League 2 General Chat Thread

[WH_Stag]

Lincoln down to 10 men again? shock! Ugly over physical side that loves to hoof it glad to see them loose..

I'm sure that idiot manager will say they were fouled every 5 seconds of some shit again.

 

[UTS]

4-0 home wins off the top of my head:

Gillingham 2007/08
Plymouth 2013/14
Wigan 15/16
Grimsby 17/18

Must have been some in the 10/11 promotion season surely.

 

[denzel ecfc]

I've been searching for a Lincoln thread and can't find one. Well done Harry Kewell for the Crawley win. Oh, hang on....

 

[Luke Imp]

Tough watch today at SB from our point of view but also the match generally. Difficult with a swirling wind and rain.

We were better with 10 than we were with 11. Crawley were happy to sit in and didn't touch the ball in our box until the 80th minute or something.

The life of a lower league football fan where your team churns out a 90 minute performance a week earlier and you wonder what on earth happened the next game!

First half we didn't get going at all. Crawley saw most of the ball but didn't really threaten bar Palmer somehow missing from about 2 yards, albeit a ball fired in across a very wet surface and Akinde had a similar misfortune at the other end.

Andrade(?) seemed to get caught in the build up to their first and looked a clear foul but they played on down that side.

Second half and on first viewing, it looked a red card for Frecklington and that kicked us into some sort of action, really. With losing O'Connor to injury (think someone fell on him) and Freck within 10 minutes, we had two number ten type of players in CM and couldn't really get enough quality into Akinde who was isolated having moved from 4-3-3 to 4-4-1.

Mensah missed a good chance at the end but given the quality on show from both sides, a 0-0 was probably about right. The game summed up by Bostwick's OG, which seemed to deflect and get sliced in.

Crawley were decent enough. Decent at the back and in midfield with a couple of lively players i forward areas but poor final balls. They'll be a good bet for top half with an outside chance of the PO's.

Ref was baffling in some of his decision makings. Got the big ones correct, not that there were many to make, but inconsistent in his fouls. Shackell gets penalised for hand ball and their player does exactly the same thing, pretty much in the same position only two minutes later and gives nothing. To give him some credit, he booked 3 Crawley players in quick succession for bringing down Pett, Anderson and Andrade in almost identical challenges as they were countering.

 

[Conker]

The only team that have stood out so far was Lincoln, but today performance/result and the Grimsby one makes you wonder.

Shame we did not play today.

 

[wangle]

Yeah, what went wrong today? Saw it was 0-1 at half time and just figured it would be a classic 2-1 or 3-1 home win. Grind out that 60th minute equaliser and then bring on Green and/or Rhead for a 75min+ winner.

Well first of all credit to Crawley who pretty decent in the first half but seemed to struggle when we went down to 10. They were physically very strong, bossed the midfield and played some decent stuff. They got a huge slice of luck for the own goal but were worthy of their half time lead.

2nd half as you’d expect we improved, but still not as good as you would expect for promotion hopefuls. Crawley defended very well and the ball wasn’t falling for us. Then after the (deserved) red card for freck we all thought game over. However Crawley just seemed to stop playing. We had a strong finish but it just wasn’t our day, another game and we might have nicked a point.

I must say I’m surprised with what’s happened with you since we played you? You tore us to shreads and I thought you’d kick but it’s been almost the complete opposite!

 

[Luke Imp]

There are clubs that turn financial meltdown into a springboard for success. Lincoln, Luton and Oxford, for example. Stronger now than before their fall into non league. It’s clubs, probably like ourselves, where you just become mediocre and stay that way that is worse in some ways.

I’m afraid that without significant financial backing the best clubs can hope for is to retain the status quo

Not sure you can put us in that category because we were relegated for being shit, not for being in any financial trouble.

It was the relegation that made us struggle financially to a point and with having no money man per se, we took the only option we could and that was to cut everything mid-season, work on skeleton staff and rely on quite a few non-contract players to fill gaps. There was no point in us trying to compete with Fleetwood, Luton, Grimsby at the time, Mansfield and others so effectively had to just sit in there and pray that we'd have a season or two of a good run at promotion.

We even gave a Director the managers job to save paying a wage for one!

I've been searching for a Lincoln thread and can't find one. Well done Harry Kewell for the Crawley win. Oh, hang on....

Not sure whether you know how this forum thing works, but you tend to start one before you know the match result.

The only team that have stood out so far was Lincoln, but today performance/result and the Grimsby one makes you wonder.

Shame we did not play today.

We've been saying since the start of the season that performances haven't been in keeping with the point tally.

 

[Son of Cod]

Well first of all credit to Crawley who pretty decent in the first half but seemed to struggle when we went down to 10. They were physically very strong, bossed the midfield and played some decent stuff. They got a huge slice of luck for the own goal but were worthy of their half time lead.

