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Match day thread: Crawley

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  • I personally think the squad needs a break from the Saturday / Tuesday fixture backlog, maybe a rest will reinvigorate this side

  • The tribute to Macca was very moving rolled back the years singing his name. Now to the game I only have one word which is dreadful why did we sign 3 wingers in the summer if we're not going to play with any width, why play/sign talented midfielders who can pass the ball like Saunders o'nien and gape if we're gonna lump it over their head. Please can we try and play some football next week. My only positive was muller thought he was calm in the ball and had a decent game

  • A disappointing result not helped by the referee. For other observations on the referee go to football.wikia.com/wiki/Gavin Ward(referee)

  • Ainsworth likes playing 4-3-3 or 4-1-3-2 - as today. Which are basically narrow formations. (So no wonder we're playing on a narrowed pitch.)

    The latter particularly worked fine as long as Kashket was around to feed off Akifenwa. Without him, the hoofing of the ball up the latter doesn't tend to produce results. Our opponents suss it out, close us down - and sneak goals.

    Ainsworth has taken us on two fine FA Cup runs, and we have pulled in money from them (and this season from the Checkatrade). He's a good eye for a player: (Saunders, Gape, Kasket). And good players want to come back (Stewart, Cowan-Hall). I like him.

    But as long as we keep playing this narrow, pumping balls up the middle, we will also be narrowing the options of not a bad squad at all.

  • @fedup1980 said:
    I find it strange that people can't come on here and say how they feel without getting a ton of abuse from other members. People are entitled to their opinions and they shouldn't be attacked for them

    They should if they're massive, ridiculous, cry-baby twats.

  • I agree, Muller did have a decent game.

  • Great bit from Hutch taking about McCarthy, though I thought it was a little early at about 2.47. Am glad i'd turned up in my seat by then for once.

    The lineup looked weak, but Crawley are a fairly poor team, so thought we might be ok.

    Looked that way, as we scuffled in front, looked fairly comfy without creating anything else.

    The goal was untidy, Blackman taking too long to clear, before wellying against their striker, with half the crowd thinking the lino had just got it wrong. When in reality Blackman had "probably" let it go out.
    The defending for the corner was horrific!

    That said, 1-1 would have been fair, but when teams like Crawley put a freekick in like that, you know you are doomed.

    Awful run, and the playoffs certainly look a big ask now, unless Pierre Stewart and Kashket can come back at their top level instantly, and the likes of Paris and Saunders regain their levels.

  • Bit of an old cliché but you'd get that result and performance into perspective if you were in the Vere post match for the Paul McCarthy tributes.

    Lovely words especially from Alan Hutchinson, Jim Melvin and Jason Cousins. A pleasure to listen to.

  • I thought it was actually a reasonable performance on the whole. We are on a horror run but the only really bad display I've seen in that time was Stevenage.

    De Havilland and Muller both did ok and Harriman deserves some credit for a good effort playing out of position.

    Unfortunately at the moment we keep getting the little details wrong and once we concede don't really have enough poise and invention to get back in it.

    Also thought today looked like the first time heads dropped, which is a big concern.

    Annoyingly, I think that by the time we next play at AP it will probably be two teams in the bottom half with zero to play for.

  • For me there's far too much hoof ball. It bypasses our midfield and we are more dangerous using the wings as we saw in very few moments today.

  • @Blue_since_1990 said:
    I agree, Muller did have a decent game.

    Yes started very well and didn't do much wrong..late on he misjudged bounce of the ball quite a few times ..

  • Have we only won one game in 2017?

  • Certainly out of form but don't agree with the hounding of gaz and blackman on twitter..
    Why are we not talking about the lack of goals from midfield and defence..At the moment all we have is akinfenwa to score a goal.

  • When we are in possession we seem very hurried and seldom put together a passage of passing moves. We simply get the ball forward as soon as possible. 11th in league now so we need a spark and a bit of luck to get us going again.

  • The midfield can't score as they never have the ball it's always 50ft above them

  • I prefer Muller to De Havilland for sure, but both give a lot of fouls away.

  • Again I'd say that we didn't deserve to lose and again I'd say that we've played worse and won. That said however, our performance today was nowhere near as good as it was last week against Carlisle and the injustice of defeat nowhere near as strong. The game seemed to be petering out to a 1-1 draw when they've pulled an absolute beauty out of the bag for the winner. That's the way it's going for us at the moment.

    A huge amount of discussion over the 1st Crawley goal. Was it a corner? Certainly didn't look it to me behind the goal and no Crawley players appealed for it and the ref clearly thought it was a goal kick until told otherwise by the lino. Maybe it was a good spot, but he was the only one in the ground who saw it, if it was over the line. He had the best view I guess. From our point of view it was a poor goal to concede at a stage in the game when we were starting to get on top. Poor throw by Sido putting Blackman under pressure, he couldn't do much more than control it and thump it against the striker closing him down. He seemed to have done his job, but the lino thought otherwise. The header from PCH was something I've been waiting all season to see him do, but preferably at the other end!

