Good schools? or popular schools?

Back in the day when I was a DCS, we had problems with a school serving an area of disadvantage; for fear of superinjunctions I will call it School A. This school was unfortunately located, and was relatively unpopular. More importantly, it was underachieving, and the key indicators were, bluntly, unsatisfactory (though Ofsted in its wisdom did not say so). We also had rapidly falling rolls in the area concerned. So we (and in that I include advisers, but I was personally involved) took direct action, although the governing body were less than keen as Ofsted had said that they were 'satisfactory'. I recall a meeting with the headteacher at which I made clear that standards had to improve, but so did the confidence of the comminity; one without the other would not be sufficient. In the event, the headteacher and staff made sustained and effective efforts and the standards improved dramatically year-on-year for two years, well up to the borough average. But it was not enough; the school remained unpopular, numbers fell, and we had to move to close it.