The Voice - Match preview Bradford City vs Carlisle United Tuesday 21st March @ 7:45pm

Unfortunately our record at Valley Parade this season makes every home game difficult

 

Right, 24hrs later.

First half - Mainly poor. Easily down there with some of the worst ones this season.

Second half - Goodness knows what was 'discussed' at half time, but that was our best half of the season.

Very well done to Carlisle, their resolve and sheer refusal to give us, was a credit to them and it produced a decent L2 match.

Great news that they now that they have to play Orient, Northampton, Stockport, Salford and Sutton because they will be tough opponents.

 

Good job we've got more to play away from home, then.

Cheer up Park. Still all to play for and this seasons is better than the pap of the previous five.

 

We can all sit back and relax on Saturday and watch four of our rivals trip up over each other




And then watch us trip up over Grimsby on April Fools Day

 

Gillingham vCarlisle
Doncaster v Northampton

these are more important to us at the moment

 

my thoughts on yesterday's game

Lewis - 6 - Didn't have much to do. Distribution was inconsistent an he does need to command his box a bit more but besides that he was fine

Halliday - 6 - No complaints

Platt - 6.5 - Handled the Carlisle attackers well

Stubbs - 6.5 - Ditto

Ridehalgh - 5 - Personally I think he was poor. Doesn't contribute enough on the attacking front. Id like to see Bola start next game

Clayton - 5 - One of his quieter an poorer performances. Looks a bit knackered

Smallwood - 6 - Did good defensively. His set pieces have gone back to the default setting of being dog shit an not beating the first man

Gillead - 7 - Played well imo. Especially in the second half.

Banks - 6.5 - Started off well. faded as the game went on.

Chapman - 5 - Felt like he was trying too hard to make a good impression. In essence, that isn't a bad thing, but ultimately the execution was costly as he was rushing his shots an trying to take too many players on at once. A lack of support from the midfield an full backs on the attacking front may of placed too heavy of a burden on his shoulders to be one of the very few creators in the team

Cook - 7 - This is a man who wants to fire us to promotion. very unlucky not to score

Subs :
East - 6 - Keeps it simple. very mature performance for his age.

Crichlow - 7 - Personally I think he played very well as part of a back 3

Oliver - 6 - Won a lot of headers. wasn't provided enough service from the wings when he was in the box

Perriera - N/A - Glad to see him back on a pitch. I still have hope that he can recreate last seasons form

Would also like to say, I personally think that Carlisle showed the best defensive performance of a team to of visited VP this season. Their entire back line deserved 7s at least. Perhaps Northampton may of edged them, but that Carlisle back line put up a good performance

 

The game reminded me of ours Tuesday night Grimsby looked very impressive first half and missed 3 good chances, Mansfield upped their game second half but their finishing was woeful.

 

Well hopefully, this enforced layoff will turn out better than the one before Carlisle away.
Injured players have more time to recover for the run in.
Competitors all playing each other and not many grasping the nettle, Mansfield last night had the chance to really close the gap.
Playoffs looking more and more likely to me though.I hate them, its not as if we will make ant real money from them , as the gate receipts are shared out equally among all the clubs competing i believe after running costs.
No chance the FA will scrap them though they have to drag in every penny to pay for the plastic national waste that is Wembley.

 

Yep! Another toughy for Carlisle

 

You forgot that Stockport are only 1 point behind us and Salford 2 points? Oh and Mansfield 4 with a game in hand?

 

They shouldn’t ever scrap the play offs and they’ve been around a lot longer than the new Wembley. I think they give clubs every chance to keep the season alive. Many times in the 70s City’s season was dead by feb/March as top far too far away but now the seasons alive even for someone like Doncaster this season who are 12th at the moment thanks to the play offs.

 

100% This.^^^^^^^
It keep league interest going for half the table right up to April, before any play offs kick off!

 

Oh, the good old days of playing out the season with nothing to play for before the playoffs.

Time to try the kids out from the reserves, it was like watching a training session or pre season friendly. Horrible.

 

Totally agree.
It's great walking down Wembley Way to see your team.
And I mean City not Engerland !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Why would scrapping the playoffs ever be considered? Were you watching football pre-playoffs where pretty much every game after March was a dead rubber for most teams.

 

We're not allowed, pal.

@Fordy117 will be on soon to remind us we're not allowed to follow any football this Saturday.

 

That's it! Only matters what we do.

We've dropped 4 points in the last two match. It we had won both games then we would be in the top 3 right now.

Now we have 2 less games to go and a fight just to stay in the play offs.

 

I can live with only getting a point against Carlisle, it was an even game and at least we tried to go for it in the second half. It's Newport that is still bugging me. Sitting on the draw when we were chasing promotion and should have thrown the kitchen sink at it.

 

Nothing gets passed you does it.

 

No. Maybe you should pass on some of them big birds you pull.