Bluddy hell. The unrelenting rain, coupled with the lack of a roof, made the 45-minute wait for kick-off (after standing around outside for a further 20 minutes! ) seem like hours. Town's poor start ensured the opening 25 minutes dragged on horribly, before a well-taken goal from Collins made the breakthrough. Shortly after, the linesman flagged for a penalty when a Grandison cross appeared to hit someone's arm before deciding to let us all know he was just having us on and signal for a corner. "Oh, how hilarious! I fooled you all!" Twat. Anyway, that fired up the crowd and the atmosphere was decent as we saw out the rest of the half, suffered through half time with no hot food, and cruised first 25 minutes of the second half without event really. We certainly got on their keeper's back, his kicking seemed to be affected by the impressive crowd noise (although I thought it a little below the belt when people were jeering after he made a good save and smashed his head into the post - it wasn't funny and it looked really painful). Then Morgan came on. His first action was to roast the defender for pace and win a throw, which our favourite linesman signalled as a throw to them, for reasons best known to himself. Then Morgan was clean through on goal and backheeled the ball up in the air for Wright (a dreadful touch, something Collins repeated when clean through on goal shortly after!) but we got our goal after a nice team move. They pulled one back with a stunner before Collo exchanged passes with Wrighty and slotted home with bags of composure. Neal: 6.5 - I don't think he did anything. They had one shot on target which I can recall (the goal), and I can't remember one cross not cleared by Sharps or SCS, or one shot wide that wasn't a corner. Grandison: 7 - solid defensively, great assist for Wright's goal and some good crosses. Looked tired towards the end, though. SCS: 7.5 - Immaculate. Really good performance. Sharps: 7.5 - See above. Jacobson: 7.5 - And again. Richards: 6.5 - A few good interceptions, one great pass, but the surface meant he wasn't as good as usual. Wroe: 6.5 - Filled in an unfamiliar defensive midfield role, and did it OK, with plenty of misplaced passes but plenty of interceptions. Played just like D. Mac! Wildig: 6.5 - Decent, didn't do a whole lot but worked hard. Wright: 7.5 - Very good finish, nice link up with Collo, caused them problems and was really good. Gornell: 6.5 - Decent. Held the ball up very well. Collins: 9 - Ran his socks off, two very well taken goals and his hunger and stamina levels are unreal. Morgan managed 10 minutes and about 5 touches, so I won't rate him. He was pretty poor, despite his arrival seemingly sparking a flurry of goals!
Lennny, I have given my vote to Wrighty - he looked real class last night , made plenty of chances and took one. Some idiots behind me in the stand were moaning about his tackling and wanted him taken off but I told them he would score (and he did!). I also thought Wildig had his best game yet for us - he tucked in to let Grandison roam a bit (and deliver a great cross for Wrighty to score) and was also good coming forward late on. Macclesfield were better than I expected them to be - they were very direct and had a few half chances in the first half (which Neal dealt with well on a very slippy surface) but it always looked as if our extra class would tell in the end when they had to chase the game. We could easily have had six in the end and we are now in a great position for automatic promotion.
Sounded great on the radio, and seemed the team struggled to get started as always. Collins deserves it purely on effort and gettjng the two goals.
Definatly collins for me he never stopped all game where as others had slow first halves but got better in the second.
