Macclesfield (away)

Wouldn't say hatful of attempts no. Plenty of chances to shoot from outside the box but always decided to play the extra pass and the chance was gone.

Each side had at least 1 chance to score another goal but it was a pretty lacklustre affair.

 

The time has come when MC has to take control and firmly set out his agenda..his ability is under scrutiny and he has to produce the spark that galvanises HIS players to up their game.

 

The 5 penalty takers don't need to be set in stone, but the manager should still have a rough idea as to who his best penalty takers are and who (if anyone) is nailed down to take one. Solely putting it in the players hands is why we ended up having defenders taking poor penalties and a specialist penalty taker in Wright not getting a look in. Nothing has been take out of context, we had a disorganised penalty shootout and that's the managers fault.

 

We haven't learnt from Yeovil last season who then got Man Utd in the next round
Imagine the interest it would have created to have drawn our friends down the M621 in the next round as you say another chance lost to boost the coffers for a striking partner for Doyle

 

Even when they miss?, Some repeatedly, are you saying those with the biggest mouth are the best players?

 

Cheers, Nice to hear an assessment from someone that actually went. Not a stats screen dump.

 

When it comes to penalties you need the confidence to take it. How many times have you seen somebody step up and you say he'll miss. And he does. We are talking about professional footballers here. Confidence is key.

 

I suggest an ability to take them and score is more key,

 

Think we created 2/3 clear chances,19 shots maybe but alot were very tame efforts. I can only count a miilar header from a scannell cross, a millar one on one and a side foot effort from seedorf after a riley cross which were genuine chances.
We looked slow and pedestrian and each looking to someone else to pull us out the shit. More often than not, that was payne but he always seemed to try one move too many all the time.
Both strikers (term used loosely) were isolated by the formation. Far too often scannel and seedorf were so far wide they were almost on the streets parallel to the ground. We have a good player in scannel yet i think he will go to waste playing the way we are. That is the big conundrum, how do you get scannel, payne and two strikers in the side? Im not sure you can.
Would love to know the passing stats for our back three (ch's and gk) never seen us playing so many nothing passes, Wilson in net must have played 30 passes minimum this evening.
To be fair to Macclesfield they had the best player on the pitch, in the bald lad whittaker who at 37 is nearly four years older than our boss and yet outshone akpan who i have yet to see lift a finger never mind bust a gut in a city shirt.

 

Did Payne keep running into defenders like on Saturday?

 

Yes, and our midfield on occasions too. He's a difficult one to work, an enigma if you will, a poor mans robbie blake. He does look more of a footballer than anyone in the team but strangely i dont see us being a good team whilst he isnt in regularly.
We arent good enough, for him to play the floating role yet im not sure he is made for any other position, as i dont think he has the speed and discipline to play out wide. You could sense his frustration tonight a little, and it is early days and yes i am a cynic but i could quite easily see a little injury cutting his loan spell short

 

'Best player', they say. 'Tries something different'.

I say, the new Mark Yeates.

 

See my edited version above

 

He did well at Blackburn though, didn't he? Agree in a way, but he's got more recent form than Yeates did. He either fits the system or not, it smacks of poor planning really, if they sign players that together don't make a team.

 

Morphed with Chris Brandon for good measure.

 

No, I don't think he did much for Blackburn. Rarely started, more a substitute.

Think he did OK at Oxford.

 

Hello folks interesting reading the reaction the result tonight.

Anyway thought I would offer a view from a Macc perspective.

Before the match I thought it likely that you would win with some to spare. Not so much on the basis of our two losses after all conceding 2 penalties in the 7th and 8th minutes of added time is a fairly spectacular way of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory as we did at Swindon. I wasnt there but believe we were poor against Grimsby. My big worry was that the team is much changed from last season and so is the management. It is always going to take a good while to gel, therefore not a good time to meet a much bigger outfit from the league above and more so on with a history in and a love of this competition.

As for the game I perhaps expected your team to come out and stamp your authority on the game early, as it happens I thought Macc were the better for the first 20mins and gained the belief in that period that made certain you would not be having an easy night. As expected it looked that your team had more quality on the field but Macc were making up for that with hard work and some good defending.

Second half again you had more of the ball and whilst our keeper had to make a couple of decent saves it did seem you were pretty toothless up front.

The stats perhaps mislead too as when it came to chances it was pretty much even as Macc hit the post and there was a couple of desperate scrambles where it looked like Macc would certainly score. The two goals were excellent and worth £10 admission alone.

I can understand you lot being very unimpressed by tonight, but the suggestion that Macc are shite because we are bottom after 2 is likely to be proved well wide of the mark. What I saw tonight gives me confidence that we will be well away from the relegation battle in our division, you were beaten by a better team than you perhaps think.

Always annoying getting done early in a cup by a team in a lower division especially if we go and draw Leeds at home tomorrow night! All the same its far too early to start writing your season off. My ever so slightly biased view of tonight was that it was a good game of football which we just about deserved to nick. Perhaps subconsciously like the fans your team might have been a touch complacent. Macc seemed to want it just that little bit more.

Your team try to play some nice football and I hope you have a good season and should we draw Leeds at home I hope we will do the decent thing for you and put them out.

All the best

 

You say that but we only have 2 acceptable strikers at the club, we will have to manage the best we can with just them 2