The Voice - Match preview #23: Mansfield Town vs Bradford City Thursday 1st January 2026 15:00

I get what your saying but it's not as if fans have jumped on the band wagon with regards that starting 11 there were plenty asking before the game why players had been asked to play roles that they never should have been asked to play, baffling team selection but were still 3rd in the league game in hand on 2nd so Alexanders got most right this season.

 

Only saving grace is that none of the teams around us won. Reset and move on and never play with that same back 3 again!

 

I don't think we were winning it today with any different players chosen. Let's not get over-emotional and imply the GA cost us a win. He wasn't the one who missed a good chance early on / or failed to pass the ball to player in a better position. Halliday was.

You've also no idea why he didn't pick others. Yes, I don't understand why he'd pick Kav against Swan - but then again I don't see the players every day.

 

I think the 2 changes were forced due to amount of games in a short period of time, I would imagine most teams made at least 2 or 3 changes today and they'll do the same on Sunday. Injuries have come in the worst positions with Baldwin being the only natural RCB and Pointon being only 1 of 3 regular starters in the no 10 roles.

Tilt was never going to play 2 games back to back so he had to come out and with the injury to Baldwin that left us very light for the RCB option with the only 2 options being Byrne or Joe Wright and I can see why he went Byrne as Wright is not comfortable out wide and on the ball, he's much better in the middle. If Sarcevic didn't miss today he was going to miss Sunday partly down to the amount of minutes but also with his previous injuries issues so he will need a rest more often than others. Personally I would have gone for Lapslie as he's a more natural no 10 and I don't think the role suits Kavanagh as his strengths are not running with the ball and creating in tight spaces.

It's one of these that it's easy as a fan to say keep playing these players when you never have to see how it would have worked and you don't have to worry about them getting injured when it's hypothetical.

 

This defeat had been coming but still represents a strong start when we look at the table.

Just dust it off, pick ourselves up and try and re find that early season energy sparked by a couple of additions.

 

I got told by a Barnsley fan that Humphrys aint no striker so why continue with him ............sadly it shows how weak we are up top if he continues to play him

 

Who takes the blame for Wright down the right hand side and Kav as a 10?

 

Somewhat cooled down so lets just summarise briefly

Walker did his best, made a great save in the first half and was let down by his defence

Kelly - Has games where hes okay but should never be more than a backup. The fact that he marked nobody and left Kav to mark Atkins is diabolical

Wright - either solid or a liability. All over the place the entire game

Bryne - Im not going to a game if he's starting. He's beyond shit it’s untrue. Alexander can keep persisting with his love child if he likes, but give it 9 months and it’l ultimately lead to his sack

Halliday - He may be christened as the Ginger Cafu but I don’t rate him in this league. No pace, One dimensional play, either takes a throw in too quick and gives it straight to the opposition or takes a bloody age to throw it; by which point, any momentum in the attack is gone

Touray - slowly regressing, possibly due to the fact hes surrounded by donkeys

Metcalfe - pick of the bunch

Power - Needs to step up as captain, but to a degree, I get where hes coming from

Kav - Does not deserve a spot in the team on merit. Does not deserve to be accommodated for and is definitely not a 10. Who wouldve guessed?

Wright - Cut our losses. hes not an attacker, never will be. Keep him as cover to LWB and leave it at that

Humphrys - not a fan of the way his head drops when were not playing well. Probably the highest paid player in the club so get stuck in


Alexander - Losing is part of the game, and thats fine, but it’s the manor in which we lose that pisses me off. Cant think of anything short of sabotage with that line up, and a year long persistence of picking what is clearly manager favourites and shoe horning them into the side.Why does the introduction of kav mean that Wright has to play out of position? Why does Mcyntire mot get a look in when hes the only CB we have who can play it on the deck? Why do we have to wait until theres 30 mins to go for subs to be made? What was the need to run the first team ragged for 100 minutes against Port Vale? Why is Cook not getting a look in when hes our only attacking ariel threat in our strike force? Why is Neufville getting stuck on the bench and being turned into a shell of himself?

same questions getting louder and louder every week

 

Tough month coming up. Blackpool have 3 wins and a draw from their last 4 at home. Rotherham who we have struggled against in League football for a while. Cardiff will be tough, Huddersfield away then Lincoln away inside of 4 days and Jan ends with Doncaster at home, a team we have a woeful record against.

