[choirboy]

In brief; A poor match on a cold and windy night! A draw was probably a fair outcome.
Stanley definitely missed the presence of Crooks.
In the first half Rommy tried very hard but found it difficult to link with team mates basically new to him. Procky was not at the races in the first half. He seemed to either take up positions too high up the pitch when our defenders were looking to play the ball through midfield and then he seemed to sit too deep when Carlisle were in possession and moving forward. He got into the game more in the second half which was down to his fantastic work ethic which we know so well from the past.
With Crooks missing though, the fluidity of our passing was somewhat stuttering. Although Seamus got a lot of ball he was having to take longer to find players to pass to or spaces to pass into for players to pick up.
Carlisle did there homework and closed down Pierro very quickly every time he got the ball or when he was looking to receive the ball. Pierro still had a good game though and got lots of quality balls in from the wing.
The early sending off seemed to work in Carlisle's favour as they looked for the first 40 minutes to be the team with a man advantage! They wasted time at every opportunity! Error of judgement by Bucko to go for a back pass when he was so wide and deep which set up their centre forward. The lad had a bit to do though and he found the net expertly from a narrowing angle! Carlisle really started to wast time then!
We got into the game more in the second half and we were building up the pressure when Bucko got a second Yellow Card for a 'something and nothing' sort of tackle! Like on saturday the extra space seemed to work to our advantage and we began to put together some better moves. Sean Mac had to modify his usual wide attacking role by sitting deeper more like a high line left back. Sean did well though to get his second ball in for Terry to glance a lovely header in at the near post.
At this point I thought that we would go onto win the match but to Carlisle's credit they pressed for a winner too. However, their approach was somewhat 'Route 1' especially with the use of the long throw in which was bombed into our penalty box almost constantly!
A draw was probably a fair result in the end and we move up to fourth place now. Next saturday's match away at Oxford becomes even more important now though. Bucko will be missed now too of course.
Lets hope John and Jimmy can get the selection right for Saturday to stop Oxford but also to give us a chance of a WIN!
Luke Joyce had the usual sort of 'Luke Joyce' game that he used to have for us but he got a bit of nice applause and a song from The Ultras when he came up to the corner between the Clayton End and the Main Stand.
ON STANLEY ON

ps some Dodgy refereeing again tonight!!!