The Voice - Match preview #42: Bradford City vs Stevenage Saturday 11th April 2026 3:00pm

Oddly it didn’t sound like that on the feed from the main stand . Yes they did a job which I said from the get go.

 

That’s fair but the discussion was about their “ game” , not effective how it is . I call it anti-football, which I won’t defend . You don’t like it clearly, however I’d have no qualms playing them in the next few weeks .

 

The first sentence is bang on .

 

What disappointed me most was the lack of shots.

I'm not saying it was easy, and yes, I saw Stevenage throwing themselves in front of the few shots we did attempt, but how many times did we turn down the chance to shoot?

Their keeper had a good final 10 minutes, but before that looked extremely suspect. He dropped everything he tried to catch, but the referee kept gifting him free kicks as a reward for his mediocrity.

Just have a dig. Metcalfe in particular seemed determined not to try his luck. As we saw from Kemp, sometimes it just takes a bang average effort and you win the game.

 

That was more annoying than anything, we had so many chances to have a pop but we always opted to pass it sideways and try work a cross. I couldn't tell how far away Metcalfe was from goal for the first half angle when the crowd urged him to shoot, but there were two chances in the second half when he was on the edge of the box, had the gap, decided against shooting.

Then some shooting options were just daft. Humphrys having it in a crossing position, fair few in the box waiting, but he chose to cut inside and try shooting from 25 yards. Max Power putting one towards the second tier of the kop from 20 yards out.

Just a lot of "off it" moments leading to a very poor to watch game. Hopefully we'll get something next week.

 

I get where your coming from regarding the ref but before anyone of us stepped into VP we knew that Stevenage would do this dark arts shite and there was a huge chance that the ref yet again was gonna be poor ?????? And if said time wasting was happening why did the City players not get in the refs ear from the start ??????

Honestly its bloody frustrating and i know team will pull this dark arts crap out but when teams are blatantly tme wasting then the ref should have a responsbilty to good folk who have paid good money to be entertained ............he was weak yesterday but lets be right most of them are

 

Its like an ego thing times trying to get past a very low block with a passing move rather than simply twatting the ball at goal at any opportunity

 

There's also the fact that there's a 90% chance that the end result will be the end of the attack and another minute run down on the clock. I'd rather see us trying to carve out a proper chance even if it requires patience. Taking pot shots from 25 yards is usually a sign of desperation.

 

Or sometimes it does get its rewards not having a go how many times did we really pen them up at 0-0 ?????
It was only at 1-0 that we became desperate and started actually stated creating stuff.

 

Soon as any kind of warning goes in the 2nd should result in a card but no we get mutiple warnings and more than likely a token card in the 90th minute .............about timr the officals got a grip of all this now from keepers going down with no injuries to taking an age to take a throw in ..........if keepers are on a set time to get the ball into play then why not the same for throw ins ???????

 

And the conditions, it was fairly wet for the last 20 of the first half and again raining at the start, amd we soaked their half at HT. It's a wet zippy surface, drill it and see! Instead when we were in a position from distance, every effort was leathered high and wide.

 

As usual,lack of goals has done us again
It’s ok to say we don’t play as we did a few years back but we do need a goal scorer that plays in the penalty box

 

I felt trying to cross for the 1000th time was the desperate option. Their centre backs' bread and butter. Far too easy.

Variety. That's where it's at.

 

The throw in rule came in a couple of seasons ago didn't it...?
Any longer than 'reasonable' time ended in a booking, they just need to bring that back and enforce it.....

 

My thoughts exactly. The ref is key to setting the environment to play football.

 

‘Reasonable’ time is subjective though, so the three degrees we had yesterday wouldn’t have had a clue.

 

Couldn’t go and didn’t listen - from the vibe on here, we got the game we expected! Haven’t read anything on Bobby’s injury - anybody seen a reference to what it is?

 

Stevenage played exactly how Stevenage play. We shouldn’t have been surprised. Arguably the hardest watch this season. Turgid. Kick it head it. Zero real quality. 1 shot and goal. City didn’t deserve to lose nor win either as we produced little until late on. If we get these in the playoffs we need to handle their ‘play’ differently and not default to mirror what they do.