The Voice - Match preview #6: Walsall vs Bradford City Saturday 14th September 2024 3:00pm

Don't agree, I'm happy that we don't resort to that, at least nowhere near as much as others, It's ok in small doses when apt but not constant like some teams that come to VP and the keeper time wastes from the first minute...

 

The best/worse thing about the decision against Oliver if I remember correctly was, he lost the Ariel dual he was involved in.
Didn't the Walsall defender head it clear but the ball went to one of our players so the ref blew?!

 

Thought he was very careful with his wording but yes, Cookie gets no protection whatsoever every week....

 

I'm not a fan of stats I much prefer to see what players offer over the time their on the pitch, I know against Bromley they were down to 10 men for most of the game but even at 2 - 0 they still threw men forward and until Pointon made it 3 - 0 and sealed the win at 2 - 0 Bromley still looked dangerous going forward, coming off the bench is s gamble be that to see a game out or trying to win the game of course that's IMO.

 

Decent recruiting, buying hungry players, using the loan market well and getting rid of players at the right time plus not offering contracts to players that don’t make sense.

We have a squad that’s imbalanced and not good enough again.

Bobby Pointon our hero- tell me how he is going to get a starting place week in, week out? We extended Walkers contract, got two other players as a 10. Left with a poor Smallwood as our only really DM.

Up front it’s still really Cook or nothing.

Seriously, all eyes on Sparks and Rupp again!

lucky it’s early in the season but so far it’s not good enough. Basket case of a club we are. We just can’t get it right and that’s down to Soarks.!

 

We've had this discussion and if you think Byrne and Baldwin are suitable first team members then fine, that's your opinion.

I certainly don't share it but digging out Shepherd to try and prove the point is a bit daft considering they've all been poor.

 

Shepherd was given a lesson yesterday by Jamille Matt. One foul in particular where after he gave the away fans a knowing wink and smile, good experience for the young defender but will have to learn from it.

 

I honestly do not understand his decision not to replace both Byrne and Kelly immediately, in my view it caused that poor decision by Smallwood to tackle their player, as he was trying to cover for Byrne. Leaving Kelly on was farcical he could hardly walk let alone run and we could have conceded again. All this slaver about taking care of players and not risking them when coming back from injury is now very suspect indeed.

 

Sorry didn’t see this but I totally agree.

 

Agreed but allowed to get away with it by the officials.

 

As I said, I hate it too and I'm not suggesting we should resort to it every 5 minutes but if others are going to continue using it and benefitting from it at our expense, it should be a tool in our armoury at certain times too.

 

Not sure what it's got to do with my post, but don't disagree with any of that Fordy!

 

He wasn't getting away with anything, it's within the rules. Matt had a good game yesterday, his hold up play and strength caused all sorts of problems. Fans need to get this poor officiating out of their heads, players waiting for offsides to be given and not reacting to quick free kicks are sod all to do with officials, it's just poor professionalism from the players.

 

Who's Soarks fat fingers eh .

 

Yeah, Matt's a wily old pro and there's no doubt Jack was taught a lesson yesterday. Hopefully he learns quickly though because centre halves are looking thin on the ground at the minute.

 

Hard to disagree with any of that. With clubs like Wrexham and Stockport marching on a pace in league one you'd think we'd be able to pick up the mantle and take that favourites tag but nothing I've seen so far this season strikes me that we are a team capable of finishing top three.

 

I don't think you are giving Sanderson the praise he deserves so far in saying its Cook or nothing up front.

 

90% of the moaning about referees is just borderline calls that would be supported if we were fans of the other team. It's painfully tedious. Those complaining about referees will be complaining about 'the standard of refereeing' until their final day on this earth. One thing that I can guarantee is that while officiating consists of one man on the pitch with a whistle it is never going to be better than it is now.

For what it's worth I think Smallwood was unfortunate. I don't think it's a pen but I fully understand why the ref gave it from his angle. The referees have a worse view than we do, they have to make quick decisions in real time, they don't get any opportunity of a replay. If anybody has ever refereed at any level you'll know that a good 20% of the time it's pure guess work.

Year after year for as long as I've watched football the referees are lambasted as being sh*te. It amazes me that nobody ever wonders why that's always been the perception without questioning their own judgement. I can guarantee that any poster on here attempting to referee an efl game would be getting a police escort off the pitch after 15 minutes. I know it's not a popular opinion but the standard of refereeing will not be better than it is now. Unfortunately you just can't have a sensible conversation about referees.

 

Sanderson looks a decent prospect, the trick is how do we start creating chances for them? Both his and Cooks goal last week came from defensive *@?$ ups, as a team we create little which kinda negates playing two upfront.

 

I get having a go at officals had they missed blatant penalties for us or we had a player getting a red card but that results yesterday was down to us yet again not starting the game on the front foot yet again.


The officals are poor at this level and are gonna be when them at the very top get it wrong time after time even with VAR involved.

We all know before a ball is even kicked that there is a huge chance that said offical is gonna be poor so simply do something about it ................. can these officals stop us from being on the front foot or having shot s on goal ?????
Do these officals affect late subs ?????,

To me its yet again an easy cop out to mask what was again a bang average performance