TERRY Butcher makes a fantastic first impression.

Polite, enthusiastic, amusing and self deprecating, Butcher made the best first impression of any manager I've seen unveiled by the County, from Peter Nicholas through to the present day.

There were a grand total of three journalists there to see Justin Edinburgh revealed as the successor to Anthony Hudson, and two of them were from the South Wales Argus. The other was rugby reporter and ex-player Phil Steele, filling in for the BBC as the Exiles were hardly a priority. I was the only one there to greet Peter Beadle.

Compare and contrast that with Friday, where well over a dozen journalists from across Wales assembled to meet Butcher, a name so recognisable from his playing career he instantly becomes the most high profile manager working in Wales. Yes, even more than Russell Slade.

Butcher spoke with the assuredness you'd expect from someone who has played 77-times for the Three Lions and personally I'm excited by his appointment, though I appreciate you and I are looking for different things in a Newport County AFC manager.

You want the most wins possible, infinite success and for the successful manager to never want to leave until you tell him you should. You are football supporters.

I'd love the wins and the success, but also have to factor in a professional relationship, the quality of copy said manager is likely to produce and profile, gravitas. Butcher delivers in spades in that regard.

However, I'm excited rather than pessimistic about Butcher's prospects, because I'm keeping a totally open mind to the chances of him succeeding. That isn't true for all of you.

I've already been inundated with doom and gloom tales from Hibernian fans on social media, as well as guaranteed by a County fan that the Exiles will be bottom of the table by Christmas.

I find such damning scepticism to be preposterous.

I know this is British football and in our minds, you are only a success until you are sacked, or certainly only as good as your last job.

But that's rarely fair. Context is often key.

Butcher failed at Hibernian, overseeing a relegation, but he was only there to begin with after being head hunted for doing a terrific job with Inverness Caledonian Thistle. In terms of profile, location, budget and brief, Newport are more Inverness than Hibs.

I've been told by many of you that the club have made a mistake in gambling on Butcher, a man with a mixed record and limited experience in this division, when there were tried and tested League Two commodities available and willing. Why not a James Beattie, Paul Cox or Mark Yates? They know the division.

And any one of those individuals might have done a fine job at Newport. They might also have been total failures.

Yates has led Cheltenham to the play-offs twice on a budget, but he also created the squad that ended this season heading for the Conference and ended up sacked.

Cox won the title with a Mansfield side that were better than Newport in the Conference and couldn't keep up with the Exiles in League Two. He was sacked.

Beattie wasn't sacked and didn't get relegated with Accrington before walking away, and keeping Stanley in League Two isn't easy. But they managed the same feat again this season without him, and he has no other experience in management.

I'm also told by Butcher sceptics that the Exiles and Howard Greenhaf and Les Scadding in particular are guilty of nothing more than star gazing, of picking the most famous name interested in the position in order to massage egos all round.

This argument I find hardest of all to accept.

Because that argument is coming from the same people who think Greenhaf and Scadding haven't been showing enough ambition. That they haven't been doing enough to push the envelope and take Newport even further up the pyramid.

You can't have it both ways.

The County board could have gone for steady, for consolidation and a safe pair of hands, but they've instead gone for the candidate they feel can push the club on, both on and off the field.

Butcher has spoken of being a leader and he'll need to be, because he needs to fill the role Edinburgh did, which was part manager, part chief executive.

The club are still lagging behind in certain regards off the field and Butcher's wealth of experience in football should be of great benefit to County.

Chief concern currently at the club is the complete lack of communication and transparency, hopefully something that will be genuinely addressed over the coming weeks and months.

New press officer Jamie Griffiths is familiar with the role and has already improved the website and social media side of the club, but he's currently working with one hand tied behind his back.

County seem to think that better communication means simply, "always putting things on the club website first," but that's an incredibly counter-productive policy.

Newport effectively buried the good news of Butcher's appointment by restricting their audience to only those who were awake at 10.30pm on a Thursday evening. It's nonsensical.

Butcher, an ex-Premier League boss and assistant manager at international level will have no such issues dealing with the media, nor will he be shy in implementing strategies off the field, as Justin Edinburgh did, both with the move to Rodney Parade and the restoration of Bar Amber as a training base.

It will be key he is allowed to bring in the staff he wants, with Russell Osman and Steve Marsella both thought to be possibilities. For the sake of continuity, Butcher will hopefully utilise Wayne Hatswell and Tony James, two fine coaches.

County have appointed a high profile ex-player who has a wealth of experience as a manager, albeit with a mixed record of success.

They have shown they are ambitious to continue progressing as a club and Butcher will inherit a very good squad who have just finished ninth in League Two, with many of the current squad willing to remain if they are wanted.

It feels to me like a time when cautious optimism would be pretty justified, but an open mind is surely the least the County's new manager deserves.