The man from Room Service asked as he surveyed the scene in Mr Best's plush hotel room as he delivered vintage champagne. There was £20,000 scattered across the bed which also contained the then current Miss Universe.

Bizarrely there are similarities to Colchester United’s current plight. A famous championship class footballer (Grant Holt) should have been signed before the season started by Paul Lambert when he was still employed by the club as manager. Such a signature would have brought the goals that ultimately would have fired us to promotion.

The money is represented by the failure to obtain anything in compensation from Norwich City.

The champagne is very much on ice after the most wretched run of 8 games that I can remember in nearly 40 years of supporting the U’s.

And the mystery blond, well perhaps she represents the glamour that championship football would have brought next season. However instead of Portsmouth, Middlesbrough, Ipswich and Hull we could face Rochdale, Notts County, Bournemouth, Walsall and Hartlepool again.

Mathematically it is not over, but the spectacular collapse since the match at the Memorial Stadium which has produced only 3 points out of 24 and seen the U’s slump to 7th in the table with the possibility of being overhauled by both Bristol Rovers and Southampton smacks of relegation form rather than either playoff contention or promotion.

The real sadness for me is the way that the demise has come about. The writing was on the wall at Bristol; we didn’t perform and allowed Jo Kuffour to run the show in the second half. It was not until the last 5 minutes that we woke up and despite pressure it was too late to influence a result.

The televised game against Brighton was poor fare but we did at least take a point. Worse was to come at Brunton Park and the Bank’s Stadium where the Colchester cures of failing to beat ten men in successive games reared its ugly head. In truth the Carlisle game was definitely the worst performance that I have seen since Aidy Boothroyd took over. Worse still we allowed Jason Price to score on his debut for the Cumbrians and Darren Byfield to sneak his first 2010 goal at Walsall.

Even then we could have redeemed ourselves with two home matches against the Bees and the Chairboys but two more lacklustre performances frittered away four more valuable points.

The Easter period has witnessed demise at St James’ Park but no hope of a resurrection at home to the Lions.

So we begin the start of a six game season with Swindon Town at home followed by Charlton Athletic Away, Hartlepool Away, Tranmere Home, Huddersfield Away and Orient at home to complete the 46 games.

Whether the season is then extended will depend on whether we can rekindle some of that pre Christmas spirit and secure 15 out of 18 points. Methinks that sadly it is too tall an order.

Returning to the initial question, definitely the lack of strike power has been costly, the loss of Paul Reid equally has undone the previously rock solid defence and the failure of Aidy Boothroyd to be able to play the same team on a more consistent basis has led to mistakes and consequent loss of form.

The irony is that matters are still in our own hands, but only just. Failure to defeat Swindon on Saturday and it is all over for this year.

Personally I would love the opportunity to watch the U’s at Wembley in May, but even my optimism is beginning to wane.

Up the U’s time for Aidy to become more attack minded and players to stand up and be counted.

Photo: Action Images

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