Orient

So we all expected to lose today but an uner 12 goalkeeper would have done better. Richards may have a year on his contract but I would farm him out now. In both cases he wasn't 100% responsible but his poor positioning in both goals were contributing factors in what transpired. Rooted to the line and falling (not diving) leading to pushing a weak cross right into the danger zone. The second he should have been in control as Offord was facing the wrong way. Either he should have come earlier or hung back and given Offord space to pass into.
However, his antics should not detract from a decent display by the outfield players. If Long had been his usual self, the result could have been very different.
Agyei had a good time down that left side but couldn't produce adequate crosses.
CBR was anonymous; Ainley is just getting worse. Uwakwe is not a full back. But team wise they played a good organised game.

The joys of being a goal-keeper ...

Just goes to show what a difference a top quality keeper can make to a team.

Having had 2 very good keepers for most of the season has shown just what a difference they can make.

Remember Brian Clough signing Peter Shilton at Forest - he paid big monies for him at the time. He reckoned he was worth a goal a game ...

Felt a bit sorry for Richards. He made 2 or 3 very good saves and then dropped a clanger, which I feel was at least 50% down to Offord. One of them had to take responsibility, something that generally Offord doesn't do too well. The dream team forward line were innocuous most of the game, apart from Longs miss.

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Originally Posted by whosbrianwilson

Felt a bit sorry for Richards. He made 2 or 3 very good saves and then dropped a clanger, which I feel was at least 50% down to Offord. One of them had to take responsibility, something that generally Offord doesn't do too well. The dream team forward line were innocuous most of the game, apart from Longs miss.

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Just my opinion but the GK needs a GK coach or none at all. He made TWO glaring errors looking at the highlights and hasn't Offord had 14 years academy/coaching training and he still doesn't know how to play this game. Lets look at how some of the top teams in this league can play 100% better than us without spending over one million pounds per season on coaching players that clearly doesn't work and never has for some years now. Stockport in the play offs and may get promoted and just come back into the league?

Time for a complete Board change and get rid of ALL the players and start again and in the conference based on our last few seasons and especially the last two with over 2 million pounds spent on RH? I would suggest that is a complete failure that no fan on here apart from the odd one will accept.

Its actually a disgrace and who came up with that ridiculous shirt design needs to go back to school.

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Originally Posted by whosbrianwilson

Felt a bit sorry for Richards. He made 2 or 3 very good saves and then dropped a clanger, which I feel was at least 50% down to Offord. One of them had to take responsibility, something that generally Offord doesn't do too well. The dream team forward line were innocuous most of the game, apart from Longs miss.

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There's no doubt that Offord was partially responsible but facing his own goal and with the forward on his back, the situation demanded that Richards take command. However, it could be argued that Offord, knowing how dodgy Richards is, should have taken charge and simply hoofed it away to the side stands. So yes, in the context Offord should have taken more responsibility. In the end though Richards is always a disaster waiting to happen.
As a footnote, and running the risk of inviting an 'intervention', if the retreating player had been McDonald rather than Offord, the calamity wouldn't have happened. I say this as Rod is a more 'instinctive' player whereas Offord seems to be rather bound by 'the book'.
The first goal was also affected by other defensive errors. Mellor misjudged the roll of the ball and should have, again, hoofed it into the stands. As it turned out the ball didn't have the legs to reach the dead ball line and so Mellor's attempt to shield failed and their player was able to get to the ball and cross it.
However, as their player was crossing from right on the dead ball line, there was no way Richards should have been standing on his line. He should have been at least a yard off to affect the angles. He would then have easily been able to collect what was an underhit cross.
So, yes I agree that the defence should share some of the blame but cannot accept a 50/50 share. Richards was unable to follow basic principles and so, once again, let the side down.
Hopefully we won't see him again in a Crewe shirt.

Oops! Seems I took too long with my reply.

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Originally Posted by MikeSB

Just my opinion but the GK needs a GK coach or none at all. He made TWO glaring errors looking at the highlights and hasn't Offord had 14 years academy/coaching training and he still doesn't know how to play this game. Lets look at how some of the top teams in this league can play 100% better than us without spending over one million pounds per season on coaching players that clearly doesn't work and never has for some years now. Stockport in the play offs and may get promoted and just come back into the league?

Time for a complete Board change and get rid of ALL the players and start again and in the conference based on our last few seasons and especially the last two with over 2 million pounds spent on RH? I would suggest that is a complete failure that no fan on here apart from the odd one will accept.

Its actually a disgrace and who came up with that ridiculous shirt design needs to go back to school.

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Do Stockport not employ coaches then? Maybe we are the only team that do!

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Originally Posted by Timmy58

Do Stockport not employ coaches then? Maybe we are the only team that do!

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They do have a lot of coaches...They probably cost the same as our academy..

How about Brentford's academy?

Brentford controversially closed their category two academy in 2016 on the grounds that running costs of about £2m a year meant it equated to bad business. Their switch to a B-team model, which develops players aged 17-21 and has its own games programme, has been highly successful. Their previous structure was also exploited by elite clubs who signed their best youngsters on the cheap.

More than 20 players from Brentford’s B team have graduated to the first team, including Marcus Forss and Mads Roerslev. Huddersfield and Wycombe have since introduced productive B teams.

Chris Mepham was Brentford B’s most notable success, sold to Bournemouth for £12m in 2019. Last summer they signed Daniel Oyegoke from Arsenal and Matthew Cox, who recently helped England Under-19s to the European Championship title, from AFC Wimbledon. As it stands, Cox will start the season as understudy to the first-choice goalkeeper, David Raya.

I wonder where Brentford are in the league and yet they ditched their academy for older recruits, something I have asked for at CAFC...Strange that I seem to be at the forefront when we will ditch our Cat2 sooner, rather than later and bear in mind Brentford has far more money than us and think getting rid of theirs for a B team was like going back to the reserve team of the past and shows the past is the future you know...All been done before, with great success and its sad to see our club suffering probably due to the same reason as Brentford found...A bad business decision..Its probably a good time now to ditch ours!

Yet another highjacked thread.... zzzzzzz

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Originally Posted by whosbrianwilson

Yet another highjacked thread.... zzzzzzz

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Yep, just like the Board, just like most Crewe fans, go to sleep while the world turns and hope some kids come through that will lift us to mid table in the lowest Pro league there is while teams like Brentford and Bournemouth and many more seem to progress higher and have Directors and fans who really want to succeed in this game...Meanwhile another million pounds goes down the same drain..training 5 year olds..

It wasn't me that said the academy was CAFC, it was Dario and nobody seems to want to change that model despite losing to mediocre teams we used to beat easily WITHOUT an academy and a million coaches making a great living out of nothing actually...Go and read how the really great players of the past made the grade and it wasn't from coaches or academies...It was just great football ability they had which was better than others who played the game up the street and on a Sat and Sun amateur matches..

When we have fans like we have on here, then we have NO chance of progress. 10,000 fans at Wrexham last Saturday and we have a job to get 3k in at Gresty Road...

Anyway WBW, great you are still reading my posts...;)