Thetownend.com

00:02, I'm tucked up in bed attempting to finish off my essay before the taxi arrives at half 7 tomorrow morning.

It's the big one, Wembley.

I'm very confident for tomorrow for some reason, not overly sure why, just have a feeling tomorrow is our day.

2-0. Connell to give us the lead, the Mr ferry to pop up on 79 Mins to win it for us!

See you all in the Green Man it seems!

COYR.

Will hopefully see you at the green man. I'm not even remotely able to sleep right now with excitement, so hope I don't miss my train!

Long time lurker, good time for a first post (hopefully).

Shouldn't you be more intoxicated for the OP SSWS?!

Would love a Connell or Risser winner...although any win will be greeted with much merriment.

Bring it on.

Can't fucking sleep tonight.

I'll be at the Green Man as soon as the doors open.

Really looking forward to dicking Chesterfield in the sunshine.

Can not see them causing us much trouble once the 20 minute nerves have settled.

4-0 win for us - at a canter.

Thanks to my employer I've made last minute arrangements for tomorrow. Not sure when I'll next get to see us at Wembley and if it's any time soon it'll be a much longer trip than it will be tomorrow so here we go...

Whatever the result it can't be a worse day than Millwall a couple of years ago.

TO make up for SWS being sober, I'd like to volunteer the fact thst I'm smashed and have recebtlu fismounted from a Boris bike for my own safety and am now bracing the bight bus. See you on. the other side, COyr!

Im not a regular on forums and have only been to 6 games this season. But, I am buzzinggggggg... if we lose the beer will drown the sorrows..... but on the other hand..... if we win....... I just can't imagine how much :pint: and :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick: and  :clap: but still i can't fucking wait

3-0 to us

2-1 defeat.

Up at fucking stupid o'clock couldn't sleep anyway off now to get the 7.30 train from Yeovil to Waterloo hoping for a good crowd today, 28,244 Swindon and 16,351 Chesterfield and a few floaters not accounted for making an attendance of 45,330.

Can't fucking wait, see you all there!

COYR!!!!

We will smash them 4-0. Off to the choo choo in a little while.

Come on you reds!

 :pint: bring it on! 3-1 Swindon

COME ON YOU REDS :) JUST BEEN SICK, FEEL SO NERVOUS!!!!!

3-0 in front of 30,000+ reds

I feel a 3-1 with Benson, Ritchie & Ferry scoring.  COYR.

Excited as fuck this morning. This WILL be a better day out than the PO game.

3-1, Benson, Ritchie and Connell.

Wembley taxi's all decked out in red and white, so see you all there.

Can't bloody sleep...can't wait for this one.

P.S. don't forget the clocks have gone forward...

Well the was a shit night sleep.I had a dream about football.  If anyone wants to know the score, well I don't know. But I do know that I made a deal in my dream that if I scored a goal with my chin in dream football we would win at Wembley.

I know this makes no sense, but I did, so we will.

COYR.

Just setting off from foggy Lincolnshire expecting to see Paolo dancing after a 4-2 thriller,dont care who scores as long as my Man Utd supporting brother in law and my Leeds Utd mate have a good day out ,only chance they've got of a wembley trip this season COYR

I had a dream we lost 2-0 to Barnet in the semi final then I got to Wembley (!!!)and had forgot my ticket.

Ummm....

I got to sleep about half 5 and don't remember my dream..

Morning all! Exciting isn't it?

Shit nights sleep. Didn't need any of the 3 alarms.
3-1 win

just about to leave the house, checked tickets about 5 times Drive safe and be in fine voice COYR's


♪ ♫  We are Paolos red and white army ♫ ♪

Just leaving now, can't wait for this I'm so excited right now.


2-0 Town win, Cibbochi and Ferry

COYR

 Just about to leave just like to say before i leave what ever happens today just sing your hearts out today and make as much noise as you can because none of us could of asked for a better season. :director:  COYR

Not leaving till 9 but up bright and early.

I'm predicting a 3.1 win for us today.

I just hope this singing section works and we get Wembley rocking

Barn storming 3-2 win  :)

Leaving at 8-30, let's hope the right Swindon turn up and we win 3-1.  Whatever happens let's just enjoy our day out COYR.

Just leaving,........COYR!!!!! Have a good one

I have a nagging feeling we're all in for a disappointing anti-climax. Again. A loss on penalties maybe?

Couldn't sleep last night. Too busy worrying if the alarm clock was going to go off.
On the 8.26 train this morning with my plastic JPT shirt but I don't give a fuck.
Lovely weather, lovely beer and a lovely 2-0 win to the town. What a day it's going to be.
COME ON YOU REDS  :beers:

Strangely relaxed and confident today, it's time for another worldy from Matt Ritchie, we will win 3-1 - can't wait.

COYR
 :D

I have a feeling we will see ET and maybe Pens! Just can't see us losing! I'm feeling confident

3-0

3-1 but a cracking day coming up whatever. 20 mins til my bus, be lonely until i get to victoria at least.

Shower check, shave check, shit.........erm no. All ready to hit the M4/M40 to Denham and then train in to Wembley.

2-0 COYR!!!!!

So excited about the day haven`t thought about the score but I think we`ll win a tight game 2-1

Just got an email from a friend asking if I have any links to the game - he's overseas. Anyone got any or can people post some if they get them please? Thanks. XX

Had a surprisingly good nights sleep. An refreshed and well up for this! 2-0 Swindon. COYR

Been so busy at work I haven't really given much thought to this before this morning.

Excited now, though.

2-1 to STFC, no need for extra time and all that shit.

I predict a cracking day out.  Sun shining, blue skies, red & white everywhere and Swindon at Wembley.

This is our day.

4 of us on the train from manchester! Its too fucking early! 2-0 Holmes and Ritchie

Buzzing.... about to drink my first beer.  4-0 Swindon, Benson hat-trick.

Just leaving Swansea. Had a rubbish nights sleep worrying if my alarm would go off at the right time!

Going to enjoy this one no matter what, learn from the mistakes of Millwall. Am sitting in the singing section so hope it's noisy!

Have a good feeling about today, 3-1 I reckon. Benson, Holmes and Connell.

COYR!

Strangely I feel more confident about this one that some of our big games recently... I'm going for a 2-0 win, don't care who scores. I have a feeling it could be more if we play our way. I'll be feeling the panic if they score first though, especially after last time at Wembley.

 I know lots of people think that win or lose it doesn't really matter in the big scheme of things but it does! Winning things is the pay off for support and stays in your memory forever! Anyone who argues that the expectation is better than the result should have been at the Millwall game, which is a memory I wish I didn't have. Today is the day we can blot out that memory - who knows when we'll be at Wembley again! COYR!!!!!!!!!!!!

Millwall was different - the whole season rode on that game and I was a bag of nerves all day. Came away hating Wembley.

Much more relaxed about today. Determined to enjoy the experience and make friends with Wembley.

9:30 in a cafe in clapham, bit of a booze last night, massive one today, COYR!

Got a bad feeling about this. 2-1 defeat.

Ha, great

Just gone through Woking

Just setting off from south London. Beer, sun, Wembley - what could be better?  Oh yeah, a 3-0 win!

Want to be hoarse tomorrow.

Stressful start to the day as my son's Swindon top couldn't be found!  After 20 mins of sheer panic it was found in the garden having not made its way in with the rest of the clean washing yesterday night.

I reckon our coach must have been one of the first to leave Swindon.  We've flown down the M4 and only around 20 mins from Wembley.

I don't tend to predict an actual score, but I feel as confident as I can.  Watching Swindon at Wembley basked in sunshine - what a great way to spend a Sunday.  Have a great day everyone.

Edit:  The Wembley arches are in sight.

Fast train to St Pancras 20 minute tube-WEMBLEY!We going to that pub we took over last time?

In Leicester square having some food then up to wembley! So up for it!

On the tube at Willesden Green to Wembley Park, absolutely buzzing and not just with a hangover. Beautiful day, going to be even better by 5pm. Come on you Reds.

Sneaking beer on a coach with no toilet was the biggest error of my life.

Waiting in Wycombe for mates/train. Come on you reds!!! Can't wait. Totally buzzing!!!

Just got to tube station, full of Chesterfield fans.
However it's a bit more friendly than last time :)

Here's wiziwig - it's listed to be on here

http://www.wiziwig.tv/competition.php?&part=sports&discipline=football&allowedDays=1&competitionid=&archive=no&sel_comp=no&p=2

Just got out of bed, head a shit and a couple of paracetamol, now going back to sleep! Buzzing for it!

Interviewed by graham mac. Autographs available free of charge.

Good evening fron China!  :D :D :D :D I am giving the bars a miss tonight and hope to keep informed of the goings on from TEF (shit internet connection here slower than dial-up!!)

Have a good feeling about today! Its sunny here in Shangahi for the first time in weeks so I am going for 3-1 to Town.

Come on You Reds and help me to banish the awful memories of last Wembley visit.

Holmes to score from 14".

Just watching the final of the Hong Kong sevens....can't see the sunshine here in Auckland (12.25am)
Fiji have just won and swindeon will as well....

Come on you redssssssssssss

Kick off 9am eastern time, trying to re-connect my rubbish internet and live stream Sky sports.

COYR from the The Bahamas..!

All the way from Russia! Come on you reds!

Swindon Town: Wes Foderingham; Alan McCormack (capt), Joe Devera, Oliver Risser, Jay McEveley; Matt Ritchie, Simon Ferry, Jonathan Smith, Lee Holmes; Alan Connell, Paul Benson

Substitutes: Phil Smith (GK), Raffaele De Vita, Alessandro Cibocchi, John Bostock, Ronan Murray

But am I talking to myself on here now?

Not quite, checking in from Canada. My roommate's already told me to shut up after singing the anthem too loudly :D

All the way from Market Lavington! COYR!  :beers:

The stream has gone! (

I'm still here but have no live stream due to crap internet. Anybody know how it is going? Does it sound good? I'm squirming in my sdeat not knowing whats appening!

Thanks 3Lft :) Back up and running.

Bit of a slow start by us, they just had a goal chalked (rightly) off for offside.

China can you listen on player? Do you have an account?

I'm here, in a sunny garden in rural France. COYR.

No account but have BBC text and TEF

Very nervy so far. Them and me.

Just a bit. No real killer instinct from either side. All the (TV) noise from our fans. COYR

China ... see your pm

Holmes doing everything right. Ritchie getting everything wrong so far.

Lester coming off

So Lester won't score three goals this time.  :)

H/T, pretty even to my mind, definitely came in to it as the half wore on. Holmes looks our best so far.

Thought Chersterfield started brightly and stopped us playing. We came into if from about the 30 minute mark, having had a couple of shorts through Holmes that on another day would have hit the back of the net. Chesterfield were unlucky not to be 1-0 up as the goal they scored seemed onside to me (although in the previous attack the decision was given the other way)

Connell's been a bit wasteful imho. Couple of half chances he has had may have been better used if they had fallen to Benson - As Benson seems to have better vision and would have picked up the midfielders that were breaking through in better positions.

really looking forward to the 2nd half, but, as always, am worried that we have had a lot of the ball and not done enough with it.

Thanks for that, most appreciated. I have tried STFC Player but the internet here is so crap, I have missed 10 minutes just trying to get onto the STFC site!
I hope we come storming out in the second half after a good pep talk! COYR

We're better when the ball is on the floor. They are better when the ball is in the air.

