National League Fixtures - 25/11/2017

[E10rifle]

If only we’d had last season’s team this season...

Please take Widdowson back. Pretty please?

 

[Look Out There Are Llamas]

E10rifle I presume you weren't there so here is a taster. Decided to watch this one back. I've managed 90 seconds and because it's fantastic, here's a play by play breakdown.

1. Orient kick off, it is hoofed forward. Torquay return the hoof with a hoof of their own, Happe heads out for a throw in our final third under minimal pressure.
2. Torquay take the throw, McAnuff clears a loose ball... well, slices it out for a throw in our own half.
3. Within 20 seconds from that the ball is set up for Happe to twat away, Happe hits it into a Torquay player, the loose ball falls for another Torquay player inside the Orient area but his touch is Battesque and it goes for a goal kick.
4. Grainger's goal kick, nobody competes for it, their bloke literally stands still and heads forward with Harrold static 10 yards away, from this Happe hoofs the ball up at about a 20 degree angle, McAnuff manages to win the resulting header knocking the ball out for a throw in our final third.

I'm 90 seconds in for fucks sake.

 

[Railway Blue]

I think our saving grace is that George Elokobi should be back somepoint soon and that I think if in a few weeks time nothing changes Travis and Teague will throw money at not getting relegated. Another relegation would be a massive disaster. Being a division below Hampton & Richmond, Braintree or Chelmsford is absolutely not okay. Financially I imagine we'd take a massive hit as would the Leyton Orient brand, it's probably actually cheaper to throw another 250k at not getting relegated. If we do, according to Teague we have an estimated 2nd-5th budget, I wonder if that would be the largest budget to ever drop out of this league.

As it stands and without changes I would fancy Guiseley to end up above us. I'd expect someone else from that group as well as I expect a mid table team to do an Orient over the second half of the season and be drawn in, possibly Maidenhead.

We've released a little statement saying 14 games without a win is unexpected and unacceptable. No shit.

Possibly York City last season. If not them probably Stockport County.

 

[Railway Blue]

Hard to know the truth of the various rumours about Mellon or other’s responsibility for the pre-season squad issues. I tend towards the view that plans to move Cook on didn’t come about for whatever reason and the squad building was based on that false premise. While a decision will have to be taken about Cook in the New Year and personally I’d keep and let go on a free in the summer, at the moment things are looking hopeful.

Elsewhere, the cream is rising to the top, with Daggers and the Shots picking up, though the former disappointed on their recent visit to Birkenhead. Anyone could still win this league, even Tranmere. Though Boreham Wood were probably the best side I’ve seen so far this season.

At the bottom, would like Chester to stay up, for the local derby factor. Was surprised Astles didn’t make the starting xi yesterday as strikes me as one of their better players. Haven’t seen the other strugglers in action yet.

Astles has been out with a gashed leg. He came on at 0-1 and was stupidly played as a striker so D & R helped themselves to another 3 goals. Your hope that we stay up took an almost terminal battering on Saturday. This defence is pretty well the worst I can remember in 57 years of support. We haven't had a clean sheet since the Alamo at yours.

 

[Railway Blue]

So Ling is Director of Football, he is basically CEO but for the footballing side and is responsible for acting as the bridge between that and the board, be it the senior team or the under 11s. The head coach will be directly answerable to Ling the same way the office staff are directly responsible to the CEO Danny Macklin - both of them then report directly to the chairman Nigel Travis. Ling made a few signings before Davis was appointed, but since then I believe that the head coach, director of football and chief scout will all have been involved in the transfers, which unlike most I'm not against - the more people approving a transfer deal mean less margin for error theoretically but boy did we fuck up over the summer in this regard. I was less confident than others at the time with two year deals and some of the signings but boy have they outperformed anything in my wildest nightmares, I still think player for player we have a better squad than those around us, but we don't have the right blend of players, it's all a collection of individuals, there's no synergy and they don't compliment each other. Others, like David Mooney and (controversial opinion alert) Matt Harrold have completely lost it. Ling was responsible for Davis appointment, however this time more people will be involved.

Budget wise I think we do both have an advantage and there is strong correlation with budget and team performance over a three year period, but of course that relies on signing players for their correct value to make the most of it, we've shown over the last four seasons or so it's not a guaranteed thing, as have Eastleigh. However I think that generally there's going to be a few teams with similar top end budgets and with only one automatic spot there's going to be a lot of disappointed teams. Additionally having six teams in the play offs dilutes a lot of things and adds a lot more random factors and less chance of promotion. We could both have strong seasons getting 80 points and finishing 4th - 5th. The added games completely ruin chances of promotion, as the more games in a single knockout format mean the more chance of losing obviously and to win over three play off tie rather than two is a lot harder.

