Match Thread Carabao Cup 2nd round Away v Stoke City Tuesday 26th August @ 19.45

What a superb feat that is! Totally changed the complexion of our club in a short space of time. The thing about GA is he's always praising the players, not himself and always comes across positive with a smile on his face. Compare that to a certain Mr Adams and you can see how the players are playing for him.

 

I'd agree with that. They were battling relegation last season and if injuries kick in and these players have to fill the gaps they will be looking over their shoulders again.

We made 5 changes last night and have rotated about 17/18 players over our games and have look strong in them all, expect for the first half at Stockport. where we looked weak in midfield and it was fixed at half time.

 

I don't disagree with that, but I think my point still stands that after last nights performance Neufville isn't an automatic first choice starter....and I have always been quite critical of Halliday in the past.

 

Ruddy hell, their ground must be absolutely massive as it still looked half empty!

 

No chance.

They're losing to Grimsby tonight.

Nailed on that Oduor comes off the bench to get the winner.

 

Surely Wilson will go back to TNS, even if its another loan. I'm surprised he's not there already, unless he and/or his agent thinks he worth another shot in the EFL

 

Im afraid hes nowhere near EFL standard. The sooner his agent finds him a non league club the better for his career

 

I believe he had a great season at TNS last year so I would have thought there would be a deal to be done. Regarding him being nowhere good enough for the EFL....I don't think we saw enough of him to judge. He never let us down when he played, scored a belter against Wrexham. Maybe out and out wingers are redundant nowadays

 

Clearly it is a confidence issue. He is now getting himself into some fantastic positions, so hopefully it won’t be too long before he is banging them in as well.

 

Five changes from what was an already changed side on Saturday.
The team that started last night had only two outfield players who usually start league games this season - Joe Wright and Touray - plus Sam Walker in goal. You could argue that maybe Swan should be a regular starter but so far he’s only started one league game as Humphrys has been the preferred starting striker. So that was a great win by a mostly second string side and is a testament to the depth of the squad that GA has at his disposal.

 

Afan's view:-
A Phillips, Talovierov, Bocat, Lawal*, Pearson, Donley, Boženík. 7 players who are intended to be and indeed need to be useful members of the squad for this season.
All played but still couldn't drum up any kind of performance. These players are not fringe players like people on here are suggesting. Obviously Phillips has the necessary quality ( but why isn't he showing up yet ? ) and Talovierov is, I assume, intended for a first team place given last season and his price but is still rusty after injury (?!?!). But Donley, Bocat, Pearson and Bozenik should be asking themselves some questions.
Sure Saturday will be taken more seriously and will be a very different kettle of fish, but we didn't put out some sort of U21 or academy team here.
It was a rank bad result.

* Obviously couldn't do it all on his own.

 

10 career appearances in the football league at the age of 25 suggests he isn't good enough to me, whether we have seen enough of him or not.

 

Probably right, we tend to go for premier league victims to peck.

 

It was lovely having a three goal lead and not waiting for the 4th centre half to be shown on the touch line waiting to come on and bolster our defence!

 

Wright's post match interview with Jamie Raynor

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0lz55lq

 

I heard through a friend that he was looking into Bradford Park Avenue or another non league club. I believe he and his partner have recently had a baby and playing part time and being able to work at the same time may mean he is better off. I think he's keen not to move and hence was looking into more local options.