Holmes the only threat.

Think that Hurst is playing Holmes quite well.

Really missing Caddis on the right. Devera looks solid, but we have no attacking threat down the right, which makes everything go left and Holmes (although threatening) became quite predictable.

Two time when we looked really threatening was when McEverley switched to the right and then when McCormack went on a run.

Cmon your Reds!

Shit.

Own Goal.

Shit.

Got Chesterfield 1-0 at Stan James this morning 16-1.

You banned from Wembley too?

Any links for watching this on the internet?  Just got back from a stupid fucking arsehole trip to Shanghai where I got beaten and mugged of 500 quid and was really looking forward to watching this.

My sympathies. Look back to page 4 I think for a link.

http://www.wiziwig.tv/broadcast.php?matchid=150421&part=sports

The Tykestv one seems to work ok

I wouldn't fucking bother though

Harsh. Still half an hour to play.

Yep, are you?

Only self-imposed.

Why the fucking hell do our players keep falling over?

Fuck me that was close.

I'm sitting in a stinking Shanghai shipyard getting mugged for 2 million. China is shit. Do not buy their shit.

On a lighter matter, get a grip on the game and give it your all.

So Connell shouts at the ref and gets a yellow, Westcarr lands one on Devera and it not even a talking to

Why are we missing out the midfield?

Up there with the worst perfomances of the season.

Just hoofing it now. Useless.

So close Cibo

Hope we haven't lost Ritchie for the league.

That just sums it up!

Fuck fuck fuck.

Hope Ritchie is ok.

Utter dross all round this game. Chesterfield probably deserved it, we've offered little.


Was always secondary to the league,  so lets get it together and stuff Rovers.

Their defence was surprisingly resolute for a team that's let in so many. Perhaps Sheridan's point about playing better quality opposition every week had something to it. 

Fuckety - fuckety - fuckety- fuck!

Beaten by the better team on the day.

No creativity.

Second half Holmes was played out of the game.

Smith and Hurst played very well for them.

For us I thought that Murray and Bostock offered nothing. Ritchie is half the player without Caddis overlapping. Devera looked fairly assured as did McCormack - Both however looked shagged for the second goal. Taking off Risser totally buggered up the formation and the players looked lost. Benson and Connell huffed and puffed with little/no service and no quality. Smith and Ferry created little in midfield.

Poor and disappointing performance - Let's hope we dont have to go back there in the league!

Well that was ball breakingly disappointing. The team in general and Ritchie in particular did not do themselves justice. That illustrates to me why Di Canio is desperate to get a big physical striker as Connell and Benson are too similar. And how much do we miss Caddis??

On the plus side, McEveley looked like he had been playing for us all season and looks very decent indeed.

And let's not be sour losers (not saying that anyone has been - yet), absolute fair play to Chesterfield. They scrapped, battled and defended like their lives depended on it. Although if I was a Chesterfield fan, the question at the back of my mind would be "Why the fuck have they not played like that the rest of the season?"

I guess it goes without saying that we've got to just forget all about today and not let it affect our league form. We're the best team in the division without doubt so let's prove it.

Arse. I'm beginning not to like new Wembley.

No sour grapes, Chesterfield didn't pass it around as well as us but they had the better chances. Can't help feel we helped them out a bit in this our defending was surprisingly poor.

Thought first half Holmes and ferry were outstanding. Connell should have scored and we were generally on top.

Second half was fairly disastrous, rissers own goal was one of those things but we never got going.

Most disappointing was our inability to fashion a clear cut chance. Front two were ineffective.

Disappointed. If we had scored first I think we would have won it.

Hey ho.

That was flat and we could have played another 3 hours and not even come close to scoring. No cutting edge.

Chesterfield also has bugger all threat. We scored their first and they only got a few breakaway chances and ultimately their second goal because we over committed which we only did because we scored a goal for them.

Had 0-0 written all over it.

Matt Ritchie was wasteful all game. Holmes only every other time. I would have given Ritchie 10mins second half on the left to get into the game before hauling him off.

Flàt flat flat

Was disappointed with Di Canio's interview. Said that his senior players let him down. Implied that Risser let him down. Don't think he did. The OG was one of those things. You could say that the ball could have been cleared beforehand, or that the Chesterfield player was offside in the build up, but, that shouldn't have been the end of the game.

If Di Canio was punishing Risser by taking him off, I think that was proved to be a mistake. Without him, we had no shape, which resulted in no ability to pass the ball around and move into areas that could create chances for us.

We could have got back in it with Cibbocci's header. Phenomenal save from their keeper, who had nothing else to do other than get in the way of a defender's header in the first half. Other than that though, Cibbo didn't do alot - He ran at the defence much more than McEverley, but the quality of his passing was poor.

think I just wanna sit here and cry. This has been a crap end to a crap week!

Think I agree. Would have brought De Vita on for him and swapped wings with Holmes.

Wouldn't have brought Bostock on, because he hasn't played enough with the first team to know their passing and movement game. To me, he look just the same as Abdulla. Receive and pass. Receive and pass. Although his passes weren't that great.

Not the time for a mass inquest but gutted.

Really missed Caddis and thought chesterfield were a lot more resolute than I has banked on.

If they are bottom of league 1 then we have some serious work to do in the summer.

I don't want to play the blame game but...the goal was Ritchie's fault. He could and should have cut out the cross in the first place. There was fuck all Risser could have done about it.

I think that is the real point from today - Unless they have a load of professionals who can't be arsed upon from in 'big' games? Hmmm? Seen that somewhere before!

Too true.

I really must question the line up. Why play 2 lads who have come in on loan in the last week over players who have played all season? Kennedy? De Vita?  They were not up for the fight and were left wanting. Holmes couldn't cross a fucking t.

Risser was unlucky with the goal and can't be blamed.

Oh dear. The Mongfest begins on BBC Wilshire ::)

I thought McEveley slotted in perfectly and looked good and Holmes was our most dangerous player.

Agree about Risser though.

Well played today Guys, I know that a few Swindon fans thought you would turn us over without even turning up but the form book gets well and truly shat on on a day like today!though you were good first half and your width caused us problems but we created the clearer chances and well deserved to win it, especially with our wrongly disallowed goal in the first half!anyways I digress I just wanted to come on and wish u all the best for the rest of the season, don't let today get you down as you have a fantastic team and a fantastic manager, what you've done this season is phenomenal so keep it up and hopefully this will provide the boost we need to attempt to be able to meet u in the league next year!!!also don't let me down as you are my accumulator bet from before the season started to win the L2 title :) I want my money!!!!soapy tit wank peace out COYB

Cheers contrasts and um sod off :-D

Fair play to Chesterfield, you deserved it without a doubt.

Sky come up with their stats of 11 corners to 1 and 'posession over the last 10 minutes' of 80% to 20% in favour of Swindon and so on and it means fuck all. You got the ball in the net and we didn't.

My main disappointment is not that we lost but that we did not do ourselves justice on the day.

As I said elsewhere, Chesterfield battled, closed us down and played like their lives depended on it. But as I said then, you as a Chesterfield fan must be asking the question, "Where has that spirit been for the vast majority of the season?" Because you clearly cannot have played like that for the majority of the games this season, otherwise you would not be where you are. What do you put it down to?

They won the individual battles to the ball. We had no penetration despite dominating possession at times.

Boring stuff from Chesterfield but very effective, they deserved to win it more than we did.

Good post, apart from your disallowed goal was yards off. How could you see it was on from your end? Anyway, no hard feelings to you guys, you took your chances and we didn't. Hopefully get our revenge in L1 next year. All the best.

I think it was on side in fairness. It was border line though (certainly not yards off). Sometimes it goes your way, sometimes not. Not that it matters now.

Mistake from Di Canio to pick the loan players, could be quite a divisive move within the squad. De Vita deserved a chancr today as a reward for the effort he has put in this season. Is Ritchie believing his own hype? Best moment of the day was seeing a Muslim family posing for a photograph outside with the middle aged mum borrowing a red and white wig to wear over her hijab.

The depressing thing was the fact that we were never quicker to the ball or winning the second ball, just didn't seem to want it as much!

Also the lack of a plan B, its all a little arsenal like at times.

Yep

I agree. Although McEveley did do well I thought. What effect his selection had on team morale is anyone's guess though. Not too much we can only hope.

I don't know about that, I just think we need a big bastard centre forward (Jon Parkin would be my choice) to mix it up a bit. Which, carrying on the Arsenal theme, is probably what they need (not Jon Parkin of course but someone of that ilk ;))

Fuck me is slow going getting out of shitty Wembley on this coach.

Meh. Disappointing as hell but immaterial in the long run if we go on to win the league.

Slightly worrying that three games we've built up the most this year we've failed in, but don't think we can be too negative after the season we've had so far.

I do have fuck all idea what Ronan Murray is for though.

I take it tehouse was cup tied?

I think if anything today we would have benefited with a nippy player playing on the last shoulder to get the ball off Benson/Connell. They both bought the ball down a lot stood 5 yards to the side of the other with no one ahead.

Just back. Chesterield's game plan worked a treat and we weren't very good today. Had connell not missed his effort in the first half it could have been different. No gripes at all.
Good day out an now going for a curry and beers!!

Obviously will not mean as much as winning the league, but that was a pathetically poor performance. They let themselves down.

Very disappointing. Ferry bossed it in the first half but we never gave him a touch second half, why not? Lee Holmes has regressed beyond belief since his last spell, I know they doubled up on Ritchie but he was abysmal and our set pieces were hilarious, short corners infuriate me.

A massive shame to gas it at Wembley again- I won't go there again. Now let's put this cunty league to bed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/17419742

I am not convinced that the lass who wrote this attended the game or did any homework at all!!

It wont be the 1st time the BBC are not actually there

I was tied to the TV at the Merlin, which was frustrating as hell, since the cameras couldn't deal with the shadow, so half the pitch we never saw!!  But what we did see was poor finishing, and a lot lacking in central midfield.  McEvely looked really good, don't understand the criticism of Holmes, who was the one player who was penetrating, and there were some excellent cross field balls to him.  I understand the criticism of Ritchie, but he had two men on him - he still worked very hard, even if things didn't come off for him.

I can't get too worked up about it, because it wasn't bad....it just wasn't very good, (but then I didn't spend all that money - I could not be there) and as several have said, you have to score goals to win matches.  

I agree with that. I also liked the short corners (which I don't normally) between McEveley and Holmes.

I agree totally that they let themselves down. In general though it was a disappointing performance but not 'pathetically poor'.

Holmes was the best player on the pitch for 45. Like Ritchie as a player but he may as well have watched the game from the stands today. Opposition snuff him out without caddis.

At what point did we ever threaten with one of those corners? Or are you fishing...

Odd, I thought Mcevelly was shite, and holmes completely in the pocket of their right back.

Only town players who played like we know they can today were ferry, devera and foderingham.

Very dissapointing performance, but at least I didn't get wet

Haven't read though any of the thread. At Waterloo, still on our way home. But in short, a great day out - spoiled, yet again, by the football. We met a lot of friends, and made a few more. (Good to meet you, Jimmy O.)

Very disappointed. But, unless we fuck up spectacularly, all this should seem a distant memory in a few weeks from now.

