Just Back - Summary

Well it was far from pretty but we earned the 3 points.

They probably had the better of most of the match but did absolutely sweet FA with their possession. Their strikers looked s**te at best and Ebanks-Blake even got done for pace by Doc. Hang up your boots now son.

For us the main positive would have to be Marshall making a few tremendous saves for us again and at this stage must be clear favourite for POTS come May.

Ched Evans....What can I say. This boy looks to be a class loan signing and hopefully we can hold on to him til the end of the season. I'd probably compare him build wise to Ronaldo. Fairly tall, looks quite slighty built but is immensely strong on the ball and won well over 50% of any headers he went for. Surprised me a lot given their CBs were far from small. Also very cool finish for the opener.

Matty Taylor - Other than one little scare in the 2nd half where he ran back for a ball and then for no clear reason stopped and let in their striker briefly, before then getting goal side again, he looked quality too. Don't know if he pulled up their because of the injury as he went off a few mins later. Hopefully it's only a knock and all will be ok for Saturday.

Negatives for the day.

Russell - I want to like him, I really do, but today he got the ball stuck under his feet WAY too often, barely ever passed forwards, got caught in possession numerous times and just was pretty ineffectual for most of the game.

Doc - To be fair to him he dealt with their front two PRETTY well, and when he keeps it simple, ie playing a simple 5yd pass to a midfield player then he's ok. Sadly today he did the trademark hoofs a few too many times and therefore we lost possession a fair bit. He didn't have a BAD game, I just worry everytime the ball goes anywhere near him, for good reason given some of his performances this season.

Cureton - Again, with the exception of the sitter he missed before being subbed, he did bugger all today. The service he got was s**te, mostly about a foot above his head, which makes things pretty much impossible for him.

Summary:

Dug in well, was far from pretty, scrapped HARD for the 3pts and you can't fault the commitment at all. Would like to see either Dublin or Strihavka starting with Evans on Saturday because if we're gonna play hoof ball at times Cureton is never gonna be able to do a thing. If there's one thing we MUST start doing then that is KEEP IT ON THE GROUND!!! We look so much more dangerous when we ping it around a bit on the floor, we just do this for two or three 5 min spells during a game. If they can just drill this into them in training then we could be so much more effective, and therefore help bring Cureton in more too.

Saying all that, I'd take an ugly match like that on Saturday if it gets us 3 points again against Sheff Utd!

OTBC!

Posted By: CityForLife, Dec 4, 22:34:39