The Voice - Match preview Bradford City vs Stockport County Friday 29th December @ 7:45pm

Agree with that. It's all about performance. Yes it's slightly disappointing that we couldn't grab a win from one of our last two but last night really did feel like we were watching two automatic promotion teams. Anyone who can't see that needs to watch more league 2 football.

Whether this is something to celebrate or fear I'm not sure but we now go into 5 games against teams struggling and performing poorly. We really need 10 points from these games.

 

Conditions dictated the game but can't be disappointed with a point in the circumstances. Huge game next against Crewe where a win is really the only option to keep us in the playoff picture. A draw normally wouldn't be a bad thing but that would be three on the bounce, 3 points over the festive period would be seen as a set back.

 

Ideally a win over Crewe, but I'm looking at Crawley (home), Colchester (away), then Doncaster and Salford (both home) as a real chance to put another run together. Crawley are the toughest out of that lot, but still a team we can beat.

Colchester, Doncaster and Salford are the current 20-22nd in the table. Salford in particular look like they've jacked the season in. They haven't won since October.

 

Dave Challinor's view of the game.

 

We must go all out for the win on Monday and at the very least come away with a point.
Losing to Crewe in addition to likely wins for MKDons and Wimbledon will put us 7 points behind the playoffs.
That’s not a mountain but it does mean we’d need to win the next 4 ‘easier’ games.

 

So we lose to Crewe then the seasons over with half of it to go ???????
Whatever the result against Crewe we have a lot to look forward to rather than relegation which looked highly likely after the shambles at Notts county.

 

The winning streak must have bern killing them

 

The comments from one of them seemed like he was going to start crying after the Donny game

 

In the conditions, that was a terrific performance last night. We matched the team at the top of the table, who have won 15 games already this season.

It is hard to believe how much difference GA has made to this squad of players. The discipline and organisation they are showing beggars belief at what went on earlier in the season.

Hopefully we can freshen up the squad a bit in January. I would be concerned if we lost either Alex Gilliead or Richie Smallwood for a few games - despite criticisms of both - their partnership is central to us right now. Richie Smallwood's set pieces might drive us all to despair, but his positional sense and breaking up of play has been superb under GA.

 

I'm perplexed as to why he's continually on set pieces. Surely there must be someone else in the squad capable of putting in at least one decent ball in 90 minutes. If we had a Moxon type player, imagine how many Cooky and the defenders would score.

 

I'm not sure where this has come from but I wouldn't be staking your house on it.

 

It means nothing. You could go a full season unbeaten and still be relegated.

Wins are what matters and we need to find them again quickly.

 

After listening to GA post match I wouldn’t be surprised to see Pointon start at Crewe. He said a couple of players are ready to come back to keep up the intensity.

 

But they had Championship players in their team.

 

The pitch is a real concern.Half way through the season and its knackered,and will only get worse.Yes,its rained a lot,but its rained a lot just up the road in Harrogate,and their pitch is in much better condition than ours,in fact my local park pitch has more grass on it than VP.Other than re-turfing parts of the pitch,i am not sure what can be done.

 

We could have benefited from having Stubbs on the bench instead of Taylor.

 

Quitter

 

It’s been decent for years up until now. Not sure if they did anything different in the summer? However with the concrete sub base and the amount of rain, maybe it’s just the consequence of the two and nothing can be done unless we spend millions on it.

 

Despite travelling up & down the country for decades following County last night was my first visit to VP. The Bradford fans I spoke to in the pub beforehand were friendly & knowledgeable, VP is a fantastic ground to watch football at despite the crap catering & silly stewards (searching kids & people in wheelchairs? what's that all about?). It's easily up there with my favourite grounds I've visited. A ground like that & the support you give deserves so much more than league 2 football, I can only imagine what the place must be like when it's truly packed.

As for the game I was happy with a point. You're a far harder prospect than when under Hughes. It wasn't the best of games played in poor conditions but both teams put a shift in without really troubling each other too much. I thought you probably edged it to be fair & had the better chances, we didn't really test your keeper at all especially in the 2nd half which was slightly disappointing. I'll be glad to get through the festive period unbeaten & get to the January window, we're missing several key players especially in midfield & need some fresh blood in to bolster our promotion bid. It doesn't help when we have a player like Nick Powell taking up a huge wage, talented player when he puts his mind to it but seemingly made of weetabix!

I hope both our clubs are in league 1 next season, I'm pretty confident (which is an unusual feeling being a County fan) that we'll secure a top 3 place this season, I think it may be play offs for you again but I hope you're successful this time round. Your support deserves it.

 

Thank you. We love our stadium as well. Although the pitch has taken a battering these last few weeks and was not easy to play on. A good footballing side would find it difficult. Last night I thought it was evenly matched, but looking at the highlights I think we did edge it.