Quote:
Originally Posted by VALAIRIAN
Tharme, Astley and Hamilton are a MINIMUM from today...............
Regardless of anything we might think of tactics, substitutions and favorites, I think only Abu Dhabi F.C. could sustain this.........
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I don’t usually make any public comments after a defeat………but today I cannot stay silent. Today was probably our worst performance in years.
As we could clearly see in the first ten minutes today our back three were totally stretched across the pitch and Astley and Tharme were totally beaten for pace. We desperately miss Mitch Clarke at the right side of our defence and as I said to you Joe it was blatantly obvious that we needed to make an early tactical change to a flat back four. Sean Mac has been a great servant for Stanley but I am afraid that the words ‘has been’ are so obviously applicable now. Since Sean had his bad Achilles injury he has not been the same player. He rarely tackles an opponent and stands off opposing attackers, also he cannot dribble past an opponent. His corners and free kicks are so predictable making it very easy for opposing goal keepers and centre backs to deal with.
Tharme and Astley have played quite well when not stretched out across the pitch but today they were torn apart simply by pace. Tharme to me looks a bit heavier than before his injury a few weeks ago.
We missed Seamus Coneelly particularly today in midfield. His experience and positional sense keeps the play tight.
Ross Longelo was our only player capable of beating opponents but like last week our opponents were allowed to foul him at will. Eventually he drifted out of the game too. Toby did manage to keep the score down late on in the match but he really makes me nervous when he has to kick out from back passes!!!
IMHO we finished with eight players on the pitch today…..two off injured, one sent off, subs used up and Sean Mac still on the pitch.
In terms of ‘Luck’ everything seemed to go against us today…..poor tactics and lack of tactical changes did not help but every bounce of the ball seemed to go against us! The referee IMHO was poor but we still would have lost had he been a good ‘un. His decision to give Woods a yellow card for his first tackle was ridiculous and summed up his refereeing today! Woods had won the ball cleanly! He gave yellow cards for petulance but not for the continuous fouls on Longelo and Pressley!
I know that in truth if all of our squad were available and fully fit then only three or four of todays selection would be in the first eleven.
It will be interesting to see what changes are made in selection, tactics and formation for Tuesday.
Finally, I hope that Doug Tharme and Ryan Astley aren’t badly injured and that we can get some of our boys recovering from injury back soon.
Disappointed to see some fans leaving early today……we stayed until the end and always will.
ON STANLEY ON.