Against the Windies

[Geoff Parkstone]

Their batting is fragile but the lower middle order can be a strength. Fast bowling as always a strength, but see if off and second tier is not so great, bar Holder.

We need to avoid overconfidence after the 0-4 caning of the bluenoses but also take strength from the performance for a relegation 6 pointer. The game will be a pointer for rest of season I think: can we maintain a level of performance needed to sneak up the table? Or will the o ly just inflated balloon burst?

In the spirit of 2021 optimism, I'll go for 0-0

[AdiSalisbury]

I didn't pick your delivery there, sent my off-stump flying, whilst I return to the pavilion to face the inevitable question, "what happened there then?".

2-0 loss unfortunately, I can see us making a bright start, then Wednesday growing into the game and outcompeting us man for man.

[ramAnag]

1-1.

[AdiSalisbury]

Oh well. Dominated, couldn't score, conceded, no decent options on the bench. Unlucky with the penalty, but had enough opportunities to score so can't complain.

[ramAnag]

Should have had it won in the first thirty minutes. Really deserved to be further ahead than we were against Brum.
So poor once we went behind. Offered very little after that and what has happened to Max Bird?

[AdiSalisbury]

I don't know what Bird's game is, maybe MA or mista have seen more in the U23s and can explain.

[StensonRam]

Never rated Bird, Shinnie can't cross but should have scored twice, Knight and Byrne still can't cross a ball in, if it manages to beat the first man then its because its over hit, CKR is showing them all up but we're too reliant on him to make things happen, everyone else was like statues waiting for the other one to make something happen

[Andy_Faber]

Never rated Bird, Shinnie can't cross but should have scored twice, Knight and Byrne still can't cross a ball in, if it manages to beat the first man then its because its over hit, CKR is showing them all up but we're too reliant on him to make things happen, everyone else was like statues waiting for the other one to make something happen

BUT, why didn't CKR head that cross properly?

[Ram59]

BUT, why didn't CKR head that cross properly?

He just slightly mistimed it, he headed it before the ball got there, so it hit the top of his head, rather than his forehead, fine margins.

[MadAmster]

First 35 minutes they weren't in it. All over the place at the back. Midfield lost every challenge. Up top they hardly saw the ball never mind kick it. That all changed when they got a free kick, maybe 30 yards out wide right. For the first time in the game I realised Bannan was on the park. Lovely free kick that just escaped their players who were trying to run on to it. The last 10 they were the better of the two sides with Bannan starting to pull the strings and another 2 or 3 handily placed free kicks from out wide saw one header miss the near post by about 10 yards and another by half a yard. In that opening 35 minutes we were everywhere, got every second phase ball and came close to scoring from open play as well as from set pieces. Early doors shot from Sibs forced a good save from their keeper, Kazim hit the bar, Bielik had a shot blocked and then put the rebound a foot wide, Shinnie tred to side foot the ball in when he should have blasted it, a goalline block from a Clarke header, a Clarke shot he should have connected better with and numerous blocked shots. I even thought the ref got just about everything right except........ from a corner, one of their defenders got hold of the back of Kazim's shirt and pulled it up over his head causing him to go to the floor. As clear a penalty as you're ever likely to see........... nothing given. It IS a foul. It WAS in the box. The ref was WRONG not to give it. Score from that and it would have been a very different game.

Second half started same as the first and I was wondering if our failure to convert our (half) chances would come back to bite us. For 5 minutes it was deja vu. Then Bannan woke up again. As well as putting in some very good passes and free kicks he was in the way of just about everything we tried to put into their box. Half the time he was in the right place to intercept some poor passes and the rest simply in the right place to put in a tackle or to block a shot. Our chances 2nd half were few and far between but, for much of the half, we still, IMO, looked more likely to score than they did. After our opening flurry they started to press and harry, which they hadn't done first half and that led to them picking up more second balls. Then another free kick was given away in the perfect position for Bannan to put us under pressure. Marshall came for it, got nowhere near enough on it and the ball simply went straight up in the air and was coming down on the edge of the 6. Bielik couldn't get to it, 2 Wendy's went up for it, one headed it forward, Patterson bent forward and deflected it past Marshall from 2 yards out. We huffed and puffed after that, changed personnel, to no avail, added more chabges and went 1-4-4-2 with JHI up top with CKR. Pressure but no end result. Then, right at the death, Buchanan got the ball on the left, threatened to turn back up the pitch, went forward with it, put in a cross and the ball and the left arm of Kadeem Harris make contact.. He was 4, maybe 5 yards away from Buchanan, his left arm well away from his body, as the ball goes through the air, you see movement of the arm back towards the body. I said penalty. Then they showed replays from a couple of angles. Definite penalty. There was movement of the arm into the flight of the ball. Arm to ball. That was an incorrect decision. The ref last night denied Derby 2 nailed on spot kicks. Further on the ref, he probably missed a good half a dozen or more definite fouls on Derby players in the second half and 2, maybe 3, on theirs. He had a very good first half, the penalty excepted and a not quite good enough second half.

That's 2 defeats in 9 for Rooney. Both of which were games we should not have lost. He made changes (or was that LR or SM?) in both perosnnel and system looking for a way back. We lost without being the poorer side, again. It's going to happen in football. I'm still positive about Rooney and will remain so until he goes on a run of cockups, at which time I will assess my thoughts at the time.

Unhappy with the result but reasonably happy with the performance.

With regard to the Bird question, he got in the side originally, IMO, because of his cool head, his picking up of the loose ball and his distribution. IMO, it's the distribution that's letting him down at the moment and the casue of that is his immense left-footedness which, barring just a couple of instances a game, sees him looking right when he's on the left hand side of the pitch and vice versa. I have no idea why he seems to do this but it's better than earlier this season where he virtually ignored the right hand side of the pitch even when that was the better option. The player that looked so good last season is still in there, he just needs to be found........