Just back

Quoted from Helgy

If you had pushed up too much and we would have hit you on the break more
You need pace in this division wingers than can unlock the defences ,we are hard to break down and will press to try to make teams made mistakes.
So it was hard for you to get at us because of the way we are set up,
Carlisle did us using pace & some neat football.

January window is the toughest ,teams don't want to sell their best players ,prices can be over inflated ,then add agents to the mix.

Getting that player in that will gel straight away isnt easy ,we had a few signings that took time to bed in last January.
Things can take time to blend together its not like Jolly is Russell Slade who was clueless.


Football has changed since we were out of the league ,if we go up to L1 then we will need investment to be able to compete in that league.

You have to have blind faith its part of being a fan

Quoted from Helgy

If you had pushed up too much and we would have hit you on the break more
You need pace in this division wingers than can unlock the defences ,we are hard to break down and will press to try to make teams made mistakes.
So it was hard for you to get at us because of the way we are set up,
Carlisle did us using pace & some neat football.

January window is the toughest ,teams don't want to sell their best players ,prices can be over inflated ,then add agents to the mix.

Getting that player in that will gel straight away isnt easy ,we had a few signings that took time to bed in last January.
Things can take time to blend together its not like Jolly is Russell Slade who was clueless.


Football has changed since we were out of the league ,if we go up to L1 then we will need investment to be able to compete in that league.

You have to have blind faith its part of being a fan

Quoted from Helgy

HertsGTFC
It wasn’t meant to come over that way .i am saying L2 isn’t easy , it’s a tough division and the January window is a tough one to get players in no matter what your finances are.
L1 is tougher & without investment we will struggle to compete.
Don’t have any illusions last time we went up to L1 we came straight back down because we didn’t invest in new players.

Quoted from Bigdog

I'm going to try and be pragmatic about this game. New formation, two new players working towards being fully match fit, best engine in the team missing and the wrong end of two important refereeing positions and we lost 1-0 to a team that's clear at the top and had a few quid chucked at it. Some games aren't free flowing bundles of joy to watch and some are, just depends how the teams match up. For most of the game both teams cancelled each other out. I understand the calls for a striker, every team needs better strikers than they've got no matter what position they are in the league. I'd accept one tomorrow but our lack of goalscoring could be atrributed to lack of quality chance making just as much. I don't get the outrage on here about wanting one after this game and a terrible run of injuries over the past few games after scoring plenty in the weeks beforehand. If we were toothless up front, so were they. I think we shaded it in chances created tbh. They started brightly for the first twenty minutes using the ball well with some accurate balls to the feet of Akinde and their wide men. They got their foothold because our central midfield three stood off them and looked a little disorganised. They knocked some decent crosses in, all were dealt with well by our defence but we paid by being slow to the second ball and got punished by their winner which was a decent strike to be fair. Then somehow after twenty minutes we relaxed and started knocking it around a bit and with the three or four chances created mostly from set pieces before half time, it was a bit of an injustice that we went in behind at the break. Some reports were saying that one of our efforts was over the line and it looked that way on TV.

Second half was a non event. Lincoln showed their ability to manage games out and we showed a lack of composure on the ball when trying to get into the final third although some credit has to be given to the standard of their defending.With some of the talent they had in their side, I think we need to give our players some credit in making them look quite ordinary for long spells in the game. Apart from a shaky first twenty minutes for Ring, I thought the wing backs and back three all had decent games. Hessenthaler had a decent ninety minutes, Embleton had a decent twenty minutes before half time and Rose's physicality grew into the game after a poor thirty minutes, but the overall effect of our midfield three was pretty ineffective. Clifton would have made a difference, but I think we'll still need an added ingredient of steel and athleticism in there if we're going to challenge next season. The front two were largely ineffective but they had poor service and were shackled by probably the best defence I've seen this season in open play although they looked a bit shaky at set pieces as did their keeper who seemed get attable.

Onto Mike Dean. I actually thought he got a large percentage of decisions right but got two huge ones wrong. O'Connor should have walked for his cynical elbow, I thought Akinde's was a yellow and no way should Macca have got sent off, although Macca created the situation himself by being extremely indecisive, their forward made up 50 yards whereas JM only had to make half that distance. And onto Lincoln. They looked excellent for twenty minutes and ordinary for the rest of the game. They've got some decent players and you can see with their strength how they can steamroller some teams yet we didn't lay down and die for them. I think they've got one or two weaknesses but they'll have enough to go up this season. Couldn't watch them every week though, I much prefer watching how Jolley is developing our work in progress side. Wish we could be a little more like them, we need to add a cynical edge to our play if we want to be successful, at times I think we're a little bit too nice and naive. Not throwing elbows in faces or play acting like them but getting away with a nudge here and there and being more adept in reading game situations. Nearly every team that plays Lincoln will say they're a horrible team to play against and we need our opponents to say the same about us because in our present guise we're never going to have a budget to buy the quickest and most skilful players for this level.

I like the look of Ohman and Ring, Ohman looks very strong in the air and not bad with his feet and Ring looks good with the ball but first impressions are that I'd like him to be a yard quicker if he's going to fill that wing back role. I can understand the calls for a forward but I couldn't see how a different one to the two today could have made much of a difference in today's game, I think our relatively small shortcomings compared to Lincoln can't be laid solely at Cardwell and Thomas's feet, even though their movement wasn't great the service they received was poor, although I was disappointed not to see Vernam start as I think we'd have got more joy with him running at their defence alongside Embleton rather than playing two with their backs to goal.

Disappointed with the result today and disappointed with the game as a spectacle but quite prepared to be patient and see how our side progresses over the rest of the season and depending on budget analyse where we'll need to improve over the summer to become a promotion chasing side. Definitely wouldn't be hitting any panic buttons at the minute anyway..

Quoted from MuddyWaters

Yes,they’re ahead of us with their development but they were non league two years ago. They’ve kicked on , we haven’t....sound familiar?

Quoted from Cayman_mariner

I think we can sum the reason for that up in two words OC - 'Russell Slade'.

Unfortunately we went backwards under him whereas they progressed and didn't have that setback of whatever Russell was trying to 'build'.

I think, all things considered, we look a lot better prospect squad wise than we did this time last year, even if we're not that different in terms of points on the board.

We've been incredibly unlucky with injuries that decimated our defence at the same time as probably our toughest run of games, but I've seen enough of these players to have some confidence we'll improve and think we'll finish mid-table.

Quoted from HertsGTFC

The board need to take accountability for us not moving forward since getting back in L2,

- They wouldn’t back Hurst to retain players and develop our infrastructure

- They appointed Bignot then gave him money to chuck away and p1ss off what was left of Hursts squad who CHDAJATL at the same time as making a fool out of himself on a daily basis.

- Then they appoint Slade who in reality had failed at every job he’s had and then allowed him to nearly take us back down before pulling the trigger .

Yeah we may not have had Lincoln’s finances but there no excuse for not having as much common sense and strategy.

Jolley will take us forward if not up I’m sure.

Quoted from Cayman_mariner

Agree with all of that Herts - the appointment and trust in Slade took us backwards but yes in the bigger picture the board are accountable for not moving forward since getting back in L2, but also in getting us down into non-League in the first place.  

I'd be interested to hear what the views are on the current team against the team that Hurst assembled for our first season back in the league, and whether you feel we've a better squad now, worse or about the same?