So pleased to read your comments. I firmly believe that Stead is the captain and leader we need on the pitch to see us through this difficult period.
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Whilst Jones could have closed down the player quicker or threw himself at him and risked missing completely when the player shoots, Jones, Milsom and Ward are all in position to block the shot and it either deflects off Ward or Fitz is just beaten by a very average shot far too easily, you can't lay the full blame on Jones for it and for some fans to be screaming "get him off!" after he'd also just set up our first goal was a bit over the top.
Turley marks his man tightly and goes with him out wide so whilst he is "out of position" when the cross comes in there's not much he could have done differently other than ignore the strikers run. The cross beats Ward too easily imo, Hewitt can't get in front of the player (and shouldn't be expected to really) and Vaughan isn't likely to win many headers in our box. Not sure you can really single out an individual for it.
Fitzsimons 6.5
Hewitt 6.5
Turley 6.5
Ward 6.5
Jones 6
Milsom 6
Vaughan 6
Davies 7
Thomas 8
Hemmings 8
Stead 9
Ardley 9 - His subs strengthened us after his initial tactics and team selection had worked, can't ask for much more than that.
Those of us who saw him in the Munto season knew he was bang average at best and also a nasty piece of work but those voices were drowned out by others saying how much Chesterfield fans rated him, even though he hardly ever played due to injury. Before that, he was sacked by Port Vale for attacking his captain. We should never have offered him a contract.
It was a slightly late slide tackle with no studs showing that Stead thought he could make with the wet pitch. How he got a yellow and there player got nothing for a later challenge on Thomas where he left his stoods in I’ll never know.
I was just glad to see determination.
I have seen a lot of great players and one or two I regard as' legends ' in my years supporting Notts. Stead is neither but he will be a player I will remember with great fondness . I hope he gets a job in the media. When he does an interview or is a guest pundit on Sky , not only does he come across well , he actually knows what he's talking about. So much better than some of the dross ex-players Sky come up with.
If you think that absolutely standard sliding tackle could be a leg breaker you might as well say any tackle could be a leg breaker, which I suppose is true.
A player breaking his leg shouldn't automatically mean a red card though, it can just be bad luck, a lad I went to school with who I realised yesterday now plays for Basford United broke someones leg in an interform match at lunch time and there was nothing at all wrong with the tackle.