Player Ratings - Northampton at Home
No ratings today courtesy of iFollow. They probably only managed to show 25% of the match, but by some miracle we were able to see three of the goals, including both of ours and also catch every word Sheridan said to the referee at the end of the game.
So I didn’t see enough of the game to give marks of ten, and missed entirely Northampton’s first goal, but I obviously do have some observations on what I did witness.
First off, I was struck by the size difference between teams. So often we get out muscled at this level and at times, today was no exception. I felt particularly sorry for Bennett being asked to play with his back to goal fighting with orc like defenders all day – it’s really not his game.
From what I saw of Glendon, he had less of an influence than last week and was swamped a bit by the physicality of Northampton. Jones looked busy and bright, while on the pitch and I have to say the improvement in Slater was huge following his horror show last week. I was impressed, in honesty, with his tackling and distribution.
The biggest revelation of the day, however, was Etuhu playing at right-back. Where on Earth did this come from, he actually looked like a half decent full-back. He was definitely more comfortable than in midfield...
We were on the money for the first goal – Northampton’s players being to slow to regain concentration after running over to their manager to collectively stroke their cocks. That’s not Devitt’s problem mind you, and he spanked the ball home handsomely while they were still pulling their shorts up.
In honesty, I was disappointed with the ease with which they took the lead. Some of Grainger’s use of the ball was fantastic, but you have to say the left-side of our defence was collectively asleep. It’s typical Parkes also, he’ll have a great game overall – some classy interceptions, an assist for our first goal and great use of the football – but he’ll lose concentration at a ***** time and we’ll be punished for it.
Then thanks to Northampton thinking they’d won the game, they didn’t bother to defend and Hope slotted in the equaliser. At the minute, Hope’s name is probably the first on the team sheet, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
As ever, we need to improve with our use of the ball in the final third. We need a genuine centre-forward to partner Bennett. Gerrard needs to come into the back four and do a Hill and players like Yates and Fryer need to settle quickly. But in truth, we’ve improved hugely from week one – if we’d had a geneuinely competitive pre-season it may have made all the difference.
As for what Sheridan said to the referee at the end of the game. I don't think this is going to help. Yes, he wants to win etc - and this is commendable. But the referee is hardly going to restart the game and give us a penalty for a marginal call like this. Sometimes you get them, sometimes you don't - you want to be playing well enough to win games irrespective of calls like this.
