I said before that it would be a good test for our "back to basics defence"
against Graham and Bridges and that we would do well to keep a clean sheet !!
How prophetic that was - I did not know that Carlisle had only scored one goal
in their previous 8 away games.
The stats I have just seen will no doubt surprise those who were not there
after reading Rich Ws report - 20 shots to their 7, 9 to 5 on target, 9 1
corners in our favour and 58% to 42% possession. but make no mistake we were
very mcuh second best and Rich got his report pretty much sopt on !
In addtion there were two of the worst misses you could ever see, first by
Robinson in front of an empty goal that would have brought it back to 2 1 and
then an even worse miss by their lad who somehow ,with the whole goal to aim at
and Casper nowhere near, managed to screw his shot wide to prevent an even
bigger 3 - 0 defeat.
It was pretty much business as usual for this season with us allowing Kavanagh
to look like a world beater (he must love playing against us !) and typical
keystone kops defending from all the back 5.
Things were pretty even and we were looking OK when their winger left Sheehan
for dead and put in a decent enough cross - any other defence in the league
would have cleared it but not us we let it go to Graham who was in acres of
space on the penalty spot and hit it home.
Bechio then missed a point blank header which he hit straight at the keeper
when a goal seemed certain. Things then went from bad to worse, again Sheehan
was left floundering and when the ball came into the box Lubo and Casper both
had chances to clear but played some sort of "after you Claude, no after you"
type game and then collided with each other, the ball came to ******* Bridges
who poked it home from a tight angle - game over.
There followed one of the worse passages of football ever seen - as bad as
Cheltenham at home last seson - the crowd began to berate the players, stealing
what liitle confidence they had left and Frazer managed to pass the ball
directly to one of thier players on 5 consecutive occasions when under no
pressure. The rest of the team (Snoddy excepted) totally lost their way and it
was a relief to hear the whistle at half time - drowned out by the boos of the
crowd.
Second half, they defended deeply with men behind the ball and time wasted and
feigned injury just wanting to see out the second 45 mins. We huffed and puffed
and I suppose credit should be given for the effort the players put in. A
slimline Bradley Johnson & Lee Trundle were brought on to decent effect, soon
followed by Robinson who also did some good stuff. We created and missed a few
half chances, had a couple of penalty appeals turned down, hit the post and had
a few goal mouth scrambles roared on by a crowd who were all thinking if only
we can get one back.....but it was all desparate , catch-up, hurried football
and we never really looked like getting back in it. The momentum then dried up
and we began to overhit passes - especially long cross field balls aimed at
Robinson and shot from more and more distance and daft angles as the game just
sort of petered out. It was pretty dire fare overall.
Grayson now knows what the problems are and they need addressing NOW !!
We need a new keeper and two new centrebacks and then maybe , just maybe we can
get back into the play off positions. Without those players we will slip
further down the table. You cannot win games if you cannot defend - simple !!!
Not many positives but Snoddy worked very hard and showed some good touches and
was dangerous. Robinson seemd to enjoy linking up with Trundle again and I
think these two will score goals for us - today it just wasn't going to go in
for us. Johnson, whilst not the second coming that some fans seem to think, did
look decent and appeared fitter than he was last season.
Grayson - I think Rich giving him 0 points is harsh. Most of us would have
picked that starting line up with Beckford out. Hughes does divide opinion but
the stats seem to suggest we do better with him in the team giving cover to
Frazer and we do not have a lot of options - Howson \ Kilkenny \ Prutton \
Robinson have all had chances and not been up to it.
He did at least get them working hard second half and his subs changed the
shape and style of the team which is what I want from substitutions rather than
just like for like.
Overall though a bad day at the office and no chance of automatic promotion.
Crowd v Peterboro could be lowest for a league game, given that it is Cat A and
3 days before another home game !!!
Dave
_______________________________________________
the Leeds List is an unmoderated mailing list and the list administrators
accept no liability for the personal views and opinions of contributors.
Leedslist mailing list
[email protected]
http://list.zetnet.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/leedslist
Sorry Macca - it's the curse of Bates old lad
