Left at 80

Gutless spineless useless

1st 30 minutes we were in control, scored a nice goal. Then waterfall outpaced and we went to pieces. Midfield absent for the 2nd with glennon and waterfall also culpable.

2nd half utter disgrace. They didnt want to be there. Spineless and embarrassing from the lot of them- bar Danny Rose.

Maybe we should have had a pen but means nowt, conceeding 5 at home is unacceptable

Id honestly get rid of the entire back line. Conteh was awful.

Oh its just been made 6 as we’re driving home. flipping disgrace

I paid a tenner to watch that sh1te. They should be paying me a tenner to watch that sort of performance

Quoted from Hagrid

Left at 80

Gutless spineless useless

1st 30 minutes we were in control, scored a nice goal. Then waterfall outpaced and we went to pieces. Midfield absent for the 2nd with glennon and waterfall also culpable.

2nd half utter disgrace. They didnt want to be there. Spineless and embarrassing from the lot of them- bar Danny Rose.

Maybe we should have had a pen but means nowt, conceeding 5 at home is unacceptable

Id honestly get rid of the entire back line. Conteh was awful.

Oh its just been made 6 as we’re driving home. flipping disgrace

You've summed it up well mate and kept it short and sweet.

6-1 just dreadful

Shocked and devastated.

1st day of a New Year, and...its meltdown time .

No comment.

The only consolation I’ve got is … it’s sunny in Grand Cayman having to watch that crap.  8)

Just how excrement were Salford? We’re absolutely crap and bar Rose none of them look like they care either.

This pound shop Man City impression needs to end, we don’t have the players, the end

Very very disappointing and a stark message that needs to be read - want to be a top half L2 team? Challenge for play offs? Got to learn to defend. Bunch of new, better players needed.

Apart from Danny Rose I would bin the lot

Feels like we're back in the Bignot era.

Very disappointed couldn't go today - had family round. Just looked at BBC  latest scores - won 1-0  -well done Town. Put my glasses on - "  The fukin useless bstards "

Really really really poor.. as poor as I have seen... there is absolutely no passion, no desire and absolutely no idea.. it really was a disgusting performance by so called professionals.. either the players have no concern or passion for our club or DA has no understanding of his squad.. I would suggest a mix of both... this is easily national league relegation zone football at best... I am just bewildered at the moment.. just so so poor

We don't have the money

It's not just today though. How many posts have there been this season saying how bad the defence is? Ok, it's DA in charge but Hurst spent the money and even he couldn't build a good defence, something he was known for.

30 mins in and we lead and look in control, we then make 2 shocking defensive errors and physically heads didn't go down but mentally inside they did.

We have no Faith in this lot, Hope that DA has some sticking plaster till the end of the season and Charity from some opposition chairman wanting Towns travelling supporters to bolster their coffers.

Bring back Shaun Pearson and Ben Davies, they know our squads obvious limitations

This is not a one off. This would have been the scoreline at Mansfield had Cartwright not played a blinder.

Rose, the only starter with any credit from that performance.
Shout out to Braithwaite for a tidy cameo. Why not look towards the young players. How could it be worse?

Absolutely shell shocked. I tried to keep it real on Friday by saying how bad Salford were, today really underlined that. It’s not difficult to pick our best player, much harder to pick the worst.

Where’s the fight & pride?

Oh heck!!
UTM ON a wing and prayer we dont go down.

Missed Gav btw.

That's as bad as it's ever been. Relegation fight is well and truly on.

I put £50 on us to make the play offs or better at the start of the season thinking that we’d have a solid defence. 😂😂😂

Really bad day at the office, and I think it clearly highlights that some players don't have the capability to do what we want of them consistently enough. Whether that can be resolved in January or end of the season, I do not know, but DA sure has his work cut out and I suspect he's going to be as angry as we are.

How bad it can get sometimes, I'm wondering if this is a leadership issue. You probably need 3/5 big players to pull people right, and I'm not sure if we have that.

In a week or so, we'll probably get a solid result, so it won't be as bad as it feels now, but the squad needs some major work.

This is shocking, even by the pitiful standard we have seen in recent months.

I can’t remember a 6-1 home defeat. Totally devastating and totally unacceptable.

Our next visitors are Notts County. What will Langstaff do against our defence?

Our defenders are not good enough. If we don’t get reinforcements in January we are in serious danger of going down.

I'd say some of their goals came after a fortunate bounce or ricochet went in their favour (and they didn't waste many of their chances), but too many also came because of needlessly-misplaced passes or downright sloppy play. If you're going to pass it in the way that Artell wants us to, you need to be absolutely on it at all times and I don't think we've got the ability to achieve this.

Notable they they were in general quicker than us around the park once again and pace certainly had a hand in some of their goals, in addition to the first, of course.