2nd half as you’d expect we improved, but still not as good as you would expect for promotion hopefuls. Crawley defended very well and the ball wasn’t falling for us. Then after the (deserved) red card for freck we all thought game over. However Crawley just seemed to stop playing. We had a strong finish but it just wasn’t our day, another game and we might have nicked a point.

I must say I’m surprised with what’s happened with you since we played you? You tore us to shreads and I thought you’d kick but it’s been almost the complete opposite!

Well we played really well immediately after that one for 45mins vs MK Dons. Then the next 45mins it was an arses to the wall/batten down the hatches jobby to get away with a very decent point. But after that, it has been a fairly torrid few games. I think we have played 3 decent teams, in our defence. Newport was always going to be tough and we needed to be on it to get anything there and we weren't. Yeovil, I think surprised us. Very impressed with them. Awful defending today from us though. I think what we are seeing with us is a club hopefully in a transitional phase, that is showing sporadic signs of what they can do on the pitch. We are crap at the back and up top, but 45mins at MK Dons aside I don't think we have seen anyone that is particularly better than us in the middle of the park. We are very neat and tidy at times and work at least a few decent opportunities to score out of this nice passing every match, but that is quite literally it. We are hopeless at being direct and are making so many mistakes defensively. If we can learn to cut those out and mix it up a bit we might see an upturn in results. Having no main out and our striker hasn't helped either, but Wes Thomas will be back from suspension now so that might improve things a bit.

 

[AdamStag]

Another red for Lincoln, weirdly Mansfield have not received a red card this season.

We don’t play thuggish football though.

 

[Impish]

Lincoln down to 10 men again? shock! Ugly over physical side that loves to hoof it glad to see them loose..

I'm sure that idiot manager will say they were fouled every 5 seconds of some shit again.

"Loose" hahaha pretty sure our 'idiot' manager could spell a four letter word right!

 

[AdamStag]

"Loose" hahaha pretty sure our 'idiot' manager could spell a four letter word right!

The Cowley sisters don’t have a great record against Mansfield, maybe they’ll be better learning their place first.

Spouting off like girls as Mansfield’s mastered them in their own thuggish arts. Today obviously must have affected them further

 

[Impish]

Erm, yeah, must have.

 

[Davidimp]

Opposition fans seem to spend the game watching the cowleys very strange
I watch what's going on in frontof me on the pitch, which today was very poor
O well learn more from a defeat than a win they say,find out next week I guess.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

We’re currently learning next to nothing from defeat after defeat after defeat

I did not like Luke Imps match report one bit, poor

 

[denzel ecfc]

Opposition fans seem to spend the game watching the cowleys very strange
I watch what's going on in frontof me on the pitch, which today was very poor
O well learn more from a defeat than a win they say,find out next week I guess.

Hard not to notice the Cowleys when they are in front of you and having a right hissy fit, even when winning. In the 4th officials face all game.
Kewell was unlucky to be sent off yesterday, he didn't do half as much as the Cowleys last week. I guess each official interprets things differently.

 

[Imp in Branston]

The other Imps reports are about right, we could have been playing until now and not scored. Most things that could go wrong did and the ref did make some strange decisions, for both sides.

Crawley were largely decent and for me deserved their win, but my god we looked poor for the majority and seemed to simply run out of ideas.

I don't see why others seem to be surprised if we lose or don't play well, we were poor at Northampton, Grimsby, and again yesterday, who would believe that a team can sometimes play badly and lose!?

No other management team have any histrionics on the touchline of course.

 

[Son of Cod]

Of course other managers do it to a certain extent. Note the end of that sentence, though. It seems to be relentless with the two Cowleys. It's up there with Evans and Raynor, for me. They were never quite as bad as this with Braintree either, I don't think?

 

[Conker]

I’m not saying Cowley’s are like Evans Raynor off the pitch, but on that touch line they are equally noncey.

 

[devilofajob]

I agree with the Lincoln fans.
If Akinde (pen) hadn't missed just before we scored could have been a drubbing. He seemed though to revert to how he used to play for us. Must be a red and white thing.
Can't be many teams though you've never scored at home against?

 

[shoddycollins]

I’m not saying Cowley’s are like Evans Raynor off the pitch, but on that touch line they are equally noncey.

It's the things they protest about and the amount of protesting they do that sets the Cowleys and Evans and Minime apart. Evans would turn a lurid shade of peuce and quick-waddle off down the touchline closely followed by Raynor at every single decision from a penalty to a throw-in, while the Cowleys just look like they're up past their bed-time, haven't had their feed and are getting a bit grouchy.

Always good for a laugh though, Towelgate was probably the most I've laughed at an opposition manager's antics and how wound up he gets in ages.

