Cheltenham v Swindon

[Reg Smeeton]

There is a balance. I wouldn’t call defenders smashing a ball 60 yards every time it comes near them a way of playing to be honest. There is a happy medium to be found between overplaying and not playing any football.

Playing decent football is very difficult... you can see this watching England play, here are supposedly the best we can produce, and they're not very good. Our level is even further down the ladder, so more or less all sides play the %ages... on the odd occasion a bit of quality might come out.

[Dr Pierre Chang]

theakston - did you go today?

[Batch]

The decision to bin off the Swindon Way, and return to traditional Div 4 football was entirely correct. Div 4 is a grind, we've been in it often enough in relatively recent years to know this.

There is a balance. I wouldn’t call defenders smashing a ball 60 yards every time it comes near them a way of playing to be honest. There is a happy medium to be found between overplaying and not playing any football.

a happy medium fine. I doubt anyone will disagree.

trying to continue as per last year and being in this position would have been a massive mistake. People may be a bit pissed off now, but can you imagine how much worse it would have been.

fwiw I think Power has played it right. Given the job to the manager he think best suited and STFU. As unpalatable as getting stuck in division 4 may be.

[theakston2k]

theakston - did you go today?

Yep and live in Cheltenham so will be made to suffer for the next week with yet another abject display at their place.

[RobertT]

I blame Gladwin for all this!

I think his unearthing turned Power away from what had in fact been the core of our relative success - players who were too good for Academy football but not quite good enough to hold down 1st team spots at higher divisions just yet.  He got the Management team to play the Academy way, which meant they all settled in well and knew what they were doing.  Then we go an get Gladwin, not really one of those types (although a youth prospect, never in that class) and he thought he could keep that same model but polish rough diamonds.  The next two seasons then became a flow of useless shit who knew how to pass a ball but very little else and weren't that much better at the passing stuff to the extent they could outclass a team of physical types.

Relegation at least curtailed that, but it's brought about something altogether just as ugly to watch, but for very different reasons.

[Batch]

or Power just got lucky/helping hand from Tactics first season... either way...

[RobertT]

He may have got lucky, but probably should have noticed the difference a little sooner once it became clear you can't just chuck a bunch of technical misfits together and expect the same results.  He has now, that is one thing.  It's just this entire division is like stepping back 30 years and is damning showcase for everything wrong about how we develop players in this country.  It's good in some ways, that this exists to sharpen the mind, otherwise we'd have an entire nation watching Prem football believing that English football is great, when in fact it's Aguero who is great, and Eriksson, and Fabregas, and so on.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Audrey]

It’s the utter mismatch between the defenders recruited and the forward players. Why have, essentially, dainty Anderson and Woolery chasing down launched howitzers from the non league defenders. It’s neither one or  t’other. Throw in a couple of skilful small types in midfield and it’s a right horlicks.

Either play Smith up front providing the knockdowns or play it (a bit) through midfield for Goddard/Gordon etc to thread balls into Woolery and Anderson.

[Batch]

can't disagree with either of the last two posts..

[theakston2k]

On a side note for a man who preaches discipline we don’t seem to show any on the pitch and it’s something Flitcroft needs to fix. Dunne & McDermott especially are a bit of a liability, the winner was completely avoidable and a needless freekick.

As Audrey says we just seem to have a complete mismatch in the way we set up, we spent a fair wedge on Woolery but don’t play to his strengths which is through balls for him to run on to.

[Ticker45]

As said elsewhere on here, we seem to be a mixture of players that has not gelled as yet and I am beginning to think that perhaps we never will. Defensively at times it is just a hoof forward totally bypassing the midfield to see what might break and now and again it does, but it is not pretty and I am none too sure it will be enough to see us out of this division. Having Goddard back helps the balance and might be more of the player that Woolery requires to set him up, but his confidence must be low as he was subbed once again today.

Overall we did not do enough to win today neither did we do badly enough to lose but conceding stupid free kicks in dangerous positions was eventually going to cost us and so it was. Flitcroft knows the problems and as we are well into the season now surely this indiscipline should have been be cut out?

[Reg Smeeton]

or Power just got lucky/helping hand from Tactics first season... either way...

Early doors Power's remit was to lower the wage bill... he had the benefit of TT's players and some left overs from the PdC reign, as the wage bill was further trimmed and the last of the PdC boys departed, TT's production line was severed.

So we now find ourselves probably somewhere around where our wage bill determines, at the start of the season, the aim despite Power's rhetoric is to stay in this Div and not slide further. So far so good on this.

[Posh Red]

Just for any of the old timers on here, what's the difference between how we are playing now & what Macari did to get us out of Div 4?

Get the ball forward as quick as possible & play in their half.
 

[chalkies_shorts]

Just for any of the old timers on here, what's the difference between how we are playing now & what Macari did to get us out of Div 4?

Get the ball forward as quick as possible & play in their half.
 

Macari's teams were the fittest I've ever seen. They did lump it forward and try to win the second ball. The main thing Macari did though was spot talent. Player for player I wouldn't swap any of the current team for Macaris. We were also very disciplined. Solid banks and lines. 
As for todays game, you just knew it would happen. Stupid fucking unnecessary fouls. The first half I thought we were pretty crap but so were they. The second half i thought we were far superior to be undone by our fucking stupidity was a real pisser. The new goalie looked good. Came and collected all but one.
Its got to be said the stewards and policing today was fucking useless. Town fans could have done whatever they wanted whenever they wanted. Lucky the Town fans were mostly pissed and / or resigned to losing. A special mention to the guy in his 60s who at the end of the game tried to get over the fence and was shouting to the Nam fans "come on then I'll fucking take you all on". I spoke to him in the Sudeley Arms before the game and he appeared relatively sober.

[chalkies_shorts]

Oh yes and their no 7 was a total cunt. Should have had 3 yellows in the game and then instead of celebrating the win with their fans decided to give it the big un in front of us. Fuckwit but when we got dicked there 5-0 at 4-0 their no 10 gave us the wanker sign.