Swindon v Crawley pre match chat and matchday thread

[Shrivvy Road]

13 of our 20 shots were from inside the box 

I was trying not to single McKirdy out 

[TheDukeOfBanbury]

First 25 minutes up to the stupid penalty decent enough.
Possession counts for nothing when you can’t hit the target. Honestly our shooting was woeful, McKirdy the biggest culprit.
Defensively we look ok but midfield, honestly apart from Williams static and once Davison went off we looked clueless as what to do.
East is OK but will keep saying it we don’t have that effective box to box competitive midfielder.

No idea where to go next, is Garner bold enough to change the formation? Unlikely.
Reed now missing and the play offs in danger of slipping away.

Whilst we can blame the poor officials need to look in the mirror first. Another rebuild mid season and can only hope we get back to early season form.
Last night thought how much we missed Simpson.

[LucienSanchez]

Cooper looks great, good signing… alongside O’Brien, we should be more solid (with Odimayo as the third CB rather than the walking error that is Conroy at the mo)

Other than that, no positives. Hope Barry is better than his cameo suggests. And I wish McKirdy would take a proper first touch… it all seems so frantic, meaning he loses the ball or it gets stuck under his feet. Seems churlish to criticise our top scorer, but a lot of his other contributions (including the dives and the whinging) are dreadful.

Talking of whinging, our discipline needs to drastically improve - and that starts with Garner.

[Batch]

mcKirdy definitely had one of 'those' games

[4D]

I hope last night fires them up for Saturday. I'll be there regardless, but I'm glad I chose not to go last night.

[Batch]

but I'm glad I chose not to go last night.

You picked a good one to miss from a football point of view.

I did enjoy the equaliser though, unexpected and scrappy and in some ways felt like we did a Colchester.

[horlock07]

Not read back and just watched the 'highlights'.


The pretty much sum up this team, the first 20 secs detail the shambles of playing out from the back and the rest is scrappy and in the main pretty pointless with little end product.

[Matchworn Shirts]

The constant overdramatic arm waving and Scream painting impressions from McKirdy are getting tiresome.
Does not take away from him being a good player but it is annoying

[JoeMezz]

                JoJo

Iandolo Cooper JOB Odimayo

           Lyden Reed

McKirdy/Barry Williams Payne

             Davison

Yes yes yes

[Bob's Orange]

Another strange evening involving Swindon Town! First 30 minutes I thought we played some of the best football so far this season, that said, it seemed that Crawley were still on the team bus as they just watched us ping the ball about, let our centre backs saunter up the pitch, basically play our football without anyone really laying a finger on us. Of course as is the problem we didn't really create a lot, shots blocked blah blah. Cooper should have had a penalty for being held and then hacked down, but of course nothing given! Then after Conroy was dispossessed in midfield Crawley realised they were actually in a game and they looked quite dangerous on the break. From a corner Lydon was warned about holding in the box by the ref and then of course when the corner was swung in he fouled the same guy he was previously warned about not fouling. Soft, but I think it was a pen. My Ifollow froze just as the penalty take was stepping up, still no idea if he scored!!

Second half was just frustrating. Attack versus defence with Crawley offering nothing apart from launching the ball down the pitch as far as possible. We passed and probed and never really looking like scoring. With Davison off injured there was no point in putting balls into the box as Barry and McKirdy are too slight and similar, and that partnership never really worked. We got a fluky goal that we probably maybe just about deserved. I felt that had Crawley had a more tactically aware manager instead of a dinosaur egg they had the opportunities to break with humbers and put the game to bed 2 or 3 nil. Luckily they didn't and we managed to fluke a point.

Player wise I think Davison will split the camp. I thought he was a bit of a donkey based on what I have seen so far, but has good aeriel presence that will be useful. McKirdy for all his monumental effort last night was terrible, and has a habit of dribbling the ball off the pitch for a goal kick which annoys me! Iandolo the pick of the wing backs, I really think Hunt for KKH is a big miss as there is little to no danger caused by Hunt down that side. It's not his game and at home I think we need to give teams more to think about down both sides. O'Brien and Cooper were excellent and I also thought Conroy played well for the first 30 minutes but really just makes too many high profile mistakes that at a higher level would get punished more. The crowd seems very angsty at the moment, every mistake Gladwin or Conroy make is jeered and moaning at Jojo for following the manager's instructions just seems counter-intuitive.

Finally the bit that really irritated me. Garner running onto the pitch to berate the referee, just what is he expecting to get out of doing that? It shows a huge lack of discipline and had he not done that, I don't think Louis Reed gets a red card and a subsequent 3 game ban. The fact we have had 3 red cards this season, the latest on 97 minutes and 2 after the game has finished highlights Garner has to do more to keep his anti-referee tirades in check. Of course it's frustrating, but really what benefit comes out of it other than a touchline ban, or in the case of Conroy and Reed, a 3 game ban for basically doing nothing! Exeter are going to fancy their chances on Saturday! ugh. 

[Batch]

The constant overdramatic arm waving and Scream painting impressions from McKirdy are getting tiresome.
Does not take away from him being a good player but it is annoying

😱😱😱🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️😱😱

[Batch]

great report Bob.

[DiV]

Be interesting to see how we’d do with a flat back 4 now.

Said a lot earlier on in the season our squad seemed built for 4231. We have (had) so many who could play across that attacking midfield three. McKirdy, Barry(Gilbert), Payne, Williams, Gladwin even Iandolo and KKH could do a job further up the pitch.

Reed and Lyden (and Grant as was then) to hold.

Then you have Hunt, Tomlinson, Iandolo and Odimayo as full back options.
Odimayo, Conroy, JOB, Cooper and Baudry (!!!) as your CB options.

[DiV]

Obviously the issues with that is you need a central out and out striker, something that we are short on.

[Bob's Orange]

Because he knows he should’ve been playing. Petulant but I’d feel the same if I was him irrespective of how childish it was.

So because he had a strop on about not playing he gets himself a red card therefore ruling him out of the next 2 games? That's some weird logic you are implying there.