Need to get some momentum back against Blackpool and Rotherham and hope we can get some rhythm again.

 

People can say it’s reactionary and that we should look on the table to see the bigger picture. The bigger picture is weve played crap for the better part of 3 months, rode our luck thanks to the efforts of Walker, Baldwin, Touray, Sarc, Pointon and Metcalfe. The writting was on the wall a few weeks ago but we were slogging out 1-0 wins by luck so nobody wanted to hear it then

 

Mansfield made 5 today and thats on the back of two great away wins ...................what folk are also missing is the amount of players we are still missing and with a squad at its limits with still a decent amount of League 2 players in there then this may have been on the cards


Maybe GA took a calculated risk in trying to get something today with a weak selection and going in strong for the Blackpook game we shall never know ............we stand 3rd now we get a result at Blackpool then we can head into January with hope rather the negative shite we have had to endure over the majority of the last 8 seasons.

 

Wright was left hopelessly exposed due to Byrne been poor at this level and / or the two midfielders in front of him getting constantly over-run. The number of times Power, Wright, Halliday and to a lesser degree Metcalf gave the ball ways was appalling.

I'm puzzled why you'd replace him when he's been the constant in a team that conceded just three goals in the last seven matches.

Baldwin and Pennington are a step up on Byrne. Tilt will not yet be capable of playing two matches in three days. The only criticism is how on earth Kelly gets ahead of McKintyre. Kelly'w defending has often been fine, but he's not in the stratosphere as McKintyre and that's vital when playing a back three.

 

Fully agree mate especially with the other sides also dropping points very disappointing, iff Mr Rupp is serious about taking this club forward im afraid he's going to have to put us hand in his pocket today especially illustrated where and when !

 

Riding your luck is getting battered game after game and your keeper pulking you out of the shit so over the last few months how many time has this happened ????,?
I would at a guess say the first half at Bolton apart from that the majority of games we have been the slightly better team hardly luck is it ??????

 

We're newly promoted up against better teams, so that means our defenders will always be more exposed and occasionally look terrible.

You forget that he's been part of a team that kept five clean sheets in seven matches before today. Let's remember that before today we were conceding an average of just a goal a game and had the second best defensive record in the division.

Virtually every team complains about their defenders. It's that kind of division this season.

 

Other teams must have sussed us out, that's the only explanation for moving away from the exciting free flowing football that critics up and down the country we're raving about upto mid October.

I can see no other reason as to why would change that or deviate from that unless teams were preventing us doing it.

Since then we have had two months of booting it down the channels shite. God knows how but for the majority of games we got results.

If they haven't sussed us we need to get back to the high press counter attack that saw teams being unable to handle us early doors

 

I like Humphrys and I certainly think there is a player in there!! Just not sure where he 'fits'!! I think, if anything, he is maybe trying too hard to make an impression... or he needs to work on his decision making. He certainly does frustrate!!

A couple of observations from the first half:

He had the ball about 25 yards out towards the right hand side of the box. There was an easy ball out to an unmarked Halliday on the right, he could have then spun and got in the box awaiting a cross from Halliday. Instead he turned inside and beat one man but then ran into another 2 defenders and lost the ball.

He beat a couple of men on the left hand side just inside the box running towards the touchline. There looked to be a couple of men to play the ball back to but instead tried to thread a shot through a defender, the goalkeeper and the near post!!

Certainly many many other similar occasions during the course of the season so far!!!

 

Yes that four times out of 23 matches is very frustrating

 

I have no issue with hums but surly he has to start out wide and swan up top
ok swan missed a sitter the goalkeeper made a good save but the speed shown
by swan says he will create more chances give him a run from the start
I think we will start to improve. mind you our midfield is lacking a hold up player and
someone who can pass.

 

Good points there re GA Bantam75 - I agree with them all.
GA has to step up and admit that his selections today were very poor and I for one could see nothing but a hammering.
I don't want to hear any excuses such as "I trust the whole squad" etc etc
Today has proved that the whole squad simply cannot be trusted.
We all have our opinions regarding players and for me we have, and it has shown, too many that are simply not good enough for League1. For me Byrne, Kavanagh, Kelly and Tyriek Wright are poor.
If we are to progress then for me these four have to be shown the door asap.