There was so much wrong with that second half performance, it will be interesting to see what Artell says about it!

First 30 mins we were actually pretty good, one absolutely shocking bit of defending from Waterfall and the game flipped on its head.

From that, everything Walsall hit went in and we gifted them every chance they had, they had 6 shots on target and scored 6 bloody goals.

Defensively we were an absolute shambles, but on most other days that game doesn’t end 6-1, it’s a freak result but it’s one that we’ve deserved.

Big window ahead.

The capitulation after their equaliser was extraordinary, I don’t think I’ve seen anything like that from a professional team before. We looked terrified in the second half and if Walsall hadn’t wasted so much time they could have got double figures
I wonder what happened or was said at half time because there was no heart, fight or passion after the break.

Started well and were the better team first half. Pressed well with Rose and Clifton, Green won lots of the ball.

The 2nd half was as bad as you're likely to see, totally disorganised and continued to play into where they were hurting us. No 8 Hutchinson was very good but nobody got near him all day.

Have to say I'm a little worried about how Artell reacts to the game in front of him. No change of shape, no move to neutralise their threats.

Was hugely disappointed to see some hiding and some giving up from a few.

Thought Andrews was good when we were on top. Jogged his way around 2nd half hiding from the ball, would love to know how many touches he had 2nd half before he went off. Criminal defending and confusion for the other goals and lack of responsibility for runners.

It's early days yet, but that was flipping bad.

Quoted from pontoonlew

First 30 mins we were actually pretty good, one absolutely shocking bit of defending from Waterfall and the game flipped on its head.

From that, everything Walsall hit went in and we gifted them every chance they had, they had 6 shots on target and scored 6 bloody goals.

Defensively we were an absolute shambles, but on most other days that game doesn’t end 6-1, it’s a freak result but it’s one that we’ve deserved.

Big window ahead.

Its not a freak result, we’ve had a pasting coming for a while, we should have had one at Mansfield but for Cartwright, defensively, no matter who plays, we are a shambles and pissing about with it at the back with players who cannot do that role, is not helping

Surley this is the first time in football history that
In a matter of days a teams wins 3-0 away then loses 6-1 at home

Looking forward to Artells speach tonight, lots of blinks, scratching of the head, and "Rome wasnt built in a day", and he hasnt been here long, same old, same old

What a disastrous holiday period. 3 points from 12 and 10 goals conceded.

Didn't think I could feel lower than watching Harrogate and their 50 fans outplay us on our own turf, but today I had to listen to 200 Walsall fans ole their team, whilst ours crumbled to a pathetic and spineless drubbing. And here we are again for the umpteenth EFL season of hoping there are 2 worse teams than us.

It's just a drudge most of the time watching us at BP, season after season, manager after manager.

Meanwhile, Tranmere keep winning since they appointed Adkins, with the kind of bounce we very rarely get, and BP remains like a morgue with fans desperately wanting a team to cheer, and being left wanting.

Danny Rose was our best forward, our best defender and miles out in front of the others in terms of quality, effort and will to win. If we had a few more like him, we'd be half way there.

Walsall managed to turn 34% possession into 18 shots, 7 on target and 6 in the net. Very very concerning.

Has Artell spoken yet?

Quoted from ginnywings

What a disastrous holiday period. 3 points from 12 and 10 goals conceded.

Didn't think I could feel lower than watching Harrogate and their 50 fans outplay us on our own turf, but today I had to listen to 200 Walsall fans ole their team, whilst ours crumbled to a pathetic and spineless drubbing. And here we are again for the umpteenth EFL season of hoping there are 2 worse teams than us.

It's just a drudge most of the time watching us at BP, season after season, manager after manager.

Meanwhile, Tranmere keep winning since they appointed Adkins, with the kind of bounce we very rarely get, and BP remains like a morgue with fans desperately wanting a team to cheer, and being left wanting.

Danny Rose was our best forward, our best defender and miles out in front of the others in terms of quality, effort and will to win. If we had a few more like him, we'd be half way there.

Walsall managed to turn 34% possession into 18 shots, 7 on target and 6 in the net. Very very concerning.

Ginny we rely on you to tell us we are overreacting and we should be grateful for what we get .

Quoted from Wiley2405

Has Artell spoken yet?

Hopefully he’s resigning

We are quite literally made of toilet paper, started well, confident passing, scored a goal, could have had two, then bang. Waterfall gets outpaced, out muscled and we’ve conceded. Then the entire defence watches as Walsall pass through the box and we’re 2-1. 2nd half was quite simply gobsmacking. No fight, no organisation, no idea. We are 100% in a relegation fight, make no mistake. My worry is, we have no mental strength at all, one set back and we collapse.
DA needs a CB, CM and CF. All must have mental strength as a minimum.