    I think we need to forget about the play offs for the moment and just concentrate on getting our next point!

    One positive today, Muller looked very accomplished, our best player on the day by a distance.

  • If we lost are next 5 would Gareth be on things ice?

  • That was a poor performance today. Yes we have injuries but what is the point of having a midfield when all we do is hoof the ball up to the big guy and then see it come straight. No plan B
    Not enjoyable to watch

  • What a horrible game to watch today. A foul every 30 seconds followed by a ref spending ages setting up the free kick. I think the ball was in play less today than any game I've seen in years.

    Thought the two centre backs did OK. James Collins is a master at drawing fouls and they managed ok. The first goal was an own goal wasn't it? I was the only one around me who saw Paris head it in. Maybe I missed something.

    Feels like we've been in this position in February's a few time before under Ainsworth. A tired and injury hit set of players with one plan of attack in mind. Having said that though we'd have won today if it had been six weeks ago. We won the big moment then and now we are losing it. Two great strikes to defeat us in the last two games

  • It wasn't ever pretty when we were winning, I wouldn't mind a change tbh and not because we've lost 5in a row, because the football is absolutely diabolical iv bought people along on numerous occasions and they can't belive the football. Me personally love the club and when we win I'm happy because we've won etc so I put up with the terrible football so I suppose iv got double standards. Because Gareth saved us at Torquay people on here think he's God and a bad word should never be said about him etc. but ffs open your eyes it's terrible football almost embarrassing at times something needs to change what's to say if someone else came in wouldn't do a better job, ainsworths is overrated he's got no plan b and once the opposition have clocked on and put 2 defenders on bayo that's it. The wingers never get in behind and the full backs never overlap literally never, the balls crossed from just inside our half......I can't remember the last time a ball got cut back no one's got beyond the defence to do it..........I exspect I'll get abuse to this post

  • Gareth didn't save us at Torquay, Bristol Rovers failure to get anything out of their game did. We did win our game and were excellent on the day but our fate was really out of our hands, we had to win and hope for the best.

  • The biggest indication of what's wrong is that in all the recent games we've seldom forced the opposing keeper to make a save. If the keeper palms the ball out there's always the chance of picking up a rebound.

    Colchester away on Tuesday was the perfect example. We had so much of the ball but hardly troubled people the home keeper. That's why we lost.

    The system we are currently playing is fairly easy to work out & nullify. We just don't see players like O'Nien and Gape bursting through from midfield to have a shot on goal. By all means have a preferred method of play but you've got to have a plan B and plan C if plan A isn't working!

  • As much as you would question the quality of the officiating today, I have issues with general quality of football and tactics today. I have very happy to have Ainsworth as manager. He has demonstrated dedication to the club and an ability to attract a number of good players, along with a number of desirable attributes which make it easy to understand why he may be popular among the players. I don't pretend to be a master tactician, but it is tough to ignore the obvious. Despite the problems in terms of injuries (which are considerable) as well as squad size, we were able to put out a decent team today, with enough on the bench to think that if things weren't quite going our way, that we could make some positive offensive changes.

    1-1 at half-time was no disaster as long as we could push on in the second half. What proceeded was pretty pedestrian and ugly at times, which could be forgiven to a degree, if you consider the number of games we've had to play recently (fatigue factor .etc) but when you really want to be pushing for a win, to make your first substitution with 18 minutes left is utterly baffling. This, combined with an apparent lack of adaptability to change tactics during a game, when the long-ball tactic is clearly not working makes watching Wycombe incredibly frustrating. The worry is when this is ineffective against poor teams, it makes the football terrible to watch and you can understand to some extent why people do not want to pay money to watch it.

  • Some people need to get things in perspective. Today we were missing five important players and were outdone by a freak own goal from a corner that never was and a worldy from a free kick.

  • Some people need to take into account that there is a bigger picture, the quality of the opposition today, the recent run of poor results, the affect the this style of football has on attendances and the number of negative comments amongst other factors.

  • Two excellent posts @Baba.

  • It is quite simple for me. We're playing 13 games in a month and a bit, were knocked out in the most cruel fashion by Spurs, and now have loads of injuries. Essentially:

    • Poor morale
    • Low fitness
    • Low quality

    It all leads to poor form and missing the bits of luck needed to win games. Crawley were awful today, but scored their two chances, same happened with Carlisle last week. These things happen when teams are in poor form.

    However, when we get Kashket, Pierre and Stewart et al back, win a game, and finish the run of never ending midweek away matches, then the morale, fitness, and quality comes back into the team again. We've seen what this team can do this season. Chesterfield, Crewe at home, and Spurs were amazing. That can be reproduced.

    Amazingly, we're still just 4 points off playoffs, and 8 of our last 12 games are at home. I reckon we can still sneak in.

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