Going forward, yeah, I'm confident that if we survive this season we'll be hitting the play offs quite regularly and I'd expect to see Hartlepool up there but again, with the extra two spots it's that much harder. Wrexham and Stockport are both massive clubs for non league, Wrexham are in year ten down here and the longest serving club at this level, Stockport, well, Stockport.... Luton, Cambridge and Oxford spent a while here, even with a large budget - and I expect us to have a top five budget for every season we're at this level - there's every chance we'll be stuck here especially as it seems more teams are throwing money into their playing staff.

This season looks to be one of the easiest to get out of as there's no stand out consistent team at the top yet, in future years we'll probably see league winners hitting 90+ again. Problem is, even if we go on a two point per game run I think the play offs are probably beyond us, for Hartlepool not so much, but then if you're hitting 4th-7th you've probably got a slightly worse than 6/1 shot of going up.

I also think relegation for you would be worse than us. A slight oxymoron, but I think the South is of better quality overall, but I think the North with Stockport, York, Kidderminster, maybe Hereford next year, Salford if they fuck up, Darlington, there's a log jam of bigger clubs at that level, not that I think for one minute Hartlepool will trouble relegation. With a lot of clubs around London (Braintree, Chelmsford, East Thurrock, Concord, Hampton, Dartford, Wealdstone, St Albans, Hemel, Welling) our relative purchase power would be insane and really only Billericay could get anywhere near that.

I can't believe I've just typed out a view on a realistic scenario e.g. us in the Conference South.

I enjoyed reading that, but I think the Conference North is much better quality than the South.

 

[Look Out There Are Llamas]

I enjoyed reading that, but I think the Conference North is much better quality than the South.

That was always my sort of sentiment and I'm ready to admit I have minimal exposure to the Conference North. That's based on how the promoted teams have fared in season one at this level, Gloucester this season and somebody I know who's seen quite a bit of both. Of course, there are flaws to that methodology.

 

[Harrier94]

That was always my sort of sentiment and I'm ready to admit I have minimal exposure to the Conference North. That's based on how the promoted teams have fared in season one at this level, Gloucester this season and somebody I know who's seen quite a bit of both. Of course, there are flaws to that methodology.

Going off last season we played Ebbsfleet in trophy last season. We were both 2nd at the time and beat them very comfortably. Now we're sat in 8th and they are 12th in the league above.

Plus Gloucester weren't one of the good sides in the North. If Brackley had been moved I think they'd be easily near the top of the South.

 

[Silver Stone]

So what happens when the northern sides get promoted? Seems on average the southern sides do better in the National.

 

[Luke Imp]

North vs South was discussed here earlier in the season.

https://www.onefootballforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/north-v-south.16510/#post-659636

 

[Leewilson]

Please take Widdowson back. Pretty please?

Widdowson is a steady 7/10 when he's in a side that's doing well. Nothing more, rarely less.

Put him in a side struggling though (as we found out when we went down from League 2) and he's all at sea.

 

[E10rifle]

E10rifle I presume you weren't there so here is a taster. Decided to watch this one back. I've managed 90 seconds and because it's fantastic, here's a play by play breakdown.

1. Orient kick off, it is hoofed forward. Torquay return the hoof with a hoof of their own, Happe heads out for a throw in our final third under minimal pressure.
2. Torquay take the throw, McAnuff clears a loose ball... well, slices it out for a throw in our own half.
3. Within 20 seconds from that the ball is set up for Happe to twat away, Happe hits it into a Torquay player, the loose ball falls for another Torquay player inside the Orient area but his touch is Battesque and it goes for a goal kick.
4. Grainger's goal kick, nobody competes for it, their bloke literally stands still and heads forward with Harrold static 10 yards away, from this Happe hoofs the ball up at about a 20 degree angle, McAnuff manages to win the resulting header knocking the ball out for a throw in our final third.

I'm 90 seconds in for fucks sake.

I hate you.

 

[Luke Imp]

Jake Caprice tackle.

 

[Look Out There Are Llamas]

Jake Caprice tackle.

Went for the ball ref. Can't even be angry at that, such a