A very disappointing afternoon. Given the way Stevenage play I had no problems with us going back to 4-3-3 but I did think at the start that Clark, Woods and Wesolowski was the wrong midfield, Clarke was easily muscled off the ball and the other two were constantly playing and losing head tennis against taller opponents. Surely Griffiths was brought to the club for games like this. We know what to expect from Stevenage - elbows, late tackles time-wasting, feigning injury,goading our players who missed chances - and they did not disappoint. They had one off target shot in the first half before that fortunate deflection while we did not even test their keeper from several good chances. Second half was more open and they had several powerful long-range shots which our keeper saved well. We dominated the last twenty minutes, hit the bar, had a couple kicked off the line and had two decent penalty shouts but it was not to be. Our finishing was woeful and we will not go up unless that improves. Vernon had a nightmare wasting several good opportunities by getting caught offside or shooting feebly when a simple ball was on to play Mangan in. Man of the Match for me was Grandison - steady in defence and inventive going forward and unlucky not to score. We need better delivery from out wide and we need Collins, Mangan and Akpro to find their shooting boots because 2 points from 4 away games is not promotion form.
we have a chance to bounce back on Tuesday against bottom club Carlisle and we need to beat Newport on Saturday, with southend and Plymouth away coming up, both awkward games, and just at present town do not travel well. up front and midfield perhaps needs a tweak. town had 16 shots on Saturday, but a fluke deflection deprived town of a point.
Atcham, Yes - we had 60% possession and of those 16 shots I think 12 were off target. That is simply not good enough from our front men. The midfield cried out for bit more experience so it was surprising to see Lawrence and Griffith stay on the bench. As our home form has been pretty good (though we have played three fairly weak sides at home so far) I doubt if Mellon will change much on Tuesday though he might put Vincent back in as a specialist winger.
If Gayle is fit, I would prefer to go three at the back with Grandison in the middle. No goals against and 2 wins with that formation. Sounds like Hartlepool all over again GHM. Many shots wide of the mark and plenty of possession.
KDS Yes it seems to be a similar type of performance and it needs to be sorted as promotion will probably depend on how many away wins we can get against teams who have been struggling at home. It is a bit worrying that we do not seem to have played any of the top teams yet but it could be that the type of football we play may well be more suited to playing against better sides. Turner's promotion side was very good at dispatching the middle and lower ranking teams. We seem to have a strong squad presently (apart from wingers) but as a whole it looks a bit less than the sum of its parts.
Thanks for the match report. What did you think of mangan on the wing and JLAA up front? I would've thought that it would be better the other way round.
Matster, They all had their moments and Akpro started the better with Mangan coming more into the game late on. When Vernon came on for Clark all four were on the pitch but we don't seem to have any real partnerships developing up-front at the moment. Perhaps MM needs to settle on his best side and play it for a few games -I do think we need a bit more from out wide (Collins and Grandison put the best crosses in yesterday) and perhaps Vincent can provide this.
