Swindon Away - player ratings

Was wir nicht denken können, das können wir nicht denken; wir können also auch nicht sagen, was wir nicht denken können.

Under normal circumstances, playing for a point (and achieving what you set out to) at Swindon would be classed as just about acceptable. However, if you truly believe you are good enough to go for promotion out of this division, in today’s circumstances you absolutely have to go for the win. And this means go for the win for the full ninety-five minutes not just randomly for the last fif****.

When I looked at the team sheet before kick off, I thought five at the back and one upfront with Hope in midfield, but in reality Hope was upfront so 5-3-2, with Hope and Nadesan being asked to fight for headers when you have Bennett (who’s been superb in the air for the last couple of months) clicking his heels on the bench. In fairness to Hope, he was quite lively before he injured himself and was working back with the midfield with some crisp passing and decent movement.

When Hope was injured you’d have been expecting to see Bennett surely? But no, Twardek gets a run out – which points to a tactical masterplan. Tire the Swindon defence out with the movement of Nadesan and Hope / Twardek then bring your most effective forward on for the last twenty minutes to wreak havoc. A cunning plan, but for the fact Phil Brown is not a halfwit and simply brought a fresh defender on when we brought Bennett off the bench.

The reality of the situation is you’re not being clever by leaving your most effective and in-form striker on the bench for seventy minutes, you’re shooting yourself in the face with a squirty gun full of donkey sh_t in the hope you’ll smell better if it starts to rain.

Bonham – 5 – He made some saves today and managed not to send the ball back into dangerous areas when it bounced off him. None of the saves weren’t anything you wouldn’t expect any Conference keeper to make however and he was protected manfully by our three central defenders. Looked hesitant and unconfident coming off his line for crosses and was caught flapping in no-mans land on numerous occaisons. His distribution was pedestrian and painful, I’m sick of his time wasting frankly, and when he does finally kick the ball he never manages to find a Carlisle player.

Brown – 5 – Busy and worked hard, however he never looks quite as composed when asked to play as part of a back five. His use of the ball was, for the second week running, not up to the quality he showed until he was dropped. Maybe training with us for a year has actually harmed the technical side of his game? He struggled a little defensively but in fairness, our fullbacks were being asked to do an enormous amount of work this afternoon.

Grainger – 4 – You could make a rather cruel montage of Grainger being nutmegged, decieived, bamboozled and sat down with his head in a spin. It’s doubly cruel Curle is asking him to overlap and be a “wing-back” when his legs are so brittle he can’t run faster than wheezy-jog speed and he has the stamina of a broken lamp-post. Some of his passing was a little better today and his long-throw ins were a danger, but it’s time to retire. Penrith FC needs you, Danny, do the right thing please.

Ellis – 7 – More of the same from Ellis, fighting with every ounce of his heart for each header, tackle and block, getting Bonham out of jail, tidying up at the back. I want to keep mentioning last season every time I give these ratings because it still annoys the chuff out of me he wasn’t in our side...

Hill – 7 – Impressive at the heart of our defence, a left-footed Ellis. I’m not sure how many games at this level he has left in him however, he looks like he might expire at any time – but playing against forwards who are sometimes roughly half his age he’s doing ok currently. I’m not sure we can rely on him making it thorugh another pre-season however. If he wants to give management a crack I’d consider giving him the opportunity (with an experienced assistant).

Parkes – 7 – Dare I say it, he’s actually looking a bit fitter than he did before Christmas. Maybe he just looks this way because he’s playing in between Hill and Grainger. Playing in a central defensive three is probably his best position, it gives him licence to get forward and having the extra defender keeps him on point defensively. Did some excellent work today in and out of possession.

Joyce - 8* - In the absence of Jones grew into the midfield holding role and played it excellently. Always making himself available to receive the ball and was the driving force dictating play from the middle of park. In defence Joyce was always there and all our attacks seemed to involve him and start with him. It shows the level of intelligence of our management team we chose to substitute our best player – “Joyce is the holding midfielder, let’s bring JCR on who is more forward thinking”. This ignores the fact Joyce was regularly turning possession over for us and linking the play to our more creative players. When he was substituted we lost the midfield and Swindon suddenly looked the better team, in order to attack you have to get hold of the football in the first place.

Lambe – 1 – I’ve said it before, floats like a butterfly – stings like a butterfly. Lightweight garbage. His use of the ball was tediously predictable and his influence in the game minimal. If you wanted to bring on JCR, Nabi or O’Sullivan – none of them could’ve been any worse and may even have created something for us. Lambe always seems to get the nod ahead of the other players in the squad and I’m not sure why?

Devitt – 6 – Much improved. Some excellent passing and linked fluently with Joyce to good effect. Some of his shooting could have been better and wasn’t on the ball in the final third enough. I’m crying with the pain of watching a winger try to be central midfielder for half a season – he could set the division on fire playing wide...

Nadesan – 5 – Put a good shift in but we still don’t seem to be capable of getting the ball to his feet in the penalty area. Asking him to lead the line and fight for headers is a waste of a footballer – he needs to be playing off the shoulder of a big centre-forward and this forward is neither Hope nor Twardek.

Hope – 4 – Some pretty touches but inexplicable why we were asking him to fight for headers and play as a centre-forward. He’s been so effective plaing wide on the left lately – why not stick with him there? If you really want to attack, why not play him as your left-wing back? Maybe the probability of him injuring himself was high when all he was doing was trying to bounce himself off defenders three time his size.

Subs:

Twardek – 2 – We’ve succeeded in ruining a talented young footballer, full marks all round. Gone is the player with verve and pace who caused untold problems for the defenders he faced. What we have now is a youngster, clearly out of his depth, trying to play as centre-forward when he’s not suited to this role. We have players (Bennett and allegedly Stockton) who can play this role so why are we asking Twardek to do it? Curle is obsessed with signing wingers and playing them everywhere but on the wing...

Campbell-Ryce – 2 – Playing far too deep and was incredibly ineffective. We weakened the side exponentially by replaying Joyce in the middle of the park with an old winger. Why not keep Joyce on and bring JCR to replace Lambe?

Bennett – 4 – Not anywhere as near effective when coming off the bench, especially when we’d lost our control of midfield and due to Brown bringing on a fresh central defender to deal with him.