Following the hammering some of our fans gave Matt Smith for his misses against Yeovil, I watched recordings of yesterday's MOD and FLS. Rather than cooing at some of the great goals, I was amazed at the horrendous misses in games across all four leagues. Too numerous to make a note of who and against whom, but many were by recognised quality strikers. They have not suddenly become bad strikers and neither has Matt Smith. He is not yet match fit and that includes not just stamina but timing. If he stays longer than the original loan period, we will see better performances and more goals.
He lacks pace but has other attributes, like great in the air, can hide the ball for us and plays others in, very similar to Wilbs but a fair bit younger. We had Chris Woods here who was very similar and our fans slated him within minutes, he went on to score for fun elsewhere.
Cant argue with 3 goals in 2 games. He hasn't got a reputation as an out and out goal scorer but we do need back up for Wilbs- He will miss chances, but you got to be in there to even get the chance. How many chances did Baldock and Maynard ever miss? Yes, loads and that's why they didn't make it much further than they did. To be Premier league, you need to be ruthless along the lines of Shearer etc. but that's why we are league 1 and it makes it all the more entertaining.
I missed a sitter once from 2 yards. A low cross came in hard, wit the goalkeeper stranded, but cannoned off my shin and flew over the bar when it would have been easier to score - I took some stick for that one! As gdnac said - you have to be in the right place to get the chance in the first place. I ended up scoring 2 in my game. If you keep getting chances, some are bound to go in.
A lot of people who criticise Matt Smith for those misses and say he won't be a Wilbraham forget about the miss at Peterborough for Wilbraham, also the glorious chance to level it at Swindon, to name a few. I'm not critising Wilbraham for those misses it's just frustrating to see some of our fans get on someone's back so quick just because they don't score in their first game. Elliott was marked as a massive mistake loaning him, but once he become fit people quickly realised that he was a good player. Hopefully when Smith is fit we will see the player that Leeds and Fulham paid that money for.
They play in League 1 rather than the Premier League for a reason. My view (sorry to repeat this again) is that when a player is wearing our shirt we get behind them. Cotts keeps saying that Big Matt needs some games - he's right about most things