Quoted from dicko995

Looking forward to Artells speach tonight, lots of blinks, scratching of the head, and "Rome wasnt built in a day", and he hasnt been here long, same old, same old

It has to be said that, for a man with a degree in forensic biology, he does an incredibly authentic impression of Selwyn Frogatt. Articulate my bottom!

Quoted from tarka

It has to be said that, for a man with a degree in forensic biology, he does an incredibly authentic impression of Selwyn Frogatt. Articulate my bottom!

Showing your age there Tarka  ;) , it certainly wasn’t “magic”  :-/

Quoted from lee65

Showing your age there Tarka  ;) , it certainly wasn’t “magic”  :-/

He doesn't half sound like him though! lol

That’s dry January kyboshed

Better team first half and then their heads just completely went after conceding before the break.

Just too mentally weak in games when there’s a setback which is compounded by trying to play a high risk style of play and that all came together to result in this shocking day at the office.

A real low point in a truly disappointing season.  Artell was 'pleasantly surprised' by the quality of the squad when he got here. Wonder what he thinks now.  

They gave us too much space early doors, then quickly figured out if they squeezed us up the pitch they'd win it off us within 30 yards of our goal and it won't matter because we've no threat in behind. We were 5-1 down before we figured out this had happened.

Quoted from tarka

It has to be said that, for a man with a degree in forensic biology, he does an incredibly authentic impression of Selwyn Frogatt. Articulate my bottom!

Magic our Morris

Quoted from RonMariner

A real low point in a truly disappointing season.  Artell was 'pleasantly surprised' by the quality of the squad when he got here. Wonder what he thinks now.  

Probably still impressed with the quality of the squad I'm afraid.

Quoted from It Bites

Magic our Morris

Precisely! ;-)

Quoted from nightrider

We don't have the money

We did have so where has it gone. Sure Paul did not spend it on this lot???

And no one mentioned the pitch which has been on holiday but looks like a horse paddock already.

Quoted from lee65

Showing your age there Tarka  ;) , it certainly wasn’t “magic”  :-/

Our maurice

Quoted from GibMariner

We did have so where has it gone. Sure Paul did not spend it on this lot???

And no one mentioned the pitch which has been on holiday but looks like a horse paddock already.

Horse paddock?

Give your head a wobble!

Just watched the goals back on the highlights and I’m even angrier than I was at the ground. What the intercourse was Mullarkey doing for the first?! He was in no man’s land, neither pressing nor dropped off and leaves Waterfall having to chase back for an out of position Mullarkey.

Shockingly poor. Just didn’t see that coming after the first 15-20 minutes.

Keystone Cops defending today

Left at 66 minutes. To drive the 80 miles home. Haven’t done that in my four decades of watching.

The two penalty decisions killed the game. Dunno what else to say. Might put £10 on Notts County getting into double figures?

Best part of the day was seeing Gary Childs walk along the front of the Pontoon. 8 years he was with Town. A joy to watch - think I saw him make a tackle once but I could be wrong.

I imagine most of those in the squad today will be gone in 12 months and in a couple of years we'll have forgotten they ever played for us...and that is still far more than they deserve.

Left at 80 mins in disbelief tbh.

The opening 39 mins were ok, granted. But Walsall were our equal in the first half in my view, and this idea that we were somehow coasting before Waterfall made his double error for the first goal, is as rose tinted as saying we should have been 4-0 against Mansfield in the bloody first half.

We were ok till they scored and it was a good even contest between what I thought then, was two equally matched sides.

That’s not how it played out!

What I did see from early on was a few player quickly hide away from receiving the ball and providing options. Too many times I saw one of our players in possession near the lower Smiths side of the pitch and 5 (yes Five!) teamates in positions near the bloody Main Stand.

This was hiding and really obvious in its impact and we just kept being pressed, robbed and then they scored.

Yes, I can see that asking the defenders to always play out is making us vulnerable due to mistakes. But that approach needs midfielders to come towards the ball carrier and not leg it to the other side of the pitch and leave them with only sideways passes between the defenders.

Evidence? 3 of our back 4 made the most passes of any player today and over 240 of our passes were in our own half.

Eisa wasn’t up for it today. Don’t know why, but just wasn’t engaged

Conteh, Green, Clifton and Andrews all too similar.

Waterfalls header back into the danger area (when he should just head it out for a corner) for the 2nd goal should be enough to secure his seat on the bench for the rest of the season.

Transfer wise, I am told that Amos definitely leaving along with Efete.

Strange how Khouri not even involved in squad when youth team lads getting games, so likely to see him go out on loan as well.

The result is really grim and Artel now knows for sure that the squad he has inherited is very limited in terms of pace, power, skill and aerial threat.

Keep us up please and let you build your own squad next season if u can offload some of these 2/3 year contractors.

It’s gonna be a tough few months I am sure and grateful for Forest Green, Sutton, Salford and Colchester being equally excrement at mo.

