FA Cup 2018/19

[hellogregory]

Comedy goal to win a diabolical game of football between 2 terrible teams.

Into the hat for round 2 but nothing much to be positive about in terms of performance levels.

 

[Conker]

3-1 down. Sack him now.

It was always a short term thing, Yeovil doing well with that squad.

 

[Imp in Branston]

I have no idea what happened today but at least it was only the cup. Our first 11 though which is a bit worrying.

Must be having to play in gods own county that is Lincolnshire.

 

[DippyDon]

Must be having to play in gods own county that is Lincolnshire.

We'll see in January when we go back up to Cleethorpes where it matters.

I'm not even going to debate the gods own county, I lived there for three years and loved it.

 

[shoddycollins]

Interesting to see that Crewe's own match report was written by Donald Trump

Crewe Alexandra exited the FA Cup in the most harshest of fashion after a clearance from Ben Garrett hit Jamie Devitt and rolled over the line in the dying minutes.


It was so harsh on Garratt, who had heroically saved a Danny Grainger penalty in the first half and his team-mates, who didn’t deserve to lose the tie over 90 minutes.


It was such an unfortunate way to go out of the competition because it looked like having 0-0 written all over it, really after Garratt’s penalty save, but Devitt didn’t give up on a back pass from Kevin O’Connor and placed Garratt under pressure with the ball at his feet. It paid off and the Alex couldn't believe the manner of the winner on the day.

 

[Boz]

We did not respect our opposition today.

First 20 minutes we played like the team that tore Exeter and Crawley apart, but after that we were lazy and showboated. We got rightly punished and save for a couple moments of quality were poor for the rest of the match.

We won’t repeat those mistakes in the return game at Oxford but they were there for the taking and it’s underwhelming the lack of professionalism we showed.

Defensive mid Lee McCullough was missing today and the step down in quality to Jay Harris was alarming. Our top two priorities in January will have to be to sign McCullough permanently and replace Jay Harris who should be sent back to Wrexham.

Too simplistic to blame the absence of McCulloch for everything that went wrong. While Harris largely to blame for the first goal and should have changed his boots at an early stage, very few, if any, Rovers players came out with any credit from today. Agree with your points about Rovers’ mentality. Oxford has the right approach today and can feel hard done to the way things panned out.

 

[RLC]

I thought we showboated in the first twenty minutes, playing tippy-tappy stuff in the wrong areas, whereas if we had played with our usual tempo we could have made life easier for ourselves. Oxford grew in confidence as the game went on and for most of the second half we were a complete shambles, individually and collectively.

Jay Harris was not the sole reason for the poor performance today, but he is definitely a weak link. He is just too erratic to play consistently in the Football League.

Oxford deserved to win and we are very fortunate to be in the draw. I still think we will win the replay; shades of what happened to us against Peterborough last season.

 

[les.gtfc]

What on earth happened there today? Did someone not tell our players that we don't do second halves.

First half was fairly uneventful really apart from Collins aberration for their goal and their player stabbing the ball wide when through on goal (although he did look offside to me)

2nd half was a different story and we played some great football to turn the game on it's head. A fantastic equaliser from Embleton, which was in from the moment it left his foot. A shame that he'll be missing next week. Thomas then got the goal his overall play deserved before Collins made up for his first half error by heading off the line and then Vernam scored another great strike to make it 3-1.

Just a shame that there were only 1800 odd Town fans there to witness it, but the stayaways missed a great 45 minutes of football. Just goes to show that we can play when we want to. Here's hoping we can carry on this performance in the league.

 

[GuiseleySteve]

We had them last season and they were dreadful and astonishingly bad tempered - they ended up with 9 men

Thankfully we got shut of Cox and 99% of the shite he signed. Back to being a decent club again now.

 

[Conker]

Thankfully we got shut of Cox and 99% of the shite he signed. Back to being a decent club again now.

Yeah we were lucky when he managed to get us to ‘click’ when we won the title, he had a huge budget like but he’s been dreadful everywhere else.

 

[Davidimp]

Cracking game really enjoyed it, had a bit of everything.
Some good goals, sloppy defending, an inconsistent ref and lots of cards including a very late red.
Half decent crowd too of just over 6000.

 

[Luke Imp]

3 really good goals from us today and 3-2 probably flattered Northampton because it felt we were in control for large parts and created more chances.

Something isn't quite right defensively at the minute and that's coincided with losing Frecklington at Port Vale. Not because he's a defensive player, but when him, O'Connor and Pett are all available, we generally play a midfield 3 as opposed to the two we have been doing. No Eardley today either so we're making do with Wilson there.

That said, we're about par with our defensive numbers as last season so maybe it's because we're a little more open this year. Can't complain too much when we've probably more than doubled our goal scoring on this time in 2017!

Akinde seems to have stepped up a level over the last two or three games as well. It looks like it might be starting to click a bit more up there for him.

That's now us done now until Mansfield on the 24th.

 

[MrGloverLover]

It was always a short term thing, Yeovil doing well with that squad.

We have a decent squad, Way doesn't know how to manage them. The injuries today didn't help but he's got to be able to cope with that.

 

[MrGloverLover]

Tranmere versus the other Oxford looked like a bit of a ding-dong. Looked up City's hattrick bloke (we're short a striker!) and see he had a spell at MKDons without doing much but he's still fairly young.