Chesterfield stopped us playing our game. They knew our approach and halted what we wanted to do. Their first goal, lucky or not, I don't remember to be fair, killed us. They defended very well all game and we lacked the final ball. Tactically they done us. It does hurt and I'm bitterly disappointed. Shit happens

Oh well.

So long as we get the fuck out of this league - hopefully as champions - then the bad memories of Oxford x2 and Wembley will be banished for all eternity.

Twice at least. Holmes ended up in really good positions as a result of playing it short. I can't remember what happened with the final ball now (I'm in the process of erasing the whole thing from my memory) and obviously we didn't score but that's not the fault of the short corner itself.

Their right back had a great game to be fair. Although how you can think McEveley was shit is beyond me.

McEvely wasn't shit but he did lose the ball in vital areas at times. Most of the side were really bad today, so we just have move on and make sure we beat Rovers.

Well there we go....we all see things differently.  As I said before I didn't see everyone playing really badly, just not very well.  and as several have said, Chesterfield knew what they had to do to stop us and they did it effectively.  It didn't make them look good, but they scored twice, which is all it takes to win a match.  My worry is that, with the emphasis on playing good football (Arsenalesque, as was mentioned a way back) we don't really know what to do when our flair players are closed down.

She was there and I have to stick up for her - she's a very good reporter.

Well she didn't report that very well did she?

Not particularly great at research though apparently, or she might have realised that Caddis is a full back and Risser is not our captain.

Did Holmes take all of our corners today - were they all from the left?

Why we didnt think to try an inswinger to mix it up at any point I dont know.

Short corners not a fan, as we usually dont end up getting the ball in the box. Today we did but found a blue head each time.

A half-hearted synopsis from where I was (sat next to a mental woman, who got in a sulk and left 15 minutes before the end because I asked her to stop touching me):

 - Ferry was good when we used him
 - Set pieces have been mostly poor all season - we need to do something about that, as there are decent half chances to be taken
 - Connell's OHK was unnecessary - should have kept it simple and scored
 - Bostock was woeful
 - Ritchie had a number of one on one chances with the fullback and wasn't up to it... he was worryingly flat
 - It shouldn't be surprising that Risser ballsed up - he lets the ball drop and looks shakey in defence, it wasn't even one of those own goals where you could sympathise, it was just shite
 - Holmes looked good in patches, but again, delivery was poor
 - Murray - not based on just today, but he needs to be sent back - he offers nothing, and will never change the game when required
 - Atmosphere was half decent where i was, and the weather was ace
 - McEveley was steady although on today's showing didn't look markedly better than Cibocci
 - We didn't really deserve to lose (or win)... it was only after Risser fucked up that Chesterfield looked dangerous, but that was by catching us on the break as we over-committed forward
 - Ref made some stupid decisions

Ritchie also needs to try going outside his man.

He turned in every time today - so easy to defend against. At least mix it up, Holmes at least went inside and outside and gave their full back something to think about.

A day that promised so much, in the end delivered very little in terms of football.

We are at our best on the wings and from the word go our wingers weren't given the time or space to run at their man or whip in a tantalising cross. Holmes did marginally better than Ritchie against the impressive Hurst, but both weren't allowed to get into the swing of things which obviously worked massively in Chesterfield's favour.

Only players who played anything like their usual selves for me were Devera, Foderingham and Ferry. The rest were way, way below average. The goal came in the cruellest of fashions in the form of an own goal, but they really did create the more clear-cut chances, with our lack of a cutting edge up front oh so evident. The new boys were both utter shite; McEveley looked so unconfident and uncomfortable it's unreal, while Bostock made his fair share of mistakes in a short cameo. It's their first appearance, so I'll wait to pass judgement on them properly though.

The thing that really pissed me off was the hoards of people leaving after the second goal went in; without these players on the pitch, we wouldn't have got to Wembley so, despite a sub-standard performance, they still deserve our appreciation and support.

But hey, we move on and now focus on the title. Every time we've lost recently, we've really hit back and displayed a true bounce-back-ability. Let's hope Bristol Rovers are in for a thrashing!

What a load of old bollocks that was.

I had a bloke who hadn't showered for a couple of days to my left, and a kid who couldn't handle his beer effing and jeffing through the whole game behind me. I wouldn't have minded the swearing if the kid had a clue what he was talking .

Chesterfield pressed us and kept their shape and discipline really well. We played good football in patches but sometimes you just want a player to put his laces through the ball (both in attack and defence).

Been back an hour. Just watching the re run. Missed Rissers own goal getting a hotdog for my lad.

Poor, but that is based on the high expectations we now have. Will review my opinions once I have watched all the game. Consoling myself with a cup of Earl Grey and some mini eggs given a present for my birthday on Friday.

Onwards and Upwards.

I thought that getting there, finding a good pub, finding the parking place I had booked all went too smoothly, something had to go wrong. It just wasn`t to be today and Di Canio decision to play the new players signed this week didnt work. They both looked very average. Chesterfield looked there to be beaten but we didnt have the ability to sort out the final ball. Too many average performances, unfortunately. So pleased it wasn`t a play off final...disappointing but not the end of the world. Di Canio is going to be hero or villian and today he got it wrong. How he copes in League 1 only time will tell. Cant bring myself to watch the recording I made of it.....

Thought Ferry was our best player by a mile today, those balls he kept pinging out to the left wing were pretty much spot on every time. He looked composed on the ball and most of the attacking play from us was through him. Overall a poor performance, but it's hardly the end of the world. Mcevely didn't offer much offensively, but was pretty solid at the back and didn't make many slip ups. Cibo was terrible when he came on.

I dont really understand a lot of the posts criticising the performance? Yes the performance was below what you would expect in a cup final but saying the players were woeful and pathetic is a bit over the top. Had that been a league game we would be saying it was just a matter of taking chances and that we were unlucky. It seems the cup final has marred some peoples view on the game. Both teams were nervous to begin with, we began to settle into the game after about 20 minutes or so and a town goal looked forthcoming. We didnt take our chances and they punished us after a slow start in the second half. That was about it for the whole game really, the second goal was because our players pushing forward trying to equalise, had we got the first goal im sure it would have been a similar story! We knocked the ball around well at times and Chesterfield did what they had to do to nulify the threat. It was by no means an embaressment or a let down, those players worked hard to get to the final and worked hard in the final itself. At the end of the day one sloppy piece of defending decided it.

On individuals, there were a few that were better than others but again no-one was a 'let down'. Suprised to see Mceveley in the starting lineup and although he wasnt bad he wasnt great either. Devera, Ferry and Foderingham had good games. The others were OK, and collectively below average. That's why we were beaten. The point im making is that some fans shouldnt over exaggerate about what happenened today, the players lost that game after a tough battle and when it came down to it the Chesterfield team were better equipped for a battle. They won, we lost. Let's move on and win the league! 'Que sera, sera...'

My take on it:  hated the way two new players came straight into the squad and both got on the pitch, have a horrible feeling it could well hit the togetherness we seem to have - if you were good enough to go to Exeter or Southend and see us through then you deserved to be in the squad for Wembley.  Shot yourself in the foot doing that PDC.  Should have won the game in the first half when we were well on top, sadly no takers in front of goal and why try the spectacular when a simple pass will do.  Half time and I still thought we could go on an win it, one minute into the secondhalf and disaster!  From there on we totally lost the plot, PDC being the worst culprit with some strange substitutions, why the fuck was Ritchie left on the pitch, thought he was totally ineffective today - as he has been since Caddis has been injured, oh how he missed him.  We seemed to starve Lee Holmes in the second half, hardly a decent ball going out to him.  Playing three at the back was always going to be a risk when we were chasing the game, sadly they got the second right at the end, although in truth they could have had one or two more.  The worst thing for me was that the game was there for the taking, they were not a good side at all and I believe if we had got the first goal we would have gone on and win it comfortably.  Still cannot believe that squad selection!!  Flint looked very dejected at the end when he came onto the pitch and Ritchie showed today he has a bit of an attitude problem that is best kept back on the training field. Goo day out, wrong result!

nice to meet leefer & dv, 1st half the atmos was superb, 2nd half it went a bit millwall, that is all :headhurts:

I thought we outnumber them by 2 to 1, yet they seemed a lot noisier than us!

McEveley is getting some seriously mixed reviews here...for what it's worth, I didn't think he stood about as being particularly bad or particularly good on the day. But I thought Holmes was tearing their full back apart, so what do I know?

Haha, I missed the first goal getting a hotdog for my daughter.

McEv wasnt good or bad.

Infact his performance was very Kennedy like if anything.

One worrying aspect for the last few games, last three away games we have lost 2-0 and not really looked like scoring.  Need to turn that around and quickly.

He didn't look out of place, which, given the circumstances, i.e. the fact that he was making his debut at Wembley only about 2 days after signing, was quite impressive in my book.

Maybe after more than a couple of days with the squad he'll improve his understanding and be better?

Lost count of the number of chances we've created and squandered; not just in today's game but throughout the season. On our day (Which today obviously wasn't!) we are strong in every single area apart from upfront. If we had a good, solid partnership up top our goals for column would be in 3 figures by now.

tis true but his end product was shocking today.

I'm just disappointed the lads who have been with this club all season playing in this trophy were not given a chance to play. DeVita, Kennedy. Also (i've not read all this) where was flint?

I agree fully. You got to earn the right to play for the prize. PDC obviously saw it as strengthening our chances, I think it is madness for two players to make debuts at Wembley. That is my opinion.

Didn't help Bostock had a stinker when he came on either. Not saying that he isn't a good player. We'll see.

McEveley tried to get the ball down and out to Holmes.

None of the above were the main factors of our loss. The main factor was not scoring first, as Ciobocci is god said. Could have gone either way, though it was always worrying how fragile our defence looked.

And while I think Holmes was our best player in the first half his end product did let him down.

And you to,thanks for organising a good day out.
We were second best second half and though we had some good moments over all i think we played to deep meaning our wide players were having to do a lot of work just to get to the 18 yard box.
Foderingham played well and over all we did ok.....but for me the result was just about right.

Reason why we lost was because we didnt have a decent left or right back.

Needed a Caddis or a decent left back to provide supporting runs and hence options to both Ritchie and Holmes.

Not sure why Wes kept on kicking the ball to Ritchie in the first half as Ritchie was always marked by 2 players.  Holmes in comparision had loads of space.  Thought he was are only good player.

Can see why Di Canio doesn't rate Connell, poor first touch, had a poor understanding with Benson (Benson won loads of flicks and Connell never knew where to go)

Overall Chesterfield deserved the win as the chances they created were of quality, whilst Swindon never looked like scoring in a month of Sundays.

Ah well, onwards and upwards

The best part of the day was seeing Sir Lee Peacock sitting with us fans, the man is a legend !!! And I don't want to go to Wembley for at least another year or so !!!

Totally agree - Hate to say it but a Charlie Austin would fill his boots.
This team needs another Striker and I would not be surprised if we pay a price for a decent one if (when) we go up.

I really thought that today was going to be the complete opposite to Millwall and up until half time everything was going to plan.

The atmosphere in the ground was fantastic before the game and in the first half, the singing areas seemed to really work, I was in line with the six yard box dugout side and our fans were defeaning at times. Second half was a bit quiet but I think the goal came as a shock to all of us especially so quick after half time.

We played ok first half, Chesterfield started better but once we settled down there was only one team in it. If Connell had shown a bit more composure with his chance we get the lead and go on to win the game, but it wasn't to be.