Let’s hope couple of them don’t hit form.

Walsall - worth a few quid on play offs for me as their recent results and quality of the loaners they have really stood out today.

Echoes of the Mansfield game, looked OK first 30 mins, 1-0 up, chances for more with Eisa and Andrews....all of a sudden they were 2-1 up without really previously laying a glove on us.
Second half non existent.

Walsall looked stronger, quicker across the midfield, Rose isolated so couldn't hurt their big back line and once Walsall figured that out they never looked back.

Very disappointing start to the new year.

Final word.....zero atmosphere....so so quiet in that first half......second half understandably so.

Quoted from Lincspoacher

Left at 80 mins in disbelief tbh.

The opening 39 mins were ok, granted. But Walsall were our equal in the first half in my view, and this idea that we were somehow coasting before Waterfall made his double error for the first goal, is as rose tinted as saying we should have been 4-0 against Mansfield in the bloody first half.

We were ok till they scored and it was a good even contest between what I thought then, was two equally matched sides.

That’s not how it played out!

What I did see from early on was a few player quickly hide away from receiving the ball and providing options. Too many times I saw one of our players in possession near the lower Smiths side of the pitch and 5 (yes Five!) teamates in positions near the bloody Main Stand.

This was hiding and really obvious in its impact and we just kept being pressed, robbed and then they scored.

Yes, I can see that asking the defenders to always play out is making us vulnerable due to mistakes. But that approach needs midfielders to come towards the ball carrier and not leg it to the other side of the pitch and leave them with only sideways passes between the defenders.

Evidence? 3 of our back 4 made the most passes of any player today and over 240 of our passes were in our own half.

Eisa wasn’t up for it today. Don’t know why, but just wasn’t engaged

Conteh, Green, Clifton and Andrews all too similar.

Waterfalls header back into the danger area (when he should just head it out for a corner) for the 2nd goal should be enough to secure his seat on the bench for the rest of the season.

Transfer wise, I am told that Amos definitely leaving along with Efete.

Strange how Khouri not even involved in squad when youth team lads getting games, so likely to see him go out on loan as well.

The result is really grim and Artel now knows for sure that the squad he has inherited is very limited in terms of pace, power, skill and aerial threat.

Keep us up please and let you build your own squad next season if u can offload some of these 2/3 year contractors.

It’s gonna be a tough few months I am sure and grateful for Forest Green, Sutton, Salford and Colchester being equally excrement at mo.

Let’s hope couple of them don’t hit form.

Walsall - worth a few quid on play offs for me as their recent results and quality of the loaners they have really stood out today.

Aren’t you the person that falsely said Dave Moore was leaving at the start of last season.

You can't blame Hollohan this time

Quoted from davmariner

Aren’t you the person that falsely said Dave Moore was leaving at the start of last season.

Err, nope.

But thankfully, he did stay on after considering retirement. Be a sad day when he does hang his sponge up

Quoted from Lincspoacher

Err, nope.

But thankfully, he did stay on after considering retirement. Be a sad day when he does hang his sponge up

https://ibb.co/nrh7Mp4

Awks.

I'm stunned by that performance we started off and at HT I'd say we had seen a contest between two evenly matched sides with Town shading it  The lack of game management though? Waterfall tries to pass toI think  Clifton poor pass results in a quick throw and he gets outpaced.At 34 he should bring the man down and take the yellow card for the team. The second goal more trying to pass when a good old fashioned hoof would have kept us safe
2nd half Eisa who I  fail to see what he does in 90 mins to get selected loses the ball and doesn't bother to chase back when again he could have committed a foul and stopped the attack.The 4th was a stonewall penalty less than 60 secs after the referee missed a stonewall penalty for us.I  like 90% got up and left after the 5th and was home in time to see the 6th. Utterly disheartening for everyone and this lot have largely ruined Christmas and New Year for the fans. We have all been around long enough to accept you'll get bad results and performances but come on lads you're duty bound to put a shift in. Personally I  excuse Rose and Cartwright today but the other 9 starters today should be in for double training sessions. That was unacceptable from them and whilst DA inherited them as others have said you can't play tika taka with players who can't pass a football  Glennon, Rose at a push Konteh of the starters can pass and receive a ball the rest I don't see it myself Dave?

We’re division 4 footballers trying to copy Man City. Ffs it doesn’t take a genius to work out that the reward is less than the risk ! It’s just managers don’t want to lose professional face by not accepting this philosophy. I’m sorry if I sound a dinosaur and would prefer if we played like a Steve evans team ( I can’t remember who accused me of this but I’ll just say 1-6 ) but I’m confident to say you should only play to the strengths your players give you !!

