[choirboy]

Originally Posted by AccyMad

Agree with Cashy, I've no issues with whoever gets the nod to start tonight - the only thing that bothers me is the ref, apparently Darren England is the man in the middle tonight

You were absolutely right to doubt the referee's ability AccyMad!
He was absolutely USELESS!!

According to the BBC Statistics 40 free kicks were given tonight and only 3 players were booked! Mansfield got away with climbing on the backs of Stanley players so many times and really should have had a dozen more free kicks awarded against them. Our players were also guilty of some needless fouls as we gave too many free kicks away for pushing players in the back, albeit fairly gently! The referee also missed an amazingly obvious penalty fairly late in the match when either Clark or Lacey, (not sure which one it was), overlapped down the right wing into the box and was shove so blatantly off the ball with the referee only about 15 yards away and his assistant level with the play at a similar distance. If it wasn't a penalty then why was our player not booked for 'Simulation'?
The ref simply spoiled the match for me, and by the criticism levelled at him from around me, he spoiled it for many other fans too and probably the players as well! Neither side could get going because of the constant disruption to play.
We missed both Coneely and Brown tonight and I thought that we were playing with a couple of passengers in the first half. That's not to say that the lads coming in were poor it is just that Coneely takes control in midfield and bosses the match quietly with brown buzzing around doing all the running! We were much better in the second half and really we should have won the match IMHO. Pearson, Donacien and Vyner and keeper Elliot were all solid again but the outstanding player was Beckles. He fully deserved his Man of the Match award tonight. He was calm and skilful in defence, his distribution was very good and he was up there causing mayhem in their penalty box for the goal that we did mange to score!
A very frustrating night for the Stanley faithful and probably even more so for the players and for Coley and Jimmy too!

Come back Mr Kettle!