SOMETIMES the best-laid plans fail to materialise, as Martin Scott has found out to his cost after his career as Hartlepool United manager ended yesterday.

Scott left the club knowing he could have done no more to secure success at Victoria Park this season. For while he may have been a first-rate No 2 to Neale Cooper in recent seasons, the move up proved a step too far.

He's not alone in that situation. Brian Kidd left Old Trafford, where he was a top coach and right-hand man to Sir Alex Ferguson, to lead Blackburn to relegation.

Phil Brown left the security of a job at Bolton alongside Sam Allardyce and lasted all of seven months before bowing out at Derby this week.

After steering Pool through the play-off semi-final and taking the club to Cardiff, the biggest stage the club had ever played on, there is no doubt he was the right man for the job at the time.

Pre-season went better than expected. Scott and his charges sailed through games full of confidence, plenty of signings were made and plenty of goals came.

Then the season started and it all went horribly wrong.

"This was the most organised pre-season this club has had in its history, '' he said after the home defeat to Yeovil on September 3, a display from the dark ages and the first embarrassing performance under Scott.

After reaching the play-offs in League One for two consecutive seasons, there was only one aim, to go one better.

Scott admitted it himself: "Our aim is to win League One, I'm not saying we will do it, but that's what we will aim for. I'm not lowering my standards for anyone. I have high standards and aim to go one better than last year.''

In the last two seasons, the opening games of the season have set the tone. This season's first-day defeat to Bradford did the same.

It was a dysfunctional display as the campaign began with a stutter.

Given full support from the owners, IOR, he was allowed to bolster the best squad in the club's history. Yet none of his summer signings have made a first-team place their own.

For all his meticulous planning - even to the extent of asking the club's PA announcer to give a teenage debutant a big build-up when reading the teams out before a game - it didn't happen for the former Sunderland defender.

And his record in the transfer market leaves a lot to be desired.

A string of loan signings arrived but they were untested teenagers plucked from Premiership and Championship reserve and academy sides, hardly what Pool needed as they headed into a relegation scrap.

Rather than bring in the likes of James Walker and Gerard Nash, Scott may have been equally served by blooding any one of his own youth team players. He certainly had enough of them after handing out a string of first-year professional contracts to young players.

Selections and substitutions often caused bewilderment among observers. Teenagers were picked in the first team ahead of experienced players one week, before being dumped from the squad the next.

He got away with his first tactical blunder. Breaking up the Chris Westwood-Micky Nelson partnership in the play-off semi-final at Tranmere almost cost him dearly.

Unfortunately, that decision seemed to set the tone of things to come. With plenty of players to pick from, Scott already had more options than any other manager in the Victoria Park hot seat without bringing in others.

But for all his options and changes, it didn't work out.

Pool, who had forgotten what it was like to lose at home, suddenly couldn't win in front of their own fans. They have gone from having the best home record in the division to the worst. No team has scored fewer goals at home (16); no club has a negative goal difference (-5) and no team has won less games than Pool on their own patch (3).

After six seasons of unqualified success under owners IOR, the pitiful loss to Blackpool was a new low.

Losing on the field in the manner they did was humiliating, losing the plot in the dressing room afterwards was unforgivable.

If there was any chance of a comeback after the final whistle, the screams coming from the dressing room meant the point of no return had been reached.

Read more about Hartlepool here.