Quoted from 1mickylyons

I'm stunned by that performance we started off and at HT I'd say we had seen a contest between two evenly matched sides with Town shading it  The lack of game management though? Waterfall tries to pass toI think  Clifton poor pass results in a quick throw and he gets outpaced.At 34 he should bring the man down and take the yellow card for the team. The second goal more trying to pass when a good old fashioned hoof would have kept us safe
2nd half Eisa who I  fail to see what he does in 90 mins to get selected loses the ball and doesn't bother to chase back when again he could have committed a foul and stopped the attack.The 4th was a stonewall penalty less than 60 secs after the referee missed a stonewall penalty for us.I  like 90% got up and left after the 5th and was home in time to see the 6th. Utterly disheartening for everyone and this lot have largely ruined Christmas and New Year for the fans. We have all been around long enough to accept you'll get bad results and performances but come on lads you're duty bound to put a shift in. Personally I  excuse Rose and Cartwright today but the other 9 starters today should be in for double training sessions. That was unacceptable from them and whilst DA inherited them as others have said you can't play tika taka with players who can't pass a football  Glennon, Rose at a push Konteh of the starters can pass and receive a ball the rest I don't see it myself Dave?

I know he’s scored a few well taken goals but I agree re Eisa, think he’s quite greedy too.

Quoted from HertsGTFC

I know he’s scored a few well taken goals but I agree re Eisa, think he’s quite greedy too.

My point he's just not a team player.Talented given time and space to shoot.

Got to get at least 1 CB
1 LB
1 RB
1 Defence mid field
2 Central mid field
1 center forward
In other words a new team  ;D

Quoted from TAGG

Got to get at least 1 CB
1 LB
1 RB
1 Defence mid field
2 Central mid field
1 center forward
In other words a new team  ;D

As per a post on another thread, a lot of our squad played in the promotion team and several others (Green, Maher, Mullarkey) were signed from non league clubs. The style Artell craves demands higher quality players than we currently have - question is whether we can afford to recruit the quality required.

Cannot think of another season where we have conceded so many through the middle. Both CB were too slow as they have been most of this season. Clifton stood off side so many times so not able to play the ball to him. Even when he came back he was still off side when the ball was played to him. Others had an off day and if we are trying to play the ball out from the back we need to pass it to one of our players. We were playing OK for the first 20-25 mins so a small positive (very small). Let’s see what changes come in the transfer window

Got to get at least 1 CB
1 LB
1 RB
1 Defence mid field
2 Central mid field
1 center forward
In other words a new team  ;D[b][/b]

Next 3 games Notts County home, Harrogate away, Tranmere home. Based upon the last 4 games we’ll definitely need to be better 😬

Lordy, lord. Like a dodgy New Year’s Eve kebab, it’s taken some time to digest that, and now that I have, I feel like I want to spew.

It’s not often I walk away from Blundell Park having seen something I’ve never seen there before, but today I certainly did. After 70 minutes. That wasn’t a decision driven solely by the capitulation on the pitch as it happens, but I certainly wasn’t the only one leaving - they couldn’t get the gates open quick enough.

I’m just utterly dumbfounded by what I saw out there today. For 38 minutes, the best side by far and completely comfortable in the game. I was enjoying the match, right the way until Waterfall misplaced a simple pass to Mullarkey straight out for a throw, got absolutely skinned by their 11 in the next passage of play, and found ourselves level out of seemingly nothing. Then right on half-time we’re 2-1 down, and they probably should have added a third before the break.

That felt like a bit of a sucker punch at that point; we had been the better side for the bulk of the half, but now the momentum was with them. “It will be interesting to see how we react to this”, I suggested over a half-time píss. And well, you can’t really say the reaction wasn’t “interesting”, can you? Fúcking hell.

What happened during what I saw of the second-half is a bit of a blur. Much like the morning after any good NYE night out, I’m able to piece together bits of what went down, but not necessarily in the correct order and with important bits of the story missing. That’s how bewilderingly disorientating and mindblowingly shít that second-half was.

Our non-pen at 3-1 down looked nailed on from my vantage, arguably more so than theirs that was given seconds later, but as much as that might have been a butterfly effect moment that led to some Barnet ‘21 esque 4-3 comeback, you can only deal with the evidence offered up by the dimension you’re currently living in, and that’s that we surrendered all momentum to Walsall who proceeded to give us a skullfúcking that will live a long time in the memory.

I posted after the Salford game that patience would be needed as we transition to a new way of playing, and that there would be bumps in the road along the way. That was not a bump. That was more like the pile up scene from the start of Final Destination 2. A monumental clusterfúck from the very depths of football hell.

The big question of the day is simply: what the fúck happened? We were ok for almost the entire first-half. In fact we’re better than ok - we were really good. Intense, on the front foot, looking dangerous, knocking nice balls around the pitch. And then disaster.

