Most liked posts in thread: Home vs Port Vale 22nd October

A few bullet points:

• First half, take your hat off to Vale, they were very good, particularly off the ball. Good running, pulling players out of position, a high pressing game when not in possession. We were struggling, but credit to they players, the stuck with it and didn’t fold or let their heads drop. Lucky to go in at 1-1 on the balance of play.
• 2nd half we were a totally different team. We were asking all the questions. Lots of possession, nice build up play at times. Cooke is exactly what we’ve been missing for 4-5 years, an excellent acquisition.
• Thought both full backs, Wood and Mellor were poor, Wood unusually so, lots of stray passes from them.
• Ismail was a marked man especially first half, but had better luck in the 2nd.
• Akpan has been transformed. Don’t know what Bowyer has said to him but he’s a different player. Thought he was very good tonight.
• Thought both goals were shocking, especially the 2nd one. Atkinson won a header on the edge of the box and followed up into the area unchallenged. A very soft goal as Bowyer rightly pointed out in his interview.
• I don’t mind if we lose if we show spirit and endeavour and on the whole we did.
• We’ve got to remember we have key players out, Pritchard, Donaldson and Connolly to name but 3.
• People are complaining about the lack of subs but I’m not sure who we could have changed given we were dominating the 2nd half. McCartan looked to be coming on at one point but Vaughan ran off his knock. Perhaps he could have come on but for who, Oteh perhaps but I can’t see why we’d have made 2-3 subs when the momentum was with us.
• All in all a frustrating night but far from a wrist slasher as some fans would have us believe.

 

Mellor tonight. Oh boy. That was stunningly bad.

 

Very underwhelming first half, bordering on poor. Much better second half, only one team in it. Didn’t deserve that result but that’s the lesson if you can’t capitalise on the pressure you’re mounting.

Thought Cooke and Akpan were very decent. Also credit to Devine, I’ve often doubted him but that’s the best I’ve seen him play. A second winger means that game is much more stretched and think we would have eventually created enough to have got when we needed. We didn’t and a poor defending cost us a point.

Don’t dwell. Learn from it and move onto Saturday. Hopefully Connelly and/or Pritchard back on Saturday and we go back to a better suited formation.

 

Come on @Fordy117 we controled the second half and so unlucky with that effort by Akpan, there defence got every break going, we need the likes of Pritchard, Connelly back asap, bad day at the office but we didn't get the result we deserved IMO.

 

Woeful, absolutely woeful. 3 non creative midfielders at home and not a single change until 1-2 down.

Defence is shocking of late, the whole lot of them backed off Worrall as a unit for the first goal and were far too deep for the second.

Midfield non existent aside from Cooke who was average by his standards. Akpan and Devine absolute gash. And devine playing RM in the second half wtf is that about?

Vaughan - too much back to goal shite, he needs it fed to him facing the goal but we've got no intentions of creating anything down the middle. It's all get it wide and sling it in, even when your only winger is double marked for 90 minutes. All head height crosses despite not being in a position to compete with the hairy arsed centre backs we come up against every week. We're so predictable its ridiculous.

 

Thing is Ricc, our fans always come up with statements like this, basically saying the opposition will end their unwanted record against us (i.e. Morecambe). Difference is, this team is continually grinding out results to prove people wrong

Draw at worst tonight, but I expect us to pass the test as we did against Crawley & Swindon. They might have some big dumb lumps in their line up, but we will do them with the speed of our wingers

 

Is Vaughan told to spend 99% of his game going looking for the ball no where near the box? All a bit Doyle esk, who, shock, scored AGAIN tonight.

 

Yep , pretty much mirror the last few posts in all honesty. A very frustrating night but one where its hard to single out an area of blame seeing as though we dominated without carving out a real clear chance.

Thought we started slowly and again our midfield shape suited our opponents more than us but we adjusted well eventually.

Alot of huff and puff and desire to get in the box but we did struggle to break them down at times (always gonna happen with no creative mid) and we were left seemingly hoping ismail could do it all.

Defence reasonably solid, thought AOC best of the bunch again, solid in the air and used the ball very very well at times. Both full backs have had better games.

Midfield i thought werent bad, devine grew into had probably his best game, getting up and down, taking players on, getting in the box, pretty much everything we hadnt seen before from him. Looks like he is getting more confidence with gametime although it does look like he may need to take some blame for the winner with atkinson seemingly running behind him.

Cooke used the ball well as a pivot but i wonder if in games like this he would have been better in a more advanced role and let akpan sit rather than starting moves 30 yards off vaughan.

The front three tried, ismail looked knackered early on and whilst a threat i feel he should have done better a few times and just actually cross the ball instead of beating the full back for a fifth time. Oteh i would maybe have liked to have gone more central earlier, has genuine pace and would have caused problems, took one cross off vaughans head and again needed to be more clever with his big chance late on.

Vaughan was playing a role he isnt suited to but is going to have to get used to, and needs to understand he will get frustrated and adapt his game. He is winning a lot of headers, but to no-one, if we are playing to his head , the rest need to at least run off him.

Bowyer i think didnt want to gamble and lose but ended up losing anyway. We said it was difficult to pick one player to take off and swap which might change the game. Could possibly have gone mcarten for devine , given the way devine had the beating of the full back a few times i do wonder what ismail would have done over there with mccarten on the left.

To sum up a long post (apologies), a frustrating night but given we dominated the 2nd half conceding in the 93rd min with probably the only time the ball was in our box, and with so many men missing then i certainly arent seeing this as the end of the world

 

Won't apportion blame we bossed the second half, we were chasing the winner and playing silly balls across the backline and unfortunatly its cost us.
We need all three points at Macclesfield and go on another 5/6 game unbeaten run, to many missing tonight and their replacement weren't up to it.

 

Was the subs board broke ffs?

We needed McCartan on, or any other change, after an hour.

Richards-Everton had a poor game, Mellor was poor, Oteh was poor, Devine was sloppy even if he won the pen. Ismael wasn’t as effective as he has been.

We missed Connolly’s pace and Pritchard in the middle.

We looked to be getting on top before their winner but Bowyer should have subbed half an hour sooner.

 

To be fair to him second i thought it was arguably the best I've seen him play.

 

Mellor has been poor most of the games he's played this season. Bad mistake from Bowyers leaving Henley out.

 

I'm not gonna have a go at them after that, I thought first half we were flat and badly missed Connolly and Pritchard. Second half we gave it a good to but came up short, they score with their only attack of the half. Way it goes sometimes. How we lost I'll never know.

 

We’ve played worse and gained points this season. On Saturday against Crawley we didn’t play any better and got a win. It will be like this nearly every week in this division, there is no standout side at this level. Had we had the starting eleven from the Swindon game available i would have expected us to win last night, hopefully one or both of Pritchard and Connolly are back.

 

They weren’t a poor side

 

Parker said we are hopeful Connolly & Pritchard be okay, if that's the case then slap them both back in starting 11.

 

Both very important to how we play. Connolly and Ismail on the flanks and Pritchard central gives us a bit of everything.

 

Devine has been worse in my opinion. But let's be honest, it's been littered with poor performances. Cooke has probably been our best and even hes only been 6/10. I get that we have injuries, but we need more intensity. Bowyer needs to be telling them that if they want automatic promotion, it's based on finding a way to win games like this.

 

Call a spade a spade, Vaughan has barely had a decent game. We’re severely lacking Donaldson, Connolly and Pritchard. Vaughan’s suspension changed nothing.