Didn't understand Paolo's subs, he didn't need to panic going to a 3-4-3 so early, also dont think Mceverley and Bostock should have been involved, Wembley is not a place to make your debut and the players that got us to Wembley deserved to play at Wembley. I do wonder if that had an effect on the morale within the squad.

Feeling rather down in the dumps now as it is three 2-0 defeats in a row away from the CG and we need to stop that if we are going to be Champions. That said we are top of the league for a reason and i'm sure todays events will make Paolo and the players even more determined (if that is even possible) to win the title.

Disappointed at Wembley again, we seemed to give up in the second half, even PdC wasn't quite so animated! Great day out though and was kept amused by the guys around me including the guy infront who managed to sleep through the whole of the first half!

When we conceded the first goal, so person near where i sat went a bit mental and completely smashed one of the seats in half !

Hello.  Just back.  Not taking it as badly as some of the people on here and twitter have done.  Didnt take our chances.  Didnt get the rub of the green.  We always lose at (new) wembley.

Ref was inconsistent.  No idea why he booked connell, no idea why he gave a free kick for someone running in front of holmes and falling over.  That stopped us in a good attacking position.  The second goal looked to come from a very high boot putting our player on the ground.  But thats not why we lost.  Just a little annoyance.  I always hate the refs anyway.

Just didnt cut it in the final third today.  Crosses were poor and overhit or too near the keeper, shots we had were weak.  

We do forget that we have been playing for a few weeks without our captain which has neutered our most attacking side.  Our central defence was 2 central midfielders.  Injuries have cost us.

Sod it, never mind.  Its just the JPT.  Lets move on and have a backlash against the gas.

Great say out, shame about the football but oh well, let's focus on the league.

I'm starting to dislike wembley.

For gobbing off. It was a corner but the ref/lino gave a goal kick and Connell let fly.

Of course he did.  The decision was fucking stupid.  Booked because the ref and lino are fucking blind.  Brilliant.  Probably get a £1000 fine as well.

And, yes I'm still pissed off.  Twice at the new Wembley, and we've yet to up once.

Not too annoyed, but can we please score at Wembley please?

Atmosphere was 10x better than the Milwall game and just lacked in the final third.

I'll leave you with the brilliance of the Adver comment section.

The final third is what it's all about and it is why Di Canio is so desperate for a certain kind of striker. That would have made all the difference today and this was really the only area where we fell down - albeit a very key area.

And man alive, have we missed Caddis. Perversely, I am actually going to vote for him for POTY  based on the games he HASN'T played.  I had decided on McCormack and he is still ace, but we have missed Caddis so much it's ridiculous and through his absence, he has shown how vital he is to the team.

Obvious daytripper just back from the game!

Sweet. Baby. Jesus  :no:

You always learn more about a player when he's absent than when he plays.  Your point is extremely valid.  I will probably still vote for McCormack, but Caddis is very deserving.

Who else saw the nearly fisticuffs down the front of block 135? I think that was the highlight of the second half for
me

Yea, saw that. No clue why that guy got so angry.

He had a beer in the Green Man also....he was loving it.

He said a few weeks ago how much he loved the club and was now a fan and a few cynical cunts were saying, "well he would say that wouldn't he...." and so on.

He has proved those people to be the cynical cunts that they are. Actions speak louder than words.

Good weather, good beer, good Atmosphere, poor performance, crap result and decent day out overall.

Shit happens, bring on Rovers!

Di Canio’s naivety as a manager shone through today in his selection of two loan players who only joined this week.  An absolutely ridiculous game to throw them into and as others have said, completely unfair on those who missed out when they’ve put in the work to get us there.  His substitutions also left a lot to be desired – very strange all round.

We were by far the better side in the first half and had Connell taken a bit more time with his effort instead of attempting an overhead kick, could have been 1-0 up at the break.  I was still settling for the second half when we conceded and most of our group missed the goal completely.  There’s always a risk when you’re playing somebody at CB and it’s not their natural position that they’ll make a costly error.  I’m sorry for Risser that it was today of all days, I expect he’s devastated.  Seemed odd that Flint wasn’t on the bench, because a straight swap could have been done when Di Canio brought him off?

It was a disappointing display all round and the majority of players were well below the standard we have come to see from them.  To be honest, we could still be playing now and I doubt we’d have scored.  The amount of corners and crosses into the box that were wasted was criminal.

A lot of people don’t seem overly bothered, but I feel quite disappointed.  It’s not nice to be losers at Wembley twice in 3 years.

We also really need to pick ourselves up and refocus on the League.  I’m genuinely worried that our last 3 games away from the CG (including today) have all ended in 2-0 defeats  On the basis that we have 5 away games left and only 4 home, we need to start picking up points again away.  The thought of us buggering up the League and ending up back at Wembley in the Play Offs is unbearable!

Gutted frankly, I honestly thought we could win this.

Performance just wasn't there.

1st half we were ok-ish I though. 2nd there was nothing.

Ritchie was non existant, he REALLY misses Caddis.

Still, Green man was good again. and singing 'We are Swindon, we're top of the league' was something I got to experience for the first time.

Oh, and I got a picture with Lee Peacock in the pub, so not too bad.

I am sure mcevaly is a lovely guy but the choice to start with him was odd. Seeing a loan player go into the starting line up at wembley in a cup final having played no part in getting the team there if I was cibo or Kennedy would have me big style miffed.

Agree with someone who said earlier paolo hit the panic button to soon in going 3-4-3 so soon after going behind.

Ritchie without caddis is no where near the same player. 

Ronan Murray ..... like most would rather have had billy bodin.

I hate wembley. Knock down the arch and bring back the twin towers we never lost with those bad boys!!!

Arse - that is all

Well going out on a limb I thought McEvely and Holmes were both very poor.Holmes had so much posession 1st half but went past the full back once.McEvely's distribution was piss poor.I thought it was a disgrace they both started.Ferry and Benson were the only players who came out of this game with any credit and as for Murray and Bostock both fucking shit should never have got on either of 'em.Dont care if I get criticised but PDC totally to blame for this non-performance

That was fucking bollocks. Chesterfield  weren't brilliant, but did a good job on us, and deserv ed to win. Fair play also to their fans, good bunch, spoke to loads throughout the day, and i thought even though outnumbered they were quite noisy.

Just got in. Pissed as a fart. Couldn't give a shit about the result, we will still win the league. Fuck em all.
COME ON YOU REDS.

Fair comment

Really? I thought Holmes was our most effective player in the first half because he kept making loads of space and some of his ball were decent, he was a lot more effective than Ritchie. McEvelely looked a good assured left back to me, and didn't do anything wrong for me, not the most attack-minded full backs but look good for me. Ferry was brilliant agree with that, Benson was quiet we delivered a lot of balls and corners and he was just a yard too slow today. Murray was crap, and when Bostock came on we had stop playing football by then, so he struggled to settle into the game.

Holmes to me,although involved a lot just did not deliver for me.Just dont understand the praise for McEvely at all-thought he looked awful.Thought Benson was the only forward who actually held the ball up and although it maybe have been too late for Bostock to make an impression his first touch was shocking.

Had a very good day out but another woeful performance at Wembley.

Ok first half but the second was as bad as I have seen this season and up there with most of last season....utter shite.

Worse than the millwall disaster was unlike mil wall, Chesterfield were shite....but through battle and determination ....won the game...fair and square.

Saying all that....this was a big day out and icing on the cake....so let's win the league and ....fuck em all!

I echo that pretty much word for word - Di Canio's stock will have fallen somewhat today from those on the outside, looking  in (e.g. West Ham) due to his naiveity

In other news, I stopped drinking at half-time and have a stinking hangover at 10.15 in the evening. Other than that, seemed like the atmosphere was far better than Millwall, but in a stadium that size we'll always be asking a lot to get the chants reaching all corners of our half of the ground effectively.

Im dissapointed we lost but at least it was only the JPT i guess. It was Millwall all over again for me sadly though. We had possesion but did nothing with it. I thought we were ok first half without creating anything. Second half though we were bollocks though. Not sure why McKevely started. He should have gone with Cibo in my opinion. Stick to what you know. Today again highlighted how much we miss Caddis as well.

Our support was awful again. Im not sure I want to go back to Wemley. Our support there just frustrates me. Chants just didnt catch on sadly even in the singing section and the usual generic chants as well.

We can still win the league and let's be honest it is he biggest prize we could have gained back in August and it be quality if we do.

Yep IOB we just cant seem to crank it up at Wembley

Which annoyed me a lot more today than the result did.

TBF Wembley is just shit acoustics wise.............it is just typical of the FA to spend a spunk load of cash on a ground that can't grow grass properly, has seat way to far away and manages to make any sound/noise appear to have come from unique fishbowls..........creating a din of noise with nothing legible to anyone but the person sat next to you.

We played like you would expect for a side with no right back, and a midfielder at centre back.  Bottom line was we failed to defend and were woefully to slow getting the ball from front to back.

Paolo needs to develop a plan b for games like this his tactics normally work but when we face teams intent on spoiling we need to work an alternate option. 

Well done chesterfield on the win.

Shite game to watch terrible quality and an awful advert for lower league footy.

Must be just me but I didn't think Chesterfield threatened us at all until we went to 3 at the back & were getting caught on the break. But fair play to them they scored & we didn't.

And that was the main problem, we just didn't look like scoring.

We didn't play great, but I don't think we were shite either, and the one thing with this group of players is that even though it wasn't going well they kept trying, unlike most of the shite from last season.

Think a lot of people, myself included were surprised how hard it was to break them down. The truth being I think they wanted it more than us. Feel disappointed tonight but we will have our day with promotion which was the real aim all along. Bring on the Rovers.

I thought Holmes was absolute bollox. He saw so much of the ball and did fuck all with it. His shooting was fucking dire as well. Ritchie was even worse. Benson did hisd best and Connell showed why he keeps getting dropped. Ferry was good but Smith wasn't. As for the defence, how many fucking times did they have a 1 on 1? I felt sorry for Risser with the goal - their player did exactly what Holmes and Ritchie didn't - put it hard and low in the box.
Overall I thought we were shite and Chesterfield deserved their win. how many balls did they ping behind our full backs?
As for the atmosphere, i was in block 131 and I couldn't hear much.
The Green Man was better after the game than before it because you could gget a fucking drink.
Yet another fucking wanky day out at Wembley.
Roll on Rovers and than God this final is behind us. 

real real shit to lose. the same as milwall.

missed caddis as said above but we have enough good players, but they just didnt put it together unfortunately

saw joey devera in a wembley taxi rank afterwards. he said it was shit. which it was

but at least with this team and this manager we know we'll bounce back, just tough to take today

Just got back from Wembley, all be it after an episode at Reading on the train involving a couple of drunk Swindon fans and ridiculous O.T.T old bill...that's another story in itself though....

onto today...well 2 visits to Wembley now and 2 defeats with 0 goals seen for Swindon, a worrying performance that saw Chesterfield see our gameplan and close down very well. Ritchie was poor and has been for 4/5 weeks now which is worrying...whether he is missing Caddis only time will tell??! Not sure what it was but it felt like we were the Wigan side that played against us in the FA Cup (dominating possession but didn't really go anywhere?)...Connell should have scored 1st half, guess he didn't realise how much time he had on his hands.