There’s absolutely no disputing that there was a psychological capitulation, the likes of which we haven’t seen for some time. This is by no means a defence of Hurst’s 23/24 season, but his defeats were generally by small margins.

Perhaps even more worrying, did Walsall simply work us out? They definitely made a tweak to their system, if memory serves, just after our goal around the time Danny Johnson came on. If they tried to amplify that at half-time, it didn’t half work. I’d love nothing more than to see Town successful playing attractive football, but we can’t go exposing ourselves to defeats like that.

The great thing for any manager in the first few weeks of a new job is that when things go wrong, you can just blame your predecessor. But today is on Artell, ultimately. That second half was a new level of BP chaos, and that’s some going.

12 days until our next game. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? What DA does with that period is the first real challenge of his reign. Notts County are the league’s top scorers with 55 goals, with the league’s top scorer in Macauley Langstaff on 19 goals. Big, big question - how does continue to instil the kind of footballing values he wants to impress on the team without risking a demolition even worse than what we’ve witnessed today. Who’d be a football manager?

Quoted from Poojah

12 days until our next game. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? What DA does with that period is the first real challenge of his reign.

Excellent post, Poojah.

I thought about this point in particular earlier, and I think it's a bad thing. I think if we had a game Saturday (and maybe another one squeezed in between now and Saturday), he would be forced to go back to basics and look to grind something out. I worry that Cheapside will focus heavily on intricate patterns and completely fry the brains of players like Waterfall, Green and Maher.

A very depressing day DA and JS need to lift the team and fans
May as-well give Notts county the full sway end there will be loads of seats available in the home end.

Quoted from davmariner

https://ibb.co/nrh7Mp4

Awks.

That’s not “awks’ at all u muppet.

Clearly says ‘rumour’.

That is not saying he is going. Labelled a rumour and no more.

Get back in ur box lad.

Quoted from Poojah

Lordy, lord. Like a dodgy New Year’s Eve kebab, it’s taken some time to digest that, and now that I have, I feel like I want to spew.

It’s not often I walk away from Blundell Park having seen something I’ve never seen there before, but today I certainly did. After 70 minutes. That wasn’t a decision driven solely by the capitulation on the pitch as it happens, but I certainly wasn’t the only one leaving - they couldn’t get the gates open quick enough.

I’m just utterly dumbfounded by what I saw out there today. For 38 minutes, the best side by far and completely comfortable in the game. I was enjoying the match, right the way until Waterfall misplaced a simple pass to Mullarkey straight out for a throw, got absolutely skinned by their 11 in the next passage of play, and found ourselves level out of seemingly nothing. Then right on half-time we’re 2-1 down, and they probably should have added a third before the break.

That felt like a bit of a sucker punch at that point; we had been the better side for the bulk of the half, but now the momentum was with them. “It will be interesting to see how we react to this”, I suggested over a half-time píss. And well, you can’t really say the reaction wasn’t “interesting”, can you? Fúcking hell.

What happened during what I saw of the second-half is a bit of a blur. Much like the morning after any good NYE night out, I’m able to piece together bits of what went down, but not necessarily in the correct order and with important bits of the story missing. That’s how bewilderingly disorientating and mindblowingly shít that second-half was.

Our non-pen at 3-1 down looked nailed on from my vantage, arguably more so than theirs that was given seconds later, but as much as that might have been a butterfly effect moment that led to some Barnet ‘21 esque 4-3 comeback, you can only deal with the evidence offered up by the dimension you’re currently living in, and that’s that we surrendered all momentum to Walsall who proceeded to give us a skullfúcking that will live a long time in the memory.

I posted after the Salford game that patience would be needed as we transition to a new way of playing, and that there would be bumps in the road along the way. That was not a bump. That was more like the pile up scene from the start of Final Destination 2. A monumental clusterfúck from the very depths of football hell.

The big question of the day is simply: what the fúck happened? We were ok for almost the entire first-half. In fact we’re better than ok - we were really good. Intense, on the front foot, looking dangerous, knocking nice balls around the pitch. And then disaster.

There’s absolutely no disputing that there was a psychological capitulation, the likes of which we haven’t seen for some time. This is by no means a defence of Hurst’s 23/24 season, but his defeats were generally by small margins.

Perhaps even more worrying, did Walsall simply work us out? They definitely made a tweak to their system, if memory serves, just after our goal around the time Danny Johnson came on. If they tried to amplify that at half-time, it didn’t half work. I’d love nothing more than to see Town successful playing attractive football, but we can’t go exposing ourselves to defeats like that.

The great thing for any manager in the first few weeks of a new job is that when things go wrong, you can just blame your predecessor. But today is on Artell, ultimately. That second half was a new level of BP chaos, and that’s some going.

