Accrington (H) 1st January 2019

Spot on - agree - they were overally aggressive at times, tetchy and in the refs ears at every opportunity.

 

I definitely agree that they seemed intent on being rough with us but imo they played football and pressed us back better than other teams have lately.
I do however echo what DH said in that i think that was down to the lads being tired. We have being playing very high tempo football and it will take its toll on the lads.
Miller i think did not seem to be up to his same standard.
And he looked very pissed off with something. I think the lack of goals for all his efforts is getting to him.

 

Agree. We commented when Wood came on rather than Devine that it maybe cast some doubt over Devine's future here. Alex Jones apparently was in the Flying Pizza on NYE so obviously knew he wasn't going to be involved at all on New Years Day

 

To be perfectly honest we aren't unusual in being reliant on loan players. If anyone is that way inclined it would be interesting to know of each starting squad in league one how many were loan players. I suspect, apart from Sunderland a lot of sides are made up of loan signings. Its the way of the world with the bigger clubs hoovering up the talent.

 

played really well, we desperately have to keep hold of Payne and O'Brien.

it's a positively enjoyable experience going to VP these days. well played to all involved at the club for turning the atmosphere around.

 

I was surprised at how quickly Accrington lost their cool. Seemed to me that they were taking their frustrations out on the referee for losing individual battles and not adapting. The ref was a bit picky but surely you'd learn not to giveaway needless fouls. The number 3 was especially being frustrated by Miller and kept taking that out on the linesman with some frankly odd behaviour. The red card was another clear example of frustrations from the No.9 losing out constantly to NKP who was much improved.

Hopkin has done a superb job to get this team fighting and playing. He'll appreciate more than anyone the job on to try and cut down the squad and move away from the reliance on loan players. But the early signs are that we have a manager that could put a fantastic team together given the chance.

 

Just had a quick look at the Accy forum and didn't really gain any insight apart from finding out that they don't understand how the offside rule works.

 

I have an Accy Facebook friend who has taken exception to me describing them as the dirtiest team I had seen in a while. He seemed to think that City players were diving all over the place and that 3 of their bookings were for "technical fouls". He is normally a reasonable sort of bloke, so I guess you always view your own team through rose coloured specs. I didn't notice any diving from City yesterday, did anyone else?

 

Does anyone know if Gibson is injured again or just not being selected again?

I think the writing is on the wall for a few players like Wright, Devine, Jones, Gibson, Reeves (if ever fit) and they'll have find new clubs or go out on loan, if possible.

Does anyone know how Omari Patrick is doing on loan?

 

I don't think we were diving yesterday. They played like a team with a massive chip on their shoulder. They were petulant when things didn't go their way and it played entirely into our hands.

The ref set out his stall early on when their keeper was booked for kicking the ball away after ten minutes (100% correct as we were on a break and he was out of his area so was done entirely for cynical reasons). He wasn't going to take any sh!t so don't persistently foul and then be in the refs ear constantly like they had a persecution complex.

We also got 3 bookings and O'Connor's aside the other were probably marginal. If we truly were a team of diving cheats then O'Connor would've hit the deck after being pushed in the chest by Kee after his foul. There wasn't much difference in that to Scannell's push he was ref carded for against Sunderland.

They need to get over themselves as do their fans. Felt good to finally put one over them.

 

They were a very balanced team. They had chips on both shoulders. I’ll get my coat

 

Prior to the red card Payne jumped out of a challenge in front of the dug out where their guy went over the top of the ball with his studs showing and asked the ref for a free kick. It didn't look malicious but would have been nasty if Payne hadn't taken evasive action and should have been punished.

Their No14 would have been in serious trouble for the one he left on O'Connor had any of the officials seen it and could well have been joining their No 9 for an early shower. That said, it was still monumentally daft of O'Connor to behave like he did and take the law in to his own hands when he clattered him back a few minutes later.

 

I don't know about that. Stupid but good for team morale at the same time. I.e.just a little warning back that we won't be bullied

 

Leg breaker there. Thank God it wasn't worse than it was.

 

I may be completely wrong but they just got spanked 4-0 so they probably came to us with a shout in the ear about getting into us and pressing and ruffling feathers given our recent form. We scored and created chances and they went over the top a bit and then one lad was sent off and which resulted in more frustration. That's how I read it anyway.

 

You're right. Things fell for us at exactly the right time yesterday. Of course we made our own luck - but this was a team looking slightly creaky if we had a game on Saturday, probably wouldn't have any of our recognised central midfielders

It was good to see Wood playing so well, but playing against a team that's expected to go up and have 11 men, is a bit different to playing a team expected to go down (or struggle) who have 10

 

I thought, for once, we definitely got some favourable decisions. For instance Doyle 'scored' clearly after the whistle and didn't get booked and we had similar time wasting with O'Donnell. I did find at least two of their bookings comical -why would they be wasting time

Sending off was deserved

I was actually impressed with Accrington as they never gave up for a minute. Clear to see why they're arguably punching above their weight

I also thought the player that got sent off looked a handful and apparently he was at their place? Surely the type of player we should be targeting for the end of the season

 

Zanzala isn't one I would want at City. He brought his sending off on himself. His ridiculous play acting - pretending he had a head injury, when he didn't, and when getting up forgetting it was supposed to be a head injury and starting to limp, quite rightly resulted in derision from the crowd. He then let that get under his skin, resulting as others including his manager have said, in the sending off. Prior to that he didn't seem to be causing too many problems for NKP or McGowan, and has scored 4 goals this season. I don't think he is good enough for City on either the talent or the temperament front.

 

Not based on yesterday and even his own manager has criticised him (constructively) in saying he thought he let the crowd get to him

But I understand, Pulse were saying, that was untouchable at their place - so clearly there is some talent

We are going to have to occasional take a risk on potential. The old problems still exist - a club like ours can't mop up every 'at peak' player going. We're going to have generate some cash by buying - but buying well, i.e. Wyke. I just thought Zanzala, even between the moodiness, looks a potentially good player