 

[AdamStag]

Of course other managers do it to a certain extent. Note the end of that sentence, though. It seems to be relentless with the two Cowleys. It's up there with Evans and Raynor, for me. They were never quite as bad as this with Braintree either, I don't think?

The one thing the cowley sisters seen to have similar to Evans and raynor is that they simply couldn’t just accept when they were beaten sometimes, they just gone done fair and square.

Evans would say the other team were lucky when most Mansfield folk just saw the other side play better on the day and win. When we won 1-0 at Lincoln last season which was relatively straight forward as 1-0s come, the Cowleys were the same, couldn’t admit they’ve just lost to a better side on the day.

Providing it doesn’t happen too often, I’ve actually more time for a manager if he holds his hands up and admits he’s got it wrong/beaten by a better side

 

[AdamStag]

Wouldn't be saying we were technically poor if you'd seen us tear apart Port Vale and Crewe - we're a different team at home to away. In past seasons we've looked technically good but too young and soft centred - this season we look capable of both, which is promising.

Fair result today in the end - Tranmere edged the first half but we had the best chance when missing a near enough open goal. We were the better side in the second half.

In this league being a team of cloggers that can pass it a little isn’t a bad thing. Unfortunately, physically big sides do well, especially in winter months. It suited us in the conference

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

I’m not saying Cowley’s are like Evans Raynor off the pitch, but on that touch line they are equally noncey.

Literally impossible!

They can be an imitation, probably a pale imitation but they aren’t on Fatty Fat Fat and the Ginger puppet levels . They maybe touching dicks but Are they even at Warnock levels of sideline nobheadery????

 

[Indian Dan]

The truth about all the managers mentioned is that nobody would notice their histrionics if they weren’t successful.

 

[AdamStag]

The truth about all the managers mentioned is that nobody would notice their histrionics if they weren’t successful.

I guess that’s a fair way of explaining it. People only notice Evans as he’s been very successful - even though he didn’t win anything with us or get us promoted he had a good record with us (though with a foul taste at the end). No managers with previous success were comparable to him (despite him having budgets larger than most.

His antics are daft, but if he was less successful he’d be hated a lot less

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

Agree but needs to be edited to including the words at ‘ lower level’ , if Mr Evans was soooo successful with all those promotions under his belt (bar Mansfield) . Why has his managerial peak after all these years been no higher than Rotherham United (no disrespect to that club) in the Championship???!

We probably all know the answer.

If he was such a disgrace on the sideline and a poor manager he would of come and gone out of english Football in quick time and ended up at somewhere like St Johnstone

 

[Son of Cod]

Literally impossible!

They can be an imitation, probably a pale imitation but they aren’t on Fatty Fat Fat and the Ginger puppet levels . They maybe touching dicks but Are they even at Warnock levels of sideline nobheadery????

Different but just as bad. Evans/Raynor are more aggressive and animated but quite often without a specific target. More like vitriol thrown out into the open for anyone willing to bite. It might be difficult to read about your favourite boys, but the Cowleys are like a pair of conniving rats. Constantly chipping away, until they eventually get something.

 

[Luke Imp]

The one thing the cowley sisters seen to have similar to Evans and raynor is that they simply couldn’t just accept when they were beaten sometimes, they just gone done fair and square.

Evans would say the other team were lucky when most Mansfield folk just saw the other side play better on the day and win. When we won 1-0 at Lincoln last season which was relatively straight forward as 1-0s come, the Cowleys were the same, couldn’t admit they’ve just lost to a better side on the day.

Providing it doesn’t happen too often, I’ve actually more time for a manager if he holds his hands up and admits he’s got it wrong/beaten by a better side

That's not quite true with them.

In his post match interviews, DC is pretty down the middle with his assessments and always gives the opposition credit (as he did yesterday to Crawley, for example).

He's nowhere near Evans levels in that respect. Evans blamed everyone to deflect his sides poor performances.

 

[Son of Cod]

That's not quite true with them.

In his post match interviews, DC is pretty down the middle with his assessments and always gives the opposition credit (as he did yesterday to Crawley, for example).

He's nowhere near Evans levels in that respect. Evans blamed everyone to deflect his sides poor performances.

Yeah, I would agree with that. There is a reason Cowley is a BT Sports fave. Articulate and talks sense. Very similar to Paul Hurst in that sense.

 

[AdamStag]

G

That's not quite true with them.

In his post match interviews, DC is pretty down the middle with his assessments and always gives the opposition credit (as he did yesterday to Crawley, for example).

He's nowhere near Evans levels in that respect. Evans blamed everyone to deflect his sides poor performances.

Faith enough luke, you’ll have seem them more than me.

There is certainly similarities