12 days until our next game. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? What DA does with that period is the first real challenge of his reign. Notts County are the league’s top scorers with 55 goals, with the league’s top scorer in Macauley Langstaff on 19 goals. Big, big question - how does continue to instil the kind of footballing values he wants to impress on the team without risking a demolition even worse than what we’ve witnessed today. Who’d be a football manager?

Jesus wept , you got any short boring stories ?

Quoted from Poojah

Lordy, lord. Like a dodgy New Year’s Eve kebab, it’s taken some time to digest that, and now that I have, I feel like I want to spew.

It’s not often I walk away from Blundell Park having seen something I’ve never seen there before, but today I certainly did. After 70 minutes. That wasn’t a decision driven solely by the capitulation on the pitch as it happens, but I certainly wasn’t the only one leaving - they couldn’t get the gates open quick enough.

I’m just utterly dumbfounded by what I saw out there today. For 38 minutes, the best side by far and completely comfortable in the game. I was enjoying the match, right the way until Waterfall misplaced a simple pass to Mullarkey straight out for a throw, got absolutely skinned by their 11 in the next passage of play, and found ourselves level out of seemingly nothing. Then right on half-time we’re 2-1 down, and they probably should have added a third before the break.

That felt like a bit of a sucker punch at that point; we had been the better side for the bulk of the half, but now the momentum was with them. “It will be interesting to see how we react to this”, I suggested over a half-time píss. And well, you can’t really say the reaction wasn’t “interesting”, can you? Fúcking hell.

What happened during what I saw of the second-half is a bit of a blur. Much like the morning after any good NYE night out, I’m able to piece together bits of what went down, but not necessarily in the correct order and with important bits of the story missing. That’s how bewilderingly disorientating and mindblowingly shít that second-half was.

Our non-pen at 3-1 down looked nailed on from my vantage, arguably more so than theirs that was given seconds later, but as much as that might have been a butterfly effect moment that led to some Barnet ‘21 esque 4-3 comeback, you can only deal with the evidence offered up by the dimension you’re currently living in, and that’s that we surrendered all momentum to Walsall who proceeded to give us a skullfúcking that will live a long time in the memory.

I posted after the Salford game that patience would be needed as we transition to a new way of playing, and that there would be bumps in the road along the way. That was not a bump. That was more like the pile up scene from the start of Final Destination 2. A monumental clusterfúck from the very depths of football hell.

The big question of the day is simply: what the fúck happened? We were ok for almost the entire first-half. In fact we’re better than ok - we were really good. Intense, on the front foot, looking dangerous, knocking nice balls around the pitch. And then disaster.

There’s absolutely no disputing that there was a psychological capitulation, the likes of which we haven’t seen for some time. This is by no means a defence of Hurst’s 23/24 season, but his defeats were generally by small margins.

Perhaps even more worrying, did Walsall simply work us out? They definitely made a tweak to their system, if memory serves, just after our goal around the time Danny Johnson came on. If they tried to amplify that at half-time, it didn’t half work. I’d love nothing more than to see Town successful playing attractive football, but we can’t go exposing ourselves to defeats like that.

The great thing for any manager in the first few weeks of a new job is that when things go wrong, you can just blame your predecessor. But today is on Artell, ultimately. That second half was a new level of BP chaos, and that’s some going.

12 days until our next game. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? What DA does with that period is the first real challenge of his reign. Notts County are the league’s top scorers with 55 goals, with the league’s top scorer in Macauley Langstaff on 19 goals. Big, big question - how does continue to instil the kind of footballing values he wants to impress on the team without risking a demolition even worse than what we’ve witnessed today. Who’d be a football manager?

Precis
It was a shitshow and we have got a difficult game next up

Did anybody get DB's predicted score right - if they did can they help with my Lottery numbers on Wednesday please ?

Quoted from male private Nale

Jesus wept , you got any short boring stories ?

For simpletons with short  attention spans and a chip on their shoulder, you mean..?

Quoted from Dave Gilberts Left Peg

Bring back Shaun Pearson and Ben Davies, they know our squads obvious limitations

Don't be silly.

Quoted from Dave Gilberts Left Peg

Hopefully he’s resigning

Are you Yoda in disguise?

Quoted from tarka

It has to be said that, for a man with a degree in forensic biology, he does an incredibly authentic impression of Selwyn Frogatt. Articulate my bottom!

Managers are not judged on how well they speak.  He said when he took over the job that it would take a long time to get the team playing in his style, and he meant months, not weeks.  He is not responsible for individual errors that lead to goals scored against us, or the fact that some players gave up when we were 1-3 down.  As others have said, we lack quality in certain areas, and this needs to be sorted, hopefully in this window.

Quoted from Lincspoacher

Err, nope.

But thankfully, he did stay on after considering retirement. Be a sad day when he does hang his sponge up

Oops!

After yesterday we still have a decent points cushion above the bottom 2. But any risk of going back to NL for a third time must be avoided at any cost.

