Match Thread vs. Stevenage 24/02/18

[Mapperleypie]

What a shyte match . Flucking freezing as well .

True

[matt_magpie]

Infuriates me we never ever mix it up occasionally and play from the back. I think Husins a great player but the sort of player who will grow into the game the more he's given the ball but no chance with these tactics that's where Yates was better with winning the second ball off the long ball tactic. Have to say Steads the true professional having to feed on that all afternoon and keeping going. Anyway its 3 points lol.

[nay123]

Absolutely garbage from start to finish. why was the home goalkeeper wasting time in the first half at home. to top it up the top 3 teams were all losing not. getting this and hardy is back on twitter nothing to brag about today hardy it's sade when a team is 4/5 in the leig and dreading playing Mansfield it's really sade.

[Proudpie]

True

Agreed it was another dreadful game
Stevenage will be kicking themselves to go away with nothing
Had they a better strike force they would have easily beaten us
If we play like that against Mansfield they will murder us.
We just dont look like a promotion team.
But 3 points are 3 points

[Frigiliana Pie 1]

On the whole it was an undistinguished win, but I thought some of the confidence and swagger came back into the team in the last 15 minutes or so. If that can be carried over into next week’s game, we could be in for a bit of success this season after all.

[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.

[Elite_Pie]

We were dire for the first 75 minutes, as bad as we've been all season, the only positives to take from the game are the 3 points and the fact we dominated once we got a lead instead of reverting to the bizarre 8-1-1 formation we played for the last 30 minutes against Carlisle. Stevenage worked some good positions, but fortunately their crossing was awful and every shot went straight at Collin.

[navypie]

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.

Yes , Stevenage should have had a penalty , it was a clear handball by Tottle . .

[freemuzzy]

Agree with much of the assessments above. Though we’ve often ‘won ugly’ and picked up three points this season despite not playing well, this was the extreme example. For 75 minutes the performance was as bad as anything we’ve seen at ML this season.

The first half in particular was a throwback to the pre-Nolan days when the opposition would come and enjoy the space afforded to them on a big pitch, knocking it around us while we offered absolutely no intensity or nothing in return. What really confused me was Nolan regularly telling Collin to slow it down at 0-0. All the Home success under him has been built on a high-intensity game from the first minute. I can’t for the life of me work out what the thinking was there?!

Still, Grant took the chance very well when it came and for all of their possession Stevenage never really had a chance or tested Collin either. Nolan got his subs right too. Still feel that there’s a lot of work needed for us to be anywhere near promotion though.

[slack_pie]

It has been a pattern at home this season that we are poor in the first half and then pick up in the second half. I can't work out if we're just not able to play well for 90 minutes or if it's part of our game plan. Perhaps Collin's bizarre time wasting and the excruciatingly low intensity were instructions from Nolan, with the idea always being to go up a few gears for the last quarter of the match. Strange approach if true, as we could easily have been a goal or two down at half time. If we play like that against Mansfield or Luton, the game will be over by half time.