On way back/Just Back on the bus (merged)

Quoted from denni266

Well i aint going on saturday  dont care what happens  i have had enough for now

You'll be there, of course you will. By Friday you will have convinced yourself we will win.

Poor Performance
Not quite sure where we go from here
Will we lose all 4 of these tough 4 games?
Come on Town!! We have to do better

Not sure about the pass for their first being the single best of the night as a few minutes before their second Taylor played a lovely ball through to Efete who just couldn't dink it over the keeper. This was when we were enjoying our best spell of the match and I genuinely think if that goes in, we go on and win that as it felt like we had them on the ropes. Don't get me wrong though, we in no way deserved anything from that. Sousa's worst performance in a Town shirt and probably the first time Clifton has noticeably struggled, pair those two having off nights with a young lad up top making his debut having signed for us yesterday and it all just left Taylor with way too much to do. I thought Fox and Hunt were busy and worked hard but both fairly wasteful. The defence looked jittery at times, I'm not sold on this Waterfall/Pearson combo. I agree that Efete was decent but his reluctance to use his left foot when cutting in was very apparent tonight.

A mate messaged me at half time to say that there are perhaps too many youngsters in and around the starting XI and I have to agree, we've seen it time and time again now that we can't deal with physically stronger teams pressing us and it seems like everyone we play has got the memo.

To look at that negatively, we were shite tonight and we haven't fixed any of the problems we've seen over the past few months. However to put a positive spin on it, we definitely weren't outplayed and we're still somehow...I have no idea how...in third place and only four pts off the top.

Let's be frank, if you expect promotion in our first season down here, you're a bit of a plum. Hardly any fecker does it. Obviously Bristol Rovers did it through the play offs 5 years ago but they wouldn't have done if that cnutof a referee had any bottle. We're essentially victims of the start that we had in terms of how it has over-inflated people's expectations. As Marinette pointed out, quite astutely I reckon, our start probably did owe a fair amount to the extended preseason we had. Now that other teams have caught up and we've been without our star player for a month we've hit a massive rut. It's not been good enough, everyone can see that but had we started the season with 3 wins, 3 draws and 3 defeats, we'd be delighted where we are right now. So shall we have a bit of perapective eh?

Hurst didn't assemble a title-winning squad in the summer and nor could he have been reasonably expected to in his first proper window with such a high turnover of squad. We obvioisly need to strengthen, if not before January then in the window as FL players start moving around and become available. So can we stop these histrionics and just get behind the team on Saturday as they need it now more than at any poimt so far this season.

Also, did anyone else clock that their keeper got sponsor's man of the match?! Absolutely baffling choice.

Interesting if we win on Saturday we go back to 2nd which I’d have taken before a ball was kicked.

I do think we’ve lost our mojo with too many players off it and in recent weeks a lack of pace and movement.

We’ll definitely need additions in January if not before if we’re not going to completely fade.

Did anyone expect us to win the league?

Hurst has money in the budget for more players over January. Recruitment is his strongest card, and he's spent months chewing over his targets. As long as we are there or thereabouts at the top, if the additions click quickly in place, we can still have a very good season.

It was a real mix of some actually good passing and movement at times ,but the next minute it was aimless long balls, misplaced passes, lack of pressing, lack of tackling.
We just didn't get close enough to them first half and they had all the time in the world to play it around. The worrying thing was that we had every advantage - they'd played 2 gruelling games in 7 days, yet they looked a fresh as daisies and it was us who looked lethargic. Plus they'd lost their best centre half to chesterfield, had their skipper suspended and then lost another centre half in the first 15. We had all those advantages but hardly laid a glove on them
Must be so frustrating for Hurst - he more or less blamed the inexperienced players v Aldershot, yet tonight 3 of his experienced, most consistent performers (Crookes, Fox and Sousa) had absolute shockers. How their no. 11 didn't get motm i don't know. He turned Crookes inside out all night
Waterfall plus pearson is not the answer and Towler needs to come in as i'm sure he'll aid Crookes' performance.
Notice that PH said he's starting to find out about the players and he intimated that some are possibly not good enough or consistent enough. I think i'd put Bapaga (who once again did nothing once he came on), Hunt (who is the epitome of how we've gone downhill) & Pearson (think hes' turned out to be a big wage wasted) in that category
Thought taylor and Bell partnership has possibilities, and Bell looks to have a bit about him and certainly we will give us far more of  a forward threat.
Good to see efete back to his best, and seems to have regained the confidence he lost after the sending off.
Don't think macca was really to blame for tonight, but i have to say that Boot in the Solihull goal outshone him

Don't quite know where PH goes from here coz there's nobody to really bring in, apart from towler, and maybe tinker with the midfield again.. Maybe his best bet is to set us up not to concede and try and get a bit of confidence back with a whole hearted, committed defensive display

Quoted from Kris2

Really seems like we were not good enough tonight and this patch of poor games continues. Quite how this team went from winners playing with drive and style to an apathetic team lacking confidence is a mystery but Hurst needs to find a way to motivate his players before we start dropping down into mid table by Christmas.

It has completely baffled me. Teams and players have a bad day at the office but they seem to have forgotten how to pass.  Compare that to the beginning of the season when we saw crisp inventive passing. ANother goalless night.   How does that happen when 13 of our players have scored - and we're not talking goalmouth scrambles; many were contenders for goal of the season.  We need to stop the rot or we will be doing a Dagenham and Redbridge. They seem to be in freefall.   Luckily the teams around us failed to win.

Would agree with most of what’s been said so far. Sousa particularly stood out as having a terrible night, but no one could argue if they were dropped for Saturday.

The first goal so early killed us. First half they caused us tonnes of problems down their right, and had a similar chance about 5 mins before their 1st goal which we got lucky with and didn’t learn from as they continued to double up on Crookes with little support from Sousa.

Defence were ok (Efete 100% offered the most going forward), midfield 2 did ok without really getting close to Taylor/Bell to support and Clifton didn’t have a good game compared to earlier in the season.

Bell showed promising touches; one which helped create a decent chance for Taylor early on, but understandbly looked like a lad who’s only known his team mates for a day. Hopefully with time we will be a decent option/addition.

How do we change things for Saturday? I think it’s clear we don’t like playing 4-4-2 so if McAtee is fit enough to start i can absolutely see that happening and going back to 4-2-3-1, but who deserves to fill the rest of the positions take your pick. This is when a smaller squad could limit us a bit, a few chances around the park to change it up definitely feels needed but whether we have the quality in depth to make those i’m not so sure on people’s current form….