of David Hodgson's squad.

Perhaps more telling is that attendances at Feethams are back to the level they were before George Reynolds bought the club.

Pre-Reynolds they hovered around the 3,000 mark. After a couple of roller-coaster years, in which more than 4,500 regularly turned up, they're now back to that level.

It's well-documented that most of Darlington's star players, and manager Hodgson, left the club in the summer of 2000 after Reynolds declined their demands for higher wages instead of persuading them to stay. The likes of Marco Gabbiadini, Neal Heaney and Steve Tutill were replaced by less-talented imitations such as Stuart Elliott, Mark Angel and the aptly-named Ton Kaak.

Meanwhile, 25 miles up the road at Victoria Park, Darlington's fiercest rivals Hartlepool United, beaten by Quakers in the play-off semi-finals in 2000, were content to keep their relatively successful squad together and aim for a second year in the play-offs.

And this they achieved while Quakers were left floundering in 20th position - 30 points worse off than the previous campaign.

The season was littered with Darlington making stop-gap signings, most of them poor quality, with Clint Marcelle a prime example.

In contrast, the months prior to the current season saw Pool bring in players with proven quality from higher divisions. As they cleared out a batch of players manager Chris Turner felt he could take no further, in came Ritchie Humphries, Jon Bass and Tommy Widdrington, with Gordon Watson to follow later.

Darlington had to settle for non-league stalwarts Gary Pearson, Simon Betts and Danny Mellanby.

Shortly after the season began, manager Gary Bennett, an unproven and inexperienced boss, finally stepped down as Quakers' once-promising campaign disintegrated. And if further confirmation of the contrast in fortunes was needed, on the same evening passions erupted so violently at Darlington, Hartlepool were hosting an evening in celebration of their legends, manager Turner and striker Watson included.

Susan Reynolds' comments sparked outrage, but instead of calming the heated situation, her husband has said he's not bothered whether or not the players refuse to play today at Exeter.

How can the players be expected to want to play for a man who treats them with such little respect?

With such negative publicity emanating from the club, surely Reynolds should be seeking to avert further disharmony, rather than label the squad as cattle?

So as a slagging match erupts between players and chairman at 14th-placed Darlington, Hartlepool continue their push for a third consecutive play-off place.

It's clear to see that Pool have maintained their progress over the past two years, while Darlington have gone backwards.

And on top of Thursday's fiasco, that can only hurt Darlington fans even more