Originally Posted by
MAD_MAGPIE
What a strange game that was today.
First the negatives. We were as awful as I’ve seen at any other time at home this season as lacked confidence from the start and Stevenage played football. Did anyone else think Stevenage should have got a penalty early on with a handball as clear as any you will ever see?
I felt we played too deep and our midfield was non existant. We could not pass the ball and Collin was infuriating with the amount of time he was taking and slowing the game down. Many people said the same thing at the game and on here? Why?
Apart from a few flick ons towards the goal the Stevenage keeper never had a save to make. Stevenage must have known if they played football we would let them and we did. Thankfully they were poor at creating decent chances, but too many times we backed off. At half time I would have taken the 0-0 and thought a top ten team would have been 2-0 up.
The second half we had a bit of a go after the start but then it continued in the same vein, poor by Notts. Stevenage dominated midfield and it was direct from us to Stead and Shola.
Now the positives. After the game being awful for 75 minutes Grant came on and the uplift was instant. Within a couple of minutes he scored and that then lifted confidence and we then looked like the Notts County that got to top of the league earlier in the season. The introduction of Noble replacing Husin also added some steel to midfield and was a good call by Nolan. I don’t think today’s game was one for Husin. So pleased that Shola got the 2nd as once again he was a key player on the pitch and ran himself into the ground. We were then much more confident assured and started attacking and showed why we have a good home record this season.
So in the end we won 2-0 and kept a clean sheet as well. It was big win for us and for confidence. I’m hoping the last 15 minutes was the turning point and now we will see performances that we have been used to. Also the fact that we won and others around us didn’t makes it seem much better. It just shows as well that we can be awful for 3/4 of a game and still win.
Now we need to try and improve our away form against Cheltenham and FGR before the big match against our neighbours.