We signed him on loan for 6 months last season. He didn't get any injuries yet we didn't give a single minute of game time in any competition.

 

[Clarkey_GTFC]

Just seen our goals and they were all a result of exactly the way we've been trying to play. Lots of possession in and around the box but this time we had the end product; willingness to hit it from the edge of the box, bodies in the mixer when we put crosses in and getting round the back of the fullbacks and cutting it back for someone to finish. It sounds like basic stuff but we've been lacking it massively. Today we managed a bit of everything which is very pleasing. That's got to give us confidence and something to look back at as proof that we can attack effectively.

 

[jacobncfc]

1 for and 12 against in our last 2 FA Cup ties.

Loads of Notts wanting Kewell gone. Gotta say I feel sorry for Hardy, he’s gone from hero to zero in the last six months, people even seem to be revelling in him getting banned from driving.

Really don’t know about Kewell, no idea who’d we get in or who we could afford. Paul Hurst is the only stand out.

Honestly we are absolutely dreadful. I think that Kewell has a reasonably easy job, taking over a good squad of players that was massively underachieving.

The only meaningful impact that he seems to have had is that we now look much more likely to concede from our own goal kicks. He appears to have fallen out with half of the squad to the extent that 16 year olds are now preferred on the bench, the defence is as disorganised as it has been all season, and we don’t even appear to be playing a formation any more. It’s only Fitzsimons’ sudden burst of form that’s stopped us getting an absolute pasting in the last two matches.

I could almost forgive all of this still, if he didn’t then come out and say we played quite well and just missed our chances. No, Harry, we had one shot on target and the opposition had about 37.

 

[jacobncfc]

The players take some of the blame still obviously. Nathan Thomas, in particular, is an absolute waste of space.

 

[denzel ecfc]

Well I told you so. We are not good at the moment.
Not surprised about MK Dons either. Tis doesn't do cups.

 

[StrangelyBrown]

First round home win (3-2) and a cracking game for a neutral. Nice to see a full 1st team as the starting XI as well.

Home game again in R2 would be very good

 

[GuiseleySteve]

I'll be taking in City at home tomorrow (Josh Simpson should be making his 3rd debut for them) before heading up to Wharfedale on Sunday. We have games Sunday/Tuesday/Saturday so would like to see us qualify unscathed and with something in reserve. However that's not the U's way. At least Paul Cox has moved on.

We'll be fielding our strongest team and bench, looking for a fast start and aiming to remove any motivation for BBC to feature us much on their extended highlights.

I'll be keeping an eye out for dogs in fancy dress amongst the tinfoil trophies. I suspect the only half-and half scarves on show will feature ManUre.

View attachment 9886

Just a taster for you

 

[Bottega Don]

Anyone know why Swindon players didn't have their names on the back of their shirts today?

 

[Greenacres]

Anyone know why Swindon players didn't have their names on the back of their shirts today?

That is nothing, we nearly started the season without any shirts, thanks to Hummel...if it hadn't been for a local sports shop pulling the stops out we might have played our first game in skins!

 

[Back in the DHSS]

Jeeesus, just awoken (Thailand) to see Tranmere were almost Kabongo’d out of the FA cup. Wasn’t expecting that.
Don’t fancy our chances that much in the replay. Oxfords pitch looks like its plastic and not one of the better ones.

 

[KeithH]

Danny Mayor, bloody hell we miss the bugger if he fails to sing a new contract

 

[KeithH]

Sing sign whatever! He does what he wants

 

[Chris FGR]

Oxford aren't very good, we've got a fair chance of winning the replay based on that. Decent performance given we only had 16 fit players and no full backs.

 

[shoddycollins]

Danny Mayor, bloody hell we miss the bugger if he fails to sing a new contract

Who's Danny Mayor?

 

[UTS]

Who's Danny Mayor?

https://twitter.com/x/status/1061373146778005506

Here he is at it again, this time against Dover.

 

[Chris FGR]

Looking forward to January when Danny Mayor officially becomes a Forest Green Rovers player. Will fit in well with our awesome tiki take brilliance.

Until then can you keep posting those clips UTS you're wetting my appetite.

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

Honestly we are absolutely dreadful. I think that Kewell has a reasonably easy job, taking over a good squad of players that was massively underachieving.

The only meaningful impact that he seems to have had is that we now look much more likely to concede from our own goal kicks. He appears to have fallen out with half of the squad to the extent that 16 year olds are now preferred on the bench, the defence is as disorganised as it has been all season, and we don’t even appear to be playing a formation any more. It’s only Fitzsimons’ sudden burst of form that’s stopped us getting an absolute pasting in the last two matches.

I could almost forgive all of this still, if he didn’t then come out and say we played quite well and just missed our chances. No, Harry, we had one shot on target and the opposition had about 37.

The thing about Kewell was that his record at Crawley was so meh it was hard to say whether it was actually any good or not. One of the fairer accusations against our chairman is that he does appear to suffer from stars in his eyes when he’s dealing with some of football’s more famous names, and I don’t think Kewell would have got anywhere near the job with his record if he’d had a playing career at Leatherhead and Leyton Orient rather than Leeds and Liverpool.

It is still early days, but I wouldn’t be at all disappointed if he got sacked tomorrow. I’d definitely worry though that Hardy’s definitely the type of bloke to give Sol Campbell his big chance in management.