Didn't see the 1st goal as was finishing off my pint where I saw the Chesterfield end bouncing around, just thought they were welcoming back their side after half-time, how wrong was I?...Atmosphere was a lot better than the Millwall game and good to see us take 29k. Just shows the potential we can have if we move up the leagues.

Anyway enough of blabbing, I'm tired, cranky, pissed and gutted (yes people will say it's only the JPT but to lose 'there' twice in 3 years and score 0 goals is a bit frustrating to say least)...up at 7am for work & another long week!

Keep the faith! C.O.Y.R -We'll bounce back! (Just hope we keep going in the league and go up automatically now-not sure if I could take another visit 'there' and see us be defeated again :S )

At last someone I concur with.How can people say Holmes was good?Pathetic effort from our best opening second half and delivery piss poor.

If it hadnt of been for the own goal i'd have bet my house on it finishing 0-0 after 90 minutes. Neither team looked like scoring.

I dont think Holmes was bollocks. He put in a few decent crosses and had a few decent shots but not enough considering the time, space and service he had during the game. Still our only likely threat though.

Thought Holmes was still one of the few players who looked like creating something today. Far to often our wide men were isolated and were continually forced to play it backwards, for me that was pretty much the pattern for the whole game. Credit to them for making us do this.

Having just about calmed down after today's result i am about to watch the highlights(?!) of today's game. Anyone else bothering to watch it?!

Completely agree. It was extremely frustrating watching Holmes try and take on their left back, hitting it into him EVERY TIME, and losing possession. The odd time he did get a cross in, it wasn't the best of deliveries.

I was comfortable being 1-0 down so early in the second half. We had 40 minutes to score a goal or two. First half we dominated, and being the 'second half team' we are, I wasn't nervous at all. Then it gradually reached 70th-80th minute and I was getting a little nervous, getting flashbacks of Millwall.

In the end though, we had no chances. I remember a Connell volley and a header that the keeper pushed over the bar. Other than that, did we really threaten their goal? Chesterfield had a couple of one-on-ones, one of which he shanked it wide, the other which he slotted right at the end. They probably deserved it, having had the better chances, although we had majority of the possession and played the neater football. Still not the same football we've been used to this season.

Also have no idea why we played McEveley. Nor why Bostock came on. He was utter bollocks, despite my spurs supporting friend saying that he's 'sick' and he'll 'score a goal'.

I've got the 'highlights' on.

Doubt i'll watch it all.

Yeah watching it on my laptop. Missed the own goal. Feel sorry for Risser.
See how many chances we actually had. Whether we played better on TV than IRL.

I feel for him too, it was harsh. Will be good to see what actually happened close up rather than from the far end of the ground. The commentators are doing my head in going on about Paolo's scarf - i know the football wasn't great but still!

Love the fact Paolo had his bobble hat in the dugout!

He's quite wise, you never know what the English weather might do!!

I just want to say thanks to the guy from swindon in the bogs who told my old man he's a glory supporting cunt after supporting the town for 50 years and having a season ticket for the whole of the 60s and 70s makes you proud to be
from swindon dont worry ive told the old cunt

 stop eating and buy a season ticket for next year instead!

Quite a miss from Connell there. I thought he made much more contact and was much closer to the goal. He had so much time

Well this is depressing.

You talk more sense than most!

Abso-fucking-lutely. We wouldn't have put ourselves under so much pressure or conceded another if it wasn't for Paolo's rash decision to go 3-4-3.

Regarding the criticism Holmes has received for his performance, I think it pretty much summed up the entire day - full of promise but didn't deliver.

This. Got out wide and attacked the full back in the first half. Should have scored and was our only attacking threat even if the final ball was lacking. By comparison yesterday Ritchie, Benson and Connell were bollocks.

Strangely enough the non-regular I went with said he thought Connell looked better and tried harder than Benson. I think neither looked good thanks to the lack of service.

Beaten by another kick and rush team. They had a game plan, stuck to it and it worked. We tried to out-play them which didn't work and then resorted to lumping it forward.

It was plain to see that Chesterfield had a massive kick up the arse at half time.

Overall we were just far too wasteful in possession, continuously looking for the hollywood ball or looking to put one in the top corner from 30 yards.

Overall, a disapointing day out. But a day out nevertheless. Something which a lot of clubs won't get this season. The sinking feeling of loosing at Wembley wore off quite quickly, when considering the rest of the season and our likelihood of promotion. I feel that this may not be the case for Chesterfield. The high of winning the cup will soon be a memory, and relegation will loom once again.

Performance wise, i think they were the better team. They had a tactic which they stuck to and it worked. We seemed to lack creativity from the centre of midfield, something which I thought Bostock would add but he didnt. Holmes played well considering the service he was given; likewise with Connell and Benson - they won there fair share of headers but the killer ball was always missing.

It was clear to me that we need another centre back. We can't continue with midfielders playing out of position. Despite how good McCormack is. McEverly didn't impress me at all, Cibocci was far superior when he came on.

Oh well, onwards and upwards! COYR!

A day off and it's sunny, so this is lifting my spirits a bit.

When we got home my wife asked the boys what the best part of the day was, to which the answer was the meal on the Harrow Road on the way home - about sums it up.

It is easy to forget how new PDC is to management, and he came across as a bit naive yesterday in many ways - his team selection was wrong (IMO), he didn't adjust tactics to account for the much wider pitch (we play very narrow at the CG and our midfielders were isolated in the wide open spaces), and in some of his post match comments.

Hopefully lessons have been learnt - now back to the league.

I think two things sum it up really :

1) When Paolo said we played the better football but were ineffective
2) The fact that his naivety shone through by playing the 2 new loanees and poor substituions.

Don't think anyone had a rally bad game just not as good as we expect or know. The own goal changed it all.  I think that as someone has already said we need a plan B (maybe get Ritchie to play on the left ??). The balls into the box were ineffective and too samey and their CB's did well - lets have some variation and blast some low and hard or cut it back.  

Had a good day though - all in all not a bad season.

Me too

Disappointing day, but promotion far more important

Not really much to say about it really, still a bit down tbh

Played well first half without being able to find the back of the net. Holmes did ok in my book but I wasn't too impressed with the short corners. Ritchie pretty much double marked so totally ineffective. Chesterfield defended well, hence Benson and Connell not getting a sniff
Don't think the loan players should have been starting over the ones that got us there

On the plus side, I have some cash left as drinking in the Green Man was pretty much impossible, won't be doing that again
So will go out for a nice brekkie later and then clean my filthy car

Anyone else sat near me with the lad with the mega phone shouting abuse so everyone could here himsaelf, my poor kids were scared stiff of the drunken yob my little boy was quite upset  with him sat right behind us.finally got turfed out by stewards obviously we wernt the onlyones pissed off. >:(

To add, just seen the first goal as we missed it yesterday half time beer an all that

Not much Risser could have done about it, shame for him

Just to say i had a great day out,regardless of the result,and we are going to have some great days out next season also.
The Green man was rammed but pretty well organised i thought and in the main both sets of fans were a credit.
Looking forward to turning the Gas off on Saturday now.

And let's give a special mention to Leefer who approaches his 10,000th post.

Mcevely (sp) was so much better than cibbochi it was embarrassing. Ok it was his debut but what did he actually do wrong? He had composure on the ball, took his time and pretty much every time found a man in red. Cibbochi when he came on put his first 3 touches off the pitch, there was a gulf in class between the two and I see this as a great signing for the rest of the season and next. Yes he didnt gun forward too much but that will come, however defensively and with the ball he was leagues above cibbochi and kennedy.

Hadn't noticed that. :D

I thought McEveley played well too be fair, very composed, won alot of headers and had good positioning, I am a huge Cibo fan, and even I felt Mceveley was the better of the two yesterday

Dont agree Mex,i didn't think he was that good yesterday,certainly not a level above what we have anyway...did he cross the halfway line,get any crosses in....good player and your view on him may come to fruition,but not on yesterdays showing in my book.
We all see it differently though because a friend gave him our MOM!

Oh and happy 10,000th to me.

First and foremost he is a defender, chesterfield got fuck all down that side. The thing I found most impressive about him however was he never lost possession and I can't remember one misplaced pass. As for not crossing the half way line that's bollocks i'm afraid, he was always supporting Holmes, ok not overlapping but was always available for the pass and he whipped in a few good crosses. I think those that went should watch the game on tv and I am certain then you will re evaluate your opinion of him.

And congrats/commiserations on 10,000 posts.

Will do,got it recorded and will give it a watch later....maybe i was harsh about the halfway line and i am a big fan of Cibbochi and my judgement may be dimmed by the fact i thought Cibbochi should have started the match for sure.

I think McEveley looked solid, if not spectacular. I think i'd have just liked Kennedy or Cibocchi to play instead of giving him his debut, i doubt it would have changed the result in any way, however.

Talking of watcvhing the highlights, I think I need to see them, as despite reading what Risser has to say, my initial reaction was that he could and should have done better, and was hindered by his chronic lack of mobility.

How did westcarr stay on the pitch after his punch on devera?

Tans - cos the referee was a cock!!  Total and utter and the linesman on the dug-out side was even worse.  The assault on Connell which didn't even warrant a talking to, the offsides the lino missed in the first half - I got the feeling if we had scored he would have found a way of not allowing it.  A clear foul on Connell in the build-up to the second goal, although the game ws lost by then anyway.  Not a really controversial report from anybody, although I did think Holmes contributed more than he has been given credit for.  Ritchie was piss poor, he should have made way for Murray.  The og was a disaster for Risser, but had Ritchie done his job and stopped Westcarr getting the ball in it wouldn't have occurred.  After a good night's sleep I still think the same way about it, wrong team sent out - terrible to give debuts to two brand new players.  Just hope it has not affected morale too much.

Not seen the challenge/assault on Devera yet, is it bad?

Agree with comments about the officials - a number of GK/corner decisions were given the wrong way for both teams, and a few offsides seemed to be missed. Agree that there was a foul on Connell just before the second goal too.

However, that's not why we lost. The defeat is purely down to our inability to break them down, and our inability to put it in the net with the chances we did muster up.

lot of criticisdm for Rithie and Holmes on here, both saw lots of the ball (mainly thanks to ferry) but I dont recall either getting past their full back once....but perhaps maybe we should give the full backs a little more credit?

Chesterfiled were a lot better than I thought they were going to be tbh, I was expecting a shambles. Alright, they werent exactly barca going forward but for a team at the bottom I thought they defended very resolutely...fair play to them.

And fair play to spirite fans, had some good banter with a group of them in the globe beforehand...

Who was named man of the match? I similarly thought their full-backs were strong, but would have given it to their centre-half (Hurst?).

One of my gripes at the start of the first half was the poor (or lack of) link up between McEveley and Holmes down the left.  But then I thought that that improved noticeably as the first half wore on.  As others have said, Wembley probably not the right time/place to make your debut so, to an extent, I have some sympathy for him.

Do we lack a plan B when our wingers are nullified/we are losing? 3-4-3 doesn't seem to work, yesterday and Oxford prove that... (i don't know if we went 3-4-3 against Crewe?)

Well his fist connected with Devera's face. Was about as clear a red as you'll see, Ref/linos just completely missed it.

I thought the support to our wingers was lacking a bit. There were not many overlaps etc. Thought their full backs coped quite well overall.

looked like a poor mans Arsenal on a bad day. No plan b and nothing on the bench that could change it.
Plenty of possession but no cutting edge.
Just didn't happen for us.