The case for playing it out from the back should be shelved until next season.  We do not have the luxury or time to bring in new players now and try and integrate them into a new system.

It is far more important to bring in some strong characters and leaders.  Players who can inspire others and have some fight in them  Characters who are both strong mentally and physically.  

Good luck in finding them.

We surrendered yesterday from 1-1.  The change from the first 30 mins to the rest of the game showed a remarkable and sudden capitulation at the first sign of adversity..l

On this evidence (and in some previous games) this team are likely to deliver similar performances in the relegation dogfight and as the pressures increase.

There's a lot of talk about how Artell's style is to blame, but I'm not so sure.  All of their goals came from avoidable mistakes and general sloppiness.  Ok, a couple had passing errors that led to them (mainly the first two) but be it tika-taka or not, you've got to do the basic passing right.  I don't think any of those contributing errors are a result of trying to be too clever or playing out too much, it's just shockingly sloppy.  Other than hoofing it forward every time we get the ball, if you can't make simple passes you'll always suffer.

The biggest problem was an incredibly spineless and leaky performance.  We didn't challenge enough, we didn't win enough second balls, we didn't track enough runners.   That's down to individuals on the pitch.  Artell can tell his players to play triangles, he can tell them to go long, he can tell them to do what the intercourse they want with the ball.  But if players fail to do the absolute basics once they cross that white line then he's pretty limited.

Was a bit of talk pre-game around me of a little bug in the camp before the game, which might have excused some of the flat performances if true.  

Young Braithwaite showed more heart in his cameo than 80% of the starting eleven did all game.  I completely forgot Eisa was playing until someone mentioned him earlier in this thread.  When he scores it's great but his contribution without his goals is non-existent.  A pure and utter luxury player.  I thought he put in his best shift on Friday at Salford and hoped that was the start of things to come, if anything yesterday was his laziest shift so far.  He isn't alone, so few did the bare minimum.  

Artell's said he doesn't see January as a window for mass change, not sure if that's just kidology or about dampening expectations.  But I think the worst thing he can do is let that standard set in.  I actually think we might see a couple of 'surprising' departures this week to send a message.

Quoted from TownSNAFU5

After yesterday we still have a decent points cushion above the bottom 2. But any risk of going back to NL for a third time must be avoided at any cost.

It is true that we have a cushion at the moment, but several of the clubs below us have games in hand, two of them have very wealthy owners who could spend big in the window to escape the drop zone, and we have three very tough games immediately ahead of us. We definitely need some points from these games to maintain our buffer but based on yesterday's performance it's hard to see how we will. Notts and Tranmere are both in pretty good form, and Harrogate bossed us last time out.

These next three games are vital and we need to get something from them or we will be right in the mire.

Actually thought we was very good for 35 mins problem is for other 55 we was crap but still think freak result everything they hit went in , move on & try replicate salford & first 35 of yesterday , also clear pen for us at 1-3 not given then clear pen to them given small margins & poor decisions

Quoted from 123614

Oops!

What’s your record for the most number of people you are insulting/arguing with at the same time?

Quoted from 123614

Are you Yoda in disguise?

No but you’re really boring

Quoted from HerveJosse

What’s your record for the most number of people you are insulting/arguing with at the same time?

So ok, show me who I have insulted, if I have insulted anyone it would be because they insulted me first.

Secondly, this is a public forum, I do not argue with people, I debate with them and express my opinions.

I have had this kind of ridiculous statement thrown at me several times before, and when I asked for them to prove what they were saying, not one of them came back with any proof, so I challenge you to do so!

Quoted from Dave Gilberts Left Peg

No but you’re really boring

So are you - Blocked!

Quoted from 123614

So are you - Blocked!

Bless, enjoy your beetroot

Quoted from 123614

So ok, show me who I have insulted, if I have insulted anyone it would be because they insulted me first.

Secondly, this is a public forum, I do not argue with people, I debate with them and express my opinions.

I have had this kind of ridiculous statement thrown at me several times before, and when I asked for them to prove what they were saying, not one of them came back with any proof, so I challenge you to do so!

I think you are arguing with me here . Will that do.?

First game I've been to in years. Stayed the full 96 minutes. What a game to choose.

The team seemed to totally lose what they were doing after Walsall's first goal went in. Never really recovered from that moment on. Heads totally went. Like others said, first 30 minutes were great. Unlucky to not have 2 or 3 goals in that period.

Love Danny Rose, throws himself into anything and puts a real shift in.

Glennon put in some lovely corners, feel the team should have done better to capitalise on.

A lot of players looked very tired and leggy.

Quoted from SheepGTFC

First game I've been to in years. Stayed the full 96 minutes.

Good job Stockwood doesn’t read the Fishy or there’d be a lifetime ban heading your way.