Saw loads of old friends and had a good day overall.

Do we have another summer involving a high player turnover on the horizon?

I think we had 4 loan players on the pitch at various stages yesterday (McEvaly, Bostock, Holmes, Murray).

I did hope that after the shuffling last summer and in January we would have a really strong core and only need 3/4 additions.  But I can see 8/9 players coming in and with a similar amount going out?

I know that a lot of the player wages have been subsidised by Arbib/Black but the reliance on individuals no matter how wealthy worries me given the financial perils which this club has faced in the not to distant past.

I just think PDC got it wrong yesterday.  From starting with a loan player making his debut which as someone said could easily be a devisive factor within the squad. Then the Risser off, Murray on substitution which caused us to lose all shape.  If there were 10 or 15 minutes left then fine but it just looked a changed that had panic written all over it!

Any news on Caddis? Has he had a setback or just a slightly too slow recovery?

Left footed player with no great turn of pace favours his better foot  - Shock

Which is why we should try using him on the left now..

Disagree Mex. As soo as Chibo came one we had much more attacking threat down the left. He overlapped so much more than McEverley did. I dont think McEverley did much wrong but Chibo offered us more. He should have started.

Ritchie did his best in difficult circumstances. Devera (who had a good game on the whole) only got beyond him once, and fluffed the cross.

Can't help thinking that Kennedy would have given more attacking support yesterday - at least with him on the pitch we would have had one full back comfortable getting forward and whipping in crosses.

And while I am doing a bit of gentle PDC bashing, what was the point of Smith on the bench yesterday? Foderingham can save penalties too, so we had immediately limited our options off the bench.

Like all sub keepers, absolutely none unless the regular keeper gets injured!

We may not have got past Wimbledon if he hadn't saved those 3 pens, so no complaints for me. But this can't have been PDCs thinking given the squad selection.

My view on yesterday for what it's worth:

* Chesterfield full backs closed down Holmes and Ritchie very quickly so largely nullified our main threats.
* We baldy miss Caddis.
* Playing two midfielders as CB clearly doesn't always work.
* Benson and Connell had bugger all service and most of what they got was lumped up to them.
* The back four had no real pace.
* McEvely (sp?) looked alright, didn't get forward in support of Holmes as much as I'd have liked.  Needs to work on his passing because I lost count of the number that hit the guy who was closing him down. 

I think everyone's disappointed because they know the team can play much better than that but Chesterfield have to take a lot of credit because they defended and closed down really well.

Having just seen the highlights, Westcarr should never have been on the pitch at the end. Disgraceful behaviour.

It was... should face a 3 game ban for that now seeing as no action was taken at the time.

what did he do? cant bring myself to watch highlights, thanks

Gave Devera a right hook, after both were doing a bit of shirt pulling.

Think this is spot on. I was going to post about Devera getting in behind once and fluffing his lines, but he can be forgiven as he's not strictly a RB.

As loads of people have already stated, playing the 2 new loanees was a mistake, they need to be given time to get to know how we play. Bostock looked lost and it took Mcevilly a while to get going.

Chesterfield defended very well, but it didn't help that some of our crossing and passing was pretty wayward. The chance where Murray burst down the left and then punted the ball out of play, overhitting the cross badly was case in point.

Oh my days, that was frustrating.

Holmes was in acres of space at the back too. Little things like that really add to the frustration!

We have a few chances where if we hadnt have fluffed it we would have been in a great position to score. Another example was Holmes when he got the ball in plenty of space when we had men forward in the box and he slipped. We lost the momentum of the move and they had time to get men back. Little things like that show it simply wasnt our day again.

Yep, that one as well was really frustrating. I was queueing for the toilet most of the half time break, my dad said that part of the pitch where Holmes slipped was heavily watered at half time? any reason why, it was in the shade the whole time!!

(Murray's run was down the right hand side - my bad)

My view on yesterday for what it's worth:

* Chesterfield full backs closed down Holmes and Ritchie very quickly so largely nullified our main threats.
* We baldy miss Caddis.
* Playing two midfielders as CB clearly doesn't always work.
* Benson and Connell had bugger all service and most of what they got was lumped up to them.
* The back four had no real pace.
* McEvely (sp?) looked alright, didn't get forward in support of Holmes as much as I'd have liked.  Needs to work on his passing because I lost count of the number that hit the guy who was closing him down. 

I think everyone's disappointed because they know the team can play much better than that but Chesterfield have to take a lot of credit because they defended and closed down really well.


This pretty much sums up my thoughts on the game, the only thing I would add is that Murray doesn't change games for us and that Holmes benefitted fromt the space created by Chesterfield doubling up on Ritchie. Dissapointing but not a disaster. We played better football and next year we won't be in their position...

* Chesterfield full backs closed down Holmes and Ritchie very quickly so largely nullified our main threat

A few teams have played that way against us this season - or they've filled the midfield with an extra man. I too felt gutted yesterday and I'm desperate to get to Saturday and get it out of our systems.

Even though it is the Tin pot trophy I still feel a bit deflated today :( Was such a good day out, it would of been ace to of atleast scored at Wembley and seen our fans go mad! I think like alot of people I was so sure we were going to win but ohwell thats football. Fair play to Chesterfield. We didn't take our chances. Anyway can't wait for saturday now, see all you true supporters there :)

I am going Saturday! Hoping that the players come out of the blocks and we give Rovers a spanking!

Old bill were cunts taking peoples cans of beer from them. Was pathetic how they jumped out of their meat wagon and started harrasing us and tipping our beer away like it was a drugs raid, was well ott.

I got told to top my can of cider (yeh classy bird me) down the drain by a policewoman on a horse! I was so embarrassed! :/ such a rebel.

Where was that?

Near the greyhound pub on the corner

We were sat outside Wembley Stadium Station for well over an hour with a few cans and had no bother at all.

Stats can mean fuck all...

[url width=469 height=487]http://i.imgur.com/hE4OG.jpg[/url]

Once they went everyone carried on. 1 van load were just being cunts i think

fuck I am ever going to Wembley again

Been interesting to read peoples stories, I went with my dad who's in his 60's and this was his 5th time watching his club at wembley, he seemed as upset as the Millwall defeat, I was just relieved this was not a playoff final and I don't want us there again this season.

Much has already been said but here's one thing I'm worried about.
I understand why some rated Holmes and McEveley and others not fussed by their performance.

I did notice a certain swagger about their play which reminded me of the leeds clique here last year.

Now Holmes is no doubt a great player for this level and beyond but it's becoming very obvious to me how difficult Dicanio's job will be in the summer if and when we go up.

There's a certain Hunger from all our players here from the start of the season, Benson has also had the right attitude from the start.

Don't get me wrong I'm excited by these bigger name players coming in, I just hope they have the right mentality.
I'd rather have a player from a lower league team joining us with the hunger and passion to succeed rather than players who have been sitting in the championship who have forgotten what it means to be a footballer.

Just watched the game again on tv. Poor game and Chesterfield really should have scored more than the 2 they got. The disallowed goal should have stood.
Caddis missing was massive and shows what a key player he is. Would be easy to single out individuals who were poor but i don't think that would be fair

Did anyone see Eric?

I thought of you yesterday and your expensive trip.

It could have been different and it could be a decade or more before we are next there (god forbid its this season!). You made the right choice.

Arriba, was dead level and there were at least two players offside in the build-up to the goal, lino did have his flag up early enough on that occasion.  He missed a host of others though!!

You are wrong i'm afraid. watch the replay

blimey, hope you were on the sauce.

Live I thought "5 yards off".

Replay - definite goal.

Absolutely seething with Connell for that overhead. He had  3 players to lay the ball off to.

It's those sorts of things that see him dropped imo.

My favourite quote from thisis  "Why was Caddis dropped? not even made the bench?”  ???

A few points

-Paolo shouldn't have started McEveley or Holmes as they haven't been a part of the cup run and it's unfair on the other players.
-We really missed Caddis and without him Ritchie is poor.
-Atmosphere was better this time round but still not amazing.
-The daytrippers seemed slightly less daytrippy this time round. No body told me to sit down which was good.
-We should have won the game with the possession and chances we had.

I won't watch any replay of that game, but I will accept your word for it, my eyes deceived me!!!  Although it wan't Lester who was offside, just thought there were two others in the build.up!

I thought the offside was clear a pass or three before the one that Lester scored from.

Can't bring myself to watch it either. I'll trust Arriba too.

Oh and Arriba, any news on Caddis?

it was offside, when the ball comes down before lester scores it just touches the other northerners foot meaning its a pass to lester.

Not heard anything. We need him back badly though

Damn it, it keeps getting worse.

We didn't get free PDC masks.

I think we should have worn white

Got no problem with Di Canio starting with Holmes as he has already played against Crewe and Torquay.  He has had a couple of weeks training with new team mates and should be reasonably familiar how his fellow team mates play.

McEverly was a little bit different seeing as that was his first game for the club.  Would have liked to have seen Cibocci start as Kennedy is wank.

The deliveries from the full backs was poor, Kennedy has a great cross on him.

Kennedy positioning is piss poor however, and would have caused more problems for our already fragile defence

Not just the full backs!!

No doubt about that.

I cut short a holiday in Portugal for that, and on reflection not the best move I have ever made but once a fan always a fan!

Just been reading through all the views and like any game people have different opinions on various aspects. For my two pennyworth I thought that Chesterfield did a job on us to stop the Town playing our "normal" game of Richie and Holmes being able to put in crosses/shots by cutting back inside apart from the odd occasion. Richie definitely misses Caddis overlapping and pulling defenders around to create space and Holmes had a full back up against him that knew what he was trying to achieve and stopped him most of the time. Result of this was that Benson and Connell were only picking up odd pieces and nothing really creative apart from the one glaring miss by Connell. Chesterfield were what an old mate of mine would call "down county" side, in that they got in the way of every pass/cross/shot by whatever means available to them and worked hard without really playing nice passing football and on the day it worked.

I totally agree with the comments regarding PDC's team selection, all very odd and not good for team spirit I would think - the last thing we need right now is the squad losing sight of the main aim which is promotion no matter what. :hmmm:

I thought their disallowed goal was offside during the build up, not so much the actual goal but the bloke who ran through originally looked yards off at the time.

I wont watch the reply and I dont fucking care. That game was destined for 0-0 before the og. Two toothless teams out there yesterday.

I feared losing this one due to our Oxford experiences this season.

For me, Swindon have won plenty of important games this season but have arguably lost all of our BIG games (Oxford and Wembley). It's my logic and it's purely based on what I believe the difference between big and important is!

I thought the first 45 was quite similar to the Torquay game. It would have probably been enough to result in a no-thrills victory in League 2 had it continued that way.

Second half was just flatout disappointing. I really felt for Risser and the counter attack goal was on the cards.

I hope we stick it to Bristol Rovers. I won't dwell on this and I hope the players won't either.

Indeed, and that's what worries me about winning the league - we'll bugger it up at the last minute.

how sweet to think of me :-)
Yeah was the right decision, I've spend the majority of my life travelling around watching Swindon - the results in the end become by-the-by.

Win, lose or draw I love my team forever & ever.
Well worth the trip. I want to come back for some more games even more than ever now!

Where are those highlights R4E?

Not interested in the highlights, I'm still sulking. I don't mind losing but I do mind the way we played. A win Saturday will put things right but I'm still angry with some of those players. 

Football League programme on the BBC iPlayer - 40 mins highlights. Just make sure you switch off before Steve Claridge comes on at the end. If there's anyone with less aptitude as a pundit, I've yet to see them. Total wanker.

Likewise.

Clearly players don't go out to lose. They do all they can not to let the occasion get to them. But sometimes it does regardless I suppose.

But its annoying as I didn't see anything about Chesterfield to make me think "fair enough, they are too good for us", almost the opposite in fact.

But they deserved it, no doubt about it.

got to wembley park at 10ish. green man didnt live up to the hype personally, didnt seem as rocking as millwall... left a bit earlier for some food so may have picked up after. walked down the high road and jj moons seemed lively. the game itself was dissapointing. where i was sat atmosphere didnt really get going, mate in singing section (4 blocks away) said it was decent... didnt really carry to us much. left when the 2nd went in, no point watching others celebrate- performance didnt deserve a clap (nor a boo for that matter, so leaving was the best option IMO). back in swindon before 6 didnt really bother me too much about the result until this morning, felt terrible today knowing weve bottled our 3 cup finals(yellows forum style 'di canios words').
just hope we can see the league through now, couldnt handle another trip to wembley potentially against oxford.
on reflection it doesnt hurt as much as millwall.... i watched the highlights this morning, the PO finals still on my sky+ box but never been touched.

positives:
-30,000+ fans for the jpt just 2 years after a wembley trip, not many clubs would achieve that.
-di canios mistakes yesterday may be a god send- on the big stage he showed hes not the perfect manager yet (he will be) and hopefully this will put others (WHU) off an approach for him.
-some cracking games ahead, looking forward to the run in so long as we can keep our brilliant form going for another month...although in reality we only need  3 or 4 wins from 9.

Fuck me! I've just watched the highlights of the assault on DeVera.
First he gets a flat hand slap in the face off Westcarr before the shirt pulling then he finishes it off with a right clenched fist punch to his face. No wonder he had a nose bleed. The comentators were quite shocked by the furosity of it.
Another set of shit officials, even on the big stage. God only knows how PDC managed to control himself.

To be fair mate, it was well off the ball and you can understand why no officials saw it- I certainly didn't see anything until he went down. One of those things where a Premiership player would get three games on review for it, but there's not much you can do without seeing it.

Same here. I didn't see it at the time but watching on the highlights makes me cringe

That may well be your thoughts, but my thoughts are totally different.

We DID win the big games, Crawley, Southend, Torquay home and Shrewsbury at home, when it mattered.  Oxford is only a big game for the fans, hardly one for a title decider.

The games we tend to lose, e.g. Oxford and yesterday, seem to be when we play physical teams.

It was fucking dreadfull decision he made, he had all the time in the word to bring it down as well but he saw his moment of glory and it cost us.

Maybe he didn't know he had time. No denying it was a bad decision though.

There was one before as well where he was on the edge of the box and he hit it out for a goal kick with the outside of his foot with 3 players in the box.

Awareness is actually a skill i think, Benson for example has bundles of it

I don't get all this Chesterfield deserved to win talk.
Other than catch us on the break when we were pushing for a goal just what did they do to deserve the win. Sure they stopped us playing our best, but at most that would mean they didn't deserve to lose.

If we hadn't scored the OG I don't think they would have got close to scoring.

Performance wise, I thought it was a bit of a stalemate, except we didn't really create any clear cut chances apart from the Connell miss.

You're not alone in your views.  Some of Holmes' corners and crosses were woeful and their right back stopped him getting past constantly.  McEveley was slow to react and caught in possession numerous times.  Bostock just looked unfit.

First 20 minutes I though they looked dangerous as we looked all 6's and 7's at the back.  Every time the ball was knocked forward we look vulnerable to me. I breather a sigh of relief when Lester Jack got crocked.

After that all the way until half time I though it was just a case of whether we could break them down. The OG killed us, but in reality there was enough time left. We just couldn't get it right in the final third, hoofed it too much and they killed the game.


The more I think about it the more pissed off I am they were in the squad yesterday. Its not hindsight, I said they shouldn't be in it before Sunday.

No matter how many times i see it, i feel a competent defender would never have scored the O.G Risser did... it's really bad.

agree. I was commenting all game how poor Holmes's deliveries were and the fact McEverly never went forward on the overlap and his passing was poor.

I agree with Batch on selection. i'm really pissed off that they were in the squad. they didn't deserve to be. A real fucking poor decision from PDC

If you think back to our best chances to score, other than Connell's miss & Cibo's header, everything else fell to Homes.

• Curling shot from the right in the first half (although the keeper had it covered).
• The shot (from the left) that went just over the bar in the first half.
• The shot that the defender deflected onto the keeper from just inside the box (also on the first half).
• But probably worst of all was the opening he made for himself in the second half where from about 10 yards out right in front of goal he produced what is best described as a backpass.

As for Ritchie, all season he has been cutting back in to cross with his right, but it has worked OK because most of the time Caddis has been bombing down the wing outside him taking away one of the defenders leaving Ritchie 1 on 1.

Devera only did this once in the whole game (not a dig at Devera as this is not what his game is about) and so Ritchie found himself against 2 defenders virtually all game with no real help except to pass the ball backwards.   

As someone else has posted, the sooner that Caddis is back the better.

I don't think any player can say they played that well yesterday.
I think it should just be written off as a bad day at the office and put behind us now.

Well only Ferry. Those 50 yard passes to Homles in the first half were sublime!

Best player on the park first half. Not so in the second

Ferry was fantastic.

I think the Millwall experience helped him myself. He didn't turn up that day, didn't make the same mistake twice.

Just watched the assault on Devera and have followed my original very magnanimous 'congrats rog best team won on the day' message to my spireite mate with 'actually westcarr is a cunt who should have been sent off for that and the ball through to him for the second goal was from a foul' message.

Dont like to be too nice in defeat!

No, I agree and have said as much in this thread.

Neither team were better enough than the other to deserve the win. The own goal changed the game - Chesterfield were just as toothless upfront as use.

It was 0-0 all the way before the own goal....

Ferry was our best player, but it probably didn't hurt him that they were double marking the guy next to him, giving him more space.

Thought that Ferry was our best player, but he had a good 3 opportunities to shoot and passed it sideways.

We all know his shooting normally leaves much to be desired but they were screaming out to be hit!

Yesterday for me showed what we are lacking both players missing we have in our squad and types of players we dont.  Mceverly may prove the left back we need.  Wasnt overly impressed yesterday but it was his first game.  My dad watching back at home said he thought he did well.  I guess alot of us would agree a fit Caddis and Flint would be in our starting 11's.  A new centre mid to partner Ferry is a must.  We have tried a few in Smith ( hard worker, cant pass ), Risser ( to heavy and slow to play centre mid and a crap passer ) and Cox who i not really seen enough of yet.  Up front Bensons done great but feel we need 2 new strikers.  Connell works hard, i like his effort.  But quality he has is not good enough.  You woudlnt chose a connell over the quality of a simon cox or a charlie austin.  We have to aim higher in the quality of our front two.  I think we lack experiance to.  We need players who can grab hold of a game when its not going our way and look to influence the game.  I dont think we have that at present.  We also need a plan B.  I think the wingers cutting in and shooting has got us so far.  But we have to look to change it.  Holmes does he will look to get crosses in by going outside his full back.  Why we never switch wingers i dont know.  A dissapointing day in a great season.

Team for next year if we make it up ( sure we will )

1 Fodders
2 Caddis
3 new left back
4 Ferry
5 Flint
6 McCormack
7 Ritchie (  or if he leaves and im not bothered if he does a right footed winger )
8 New centre mid
9 New striker a target man
10 New striker with pace
11 Holmes

Been thinking about the team selection and subs for yesterday. After the Torquay game most of us would have gone the same team and set up after a good performance. The Cibbochi vs McEveley decision was interesting as Cibbo had the I'm coming off, no I am staying on, no I am coming off situation against Torquay. If he was fit then either Di Canio has got pissed with that (his interview after Torquay suggested that) and seen enough with McEveley in training to think he is a good enough to put in.

If there was a doubt about fitness, then McEveley would have been the replacement as Calum Kennedy seems out of the picture. I imagine McEveley would have put a big shift in training to impress if a cup final place was up for grabs. What it did do was ending up wasting a substitution as a like for like left back doesn't change much when your chasing the game.

The 5 subs rule and cup tied players didn't leave much room to manoevure as you would want a keeper on the bench so Raffa and Cibbo gave options in defence and midfield/attack. Murray must have squeezed ahead of Tehoue (assuming no cup tie) and maybe Di Canio did see Bostock as one that could change the game on reputation or training efforts.

The subs did seem a bit panicked when we went a goal down but Di Canio has called his subs right most of of the time. Connell agaist the Shrews being a good example and Murray came on in the same situation against Crewe and we dominated the last 20 mins. Apart from one first X1 change it's the same players available against Torquay but failed to respond againsts a team that was going to hang on to a lead given to them in a Wembley Cup Final.

I think what we do need next season is a big striker who can impose physically next in the Constable/Paynter mould when we can't break down teams. I wonder what we will see of Connell next season for all his efforts and endeavours he hasn't scored consistently enough throughout his career to be a 1 in 2 striker we need if we want to push on next year. Overall it's a bit flat but if we react well against Rovers then we are not far off sealing promotion and that's the real result of the this season

We've beaten more L1 teams that we've lost to this season, so why all of a sudden we're all panicking about next seasons squad and writing off current players already I don't know...

Absolutely agree.  Maybe they are lacking 'big match' temperament, but that will come - overall it is a very young squad.  It is a very good squad overall, but I agree with all who say we need another striker - so far as I can see, we simply do not have an Austin/Cox style poacher. Tehoue, Connell and Benson are a different mould, and Murray (who I certainly don't write off) seems more of an attacking midfielder.

I also agree with Oaksey M about the Cibocchi/McEveley issue.  Although Cib was declared fit, he took a painful knock against Torquay, so a potentially crocked Cib - whose form has been iffy throughout the season - against OK a new but presumably match-fit arrival in McEveley, experienced at Championship level this season....well, at the very least it was a difficult choice, and, being one of those who saw McE do OK, probably the right one.

15 shots, 9 on target, 60% possession, 11 corners. the highlights the bbc have put together are a load of shite.

Great day out overall, shame about the result...

enjoyed the green man, the decision to have a Jerk BBQ on was inspired, 10 times better than some shite old burger. Ale on in the bar too, nice have a Doombar instead of that Tetleys piss for £4.50 in the stadium...Talking of ale...anyone had that Red Army stuff from arkells? seemed to be just 3B's with a different label on the pump to me....unless thats exactly what the Angel at Purton were actually doing...still, only good for a good clear out of the bowels the following morning.  :hmmm:

As for the match, a 2-0 scoreline was completely deceiving. The fact that we had to put one in the back of the net for them before having to leave the arse end of the team hanging out at 90+3 speaks volumes. As a few others have said, if Risser hadn't of netted for them, it would probably have been 0-0 at 90 minutes. I don't think Chesterfield deserved to win as such but didn't deserve to lose, fair play to them for keeping us mostly shut out, they obviously did their homework on the wings defensively.

Surprised to see Holmes (I still prefer Homles..) getting quite a bit of stick for wasting chances and poor delivery. He wasn't great at all, but looked the only player that could create something after having the ball pinged to him (superbly in the first half) by Ferry.

If Connell's chance had been the other way round with Connell delivering the ball to Benson, I reckon we'd have gone 1-0 up at that moment. shame for Connell, definitely had more time than he realised, although can see why he went for the volley that he did, that ball seemed to take an age to drop.

Gutted for Risser and the OG, after the last few games evidently getting into some good form and confidence, for that to happen to him. I thought he played reasonably up until that point...didnt miss out on many headers lumped up by the chesterfield defence and midfield.

Evidently missed Caddis massively. Also a bit miffed at the praise for McEverly...i thought he was abject at best. Not sure if it was because i noticed him making a few mistakes in the second half which caused me to focus on him more, but he didn't get forward as much as Cibbo or Kennedy does and in the second half especially looked lazy and slow to me...the amount of times i saw him stood still watching the ball fly over his head behind him and then slowly turning and halfheartedly chasing the defender that got ahead of him annoyed me massively. Not sure if that was fatigue, poor reading of the ball or just laziness.

Final thought for Westcarr...what a little shite, didnt realise how brutal his attack on Devera was until i saw it this morning, definitely shouldn't have been on the pitch to score their second. Them down to 10 men for the final 10 minutes could've been crucial.

Oh well, as long as we go on and win the league now....Paolo definitely needs to get working on a plan B for situations like Sunday.

And there I was thinking we already had that in Paul Benson?

I don't think Benson's that sort of player at all. To me, him and Connell are too similar. Send for The Beast aka Jon Parkin :nod:

Edit: In fact, just to add to that, I've not seen loads of games live this season but when I have (Leicester, Cheltenham at home and Sunday) it's been screaming out to me that a big physical striker is exactly what we need. If we'd had one, we would have looked a different team on Sunday and in the other two games mentioned, no doubt about it.

Anyone see Late Kick Off last night? Murty being quite kind to us.

Recorded it. Was it a "behind the scenes" look at the Wembley trip?

This

This loss has no bearing on this squad's readiness for next season in the slightest. If anything our performances against league 1 teams is something we should be very much encourage by.

Why does this defeat, in which we did not play as well as we can, nullify our victories over higher league clubs?

It's a bit like saying we lost to Oxford so we aren't good enough for promotion.

Hint - Go and see more live games then, maybe the 20+ we've won without a big lump up front.

Disappointed.

Succinct.

Funnily enough, I was actually aware that we had been quite successful this season without having been to every game. That does not change the fact though, that it's an area in which we need to improve. You have to be constantly looking at where you can improve. If you don't, you go backwards.

Benson has led the line superbly since he came and has shown a great knack of being in the right place at the right time which was the 'Fox in the Box' that Di Canio mentioned earlier in the season. He also works the channels well and brings the midfield into play. However, there will be times though when you need a battering ram type of player who can break through stubborn, robust defences and I'm not sure Benson is that type for all his efforts.

I think the term 'big lump' up front is misleading. I dont want to see a player like James Constable up front for us, rather someone with a heftier physical side to his game who can power his way through challenges in and around the box to score or create chances for others, as well as being able to play a bit as well and have some pace.

Strikers are obviously not cheap, but we need that type of player to compliment Benson. Murray, Connell etc just don't fit the bill unfortunately.

Magera may be an option next season as he'll get more time on the ball than in L2. The non-heading fault may be a problem though....

And the fact he's fucking wank

Hi a spireite here hope you enjoyed your day out bu the way it was nice to talk to so many friendly fans. I dont think you played that bad i thought at times the equilizer was just around the corner especially after westcarr's first miss. the big difference is like we have witnessed this season of the gulf in class between the 2 divisions. Dont take this the wrong way but i think the problem on sunday was your manager, all weekend saturday and sunday in the papers and everytime you looked at the big screen all the build up was not 2 teams who had fought so hard to get to wmbley but about how it was di canio's first ever wembley apperence so good luck for the title and hope you do well in league 1 next season

Yep, we had our best FA Cup run for decades, we're top of the league by fuckin miles and we got to a Wembley final - our manager is definitely a problem.

If I read one more northern spacker going on about the "gulf in class" between L1 and L2 I may have a nervous breakdown.

Why do people keep spouting this nonsense?

We have lost to only one League 1 team this season. We drew against another and beat another two. Going by that points gained ratio we would be close to a play off spot.

Ask Huddersfield, Exeter and Franchise about this supposed 'gulf'

The 'gulf between Leagues 1 & 2' line being repeated by Chesterfield fans is hardly surprising given their experience of the last 12 months.  They breezed League 2 last season and have had a shocker this season.  But it's also backed up by a lot of our fans.  We have spent 8 of the last 10 seasons in League 1, and the other 2 in League 2...and during both of our seasons in the bottom division the constant refrain has been that the quality of the opposition has been, generally, awful.  So nothing controversial in the Chesterfield comments, so far as I can see.

We have been good this season - but there have been games that we have won simply by being less bad than the other lot.  If we do go up (and I don't want to take anything for granted just yet...the chasing pack are chasing hard), we are going to fight harder for our wins next season - no doubt about it.  The cup wins were cup wins.  Encouraging, sure enough, but not much of a marker for next season should we go up.

Yet to many it seems enough of a marker to suggest there's a 'gulf'

You can tell what a huge gap there is, just look at how Stevenage have struggled in league 1 this season ;)

And Bournemouth the year before this!

Exactly Posh

There's no gulf in class between League One and League Two, just a different style of football.

Really, we've gone about this season the untraditional way by trying to win the league by actually playing football. Our previous stint in League Two with Sturrock showed the traditional kick-and-rush way of getting out of the league. People say you can't win League Two by playing nice attractive football but we've (so far) proved that wrong.

It takes a completely different style of football to be competitive in League One. Just look at the play-off season. We played some nice football and Austin & Paynter thrived under it. With our passing game I'm more than confident that we'd finish top-half of League One with the team we have now.

Thanks, just put a few corrections in for you.

Of course there is a gulf in class between the 2 divisions. The quality of football in league 2 is significantly worse than in league 1.

What I don't understand about the "class" argument is the fact that some Chesterfield fans claim that league 2 class is worse than league 1, then turn around and say at Wembley they played "hoofball" or more "physically" and we played "neat" football. I wish they would make their minds up.

Perhaps in general there is, but that's not really the point being made.

To say this gulf is illustrated by us losing to Cheterfield, while omitting the fact we have beaten two other L1 teams and drawing against another is bizarre. Does that one game against Chesterfield really set the benchmark?

The reason they think there's such a gulf is because they got weaker over the summer and did diddly about it.

We won't.

There is a rather liberal use of the word 'class' here...there may be a gulf in the basic ability to defend, score goals etc, but 'class' is pushing it a little...

Messis is a class above anyone else
Barca are class etc etc...

Did they lose players (I don't know)

If they did then it weakens their silly little argument even further

They definitely got rid of their top scorer and didn't really replace him until Leon Clarke.

Is there fuck....

Then why aren't you watching football this season ?  You've said before that you're not watching us in a 'piss poor' division - or words to that effect  (although doubtless you'll argue the point

Haha spot on nev

I could give you a long explanation as to why I decided against getting a season ticket this season but you and everyone else would completely ignore it and just read what you want read anyway.

L2 is piss poor. L1 is pretty piss poor to.

There is very little if any difference in the two divisions.

So when are you likely to return DV? Next season, or when we get into the Championship? I agree with your "no difference" comment.

At the moment its looking 90% certain I will be purchasing a season ticket for next season.

For the first time, in a very long time it finally feels like the club has some ambition and desire to win.

Last season was shit but I can take being shit, its going down without a fight I couldnt take. The players, the managers, the chairman - everyone was giving in at the first attempt. I understand football is unique in that its business and sports but there seemed to be too much emphasis on business and none on sport.

Everything was done to appease the balance sheet and not the team (Greer, Austin, Morrison)

We seemed to have a bit of 'just happy to still be here and make up the numbers' mentality from top to bottom.  We were clearly going no where.

Di Canio is a character and he's been great for Swindon because he wants to win. He isnt here for the pay cheque (although im sure it helps) he's here to win. He's managed to get mentality flowing through out the club. He wants to win, Wray wants to win, the players want to win.

The club has finally got a bit of ambition and drive back. It finally feels like everyone wants to progress, wants to get better, wants to go forward - not just turn up and go through the motions.

....that was my main gripe last season, it has been festering the last few years but last season really bought it home.

Perhaps its simplifying it a bit too much - but in its most basic form - football is a competitive sport, the goal is to win.

You normally talk sense but come on...

Disagree here. The team we have now on their day isn't too far off the team we had when we reached the play off final 2 years ago in L1. The main difference is that we had 2 better strikers than we have in this team. If you get a goalscorer and a strike partnership that works on top of what we already have you're looking at top half pushing potentially on for the top 6.

In fact look at Stevenage. If you think there is a huge gap then Stevenage just prove there isn't as they have kept pretty much the same side they had last season  in L2 and are pushing for the play offs in L1.

Tell me how i'm wrong then.

DV in his response to nev contradicts himself again.(piss poor-pretty piss poor)

Anyway, we have players who i don't think are good enough for our ambitions in league 1 but do ok in league 2. We will need at least 4 new quality players in the starting 11 to be good enough to mount any sort of assault on the division.
That is to a side that has done very well this season. I am in no doubt that Di canio will address this and make the improvements necessary.

There is a difference if you compare the bottom teams in league one and league two, I've now seen all the top six teams in division two and would be surprised if they couldn't hold their own in league one. Think with the side we have now we would be a top ten side in division one.

If I were a bitter man I'd take a bit of pleasure in them losing 4-1 tonight. If.

Their revival didn't last long then. See Westcarr got booked, must of been something the officials seen this time, I'm not bitter either.

We are a fine example. We've spent time towards the top and bottom of both leagues in the last decade - loads of clubs fluctuate between the 2 divisions with success and shit in equal measure.

Agree, on us needing 4 new players to launch an assault on the top end of league 1 next year ......

But how many players will PDC sign to get these 4?

As great as Paolo has been, his transfer policy can be described as scattergun at best!  If we had greater financial constraints and Paolo had been forced into working with some of those players he signed first up .... Where do people think we would be sat right now in the league?

That's a reasonable arguement but it still doesn't sway me. The top of one division vs the bottom of the one above is without doubt close but overall the quality is not as good(hence why i said there is a gulf)
I don't think our current side would be anywhere near the top of league 1 if Di canio had taken over with us just managing to stay up last year.

I contacted the FA to ask them if they were reviewing the incident involving Devera.  They said that they are "satisfied no retrospective action is required".  Bottlers!!!

It's not like he punched him in the face or anything...

I am amazed DMR hasn't commented on this yet.

So I will - get a grip!! :)

A spokesman for the FA said that camera evidence was not enough as it shows Westcarrs arm is heading towards his face but does not clearly show if it made contact.

I thought that "intent" was enough to get you a red card. I guess I was wrong.

Dunno why we are moaning tbh.

He never touched him

In all seriousness it is a bit sad...

I actually couldn't agree more.

I'm assuming that Devera punched himself to cause his bloody nose then.
Maybe he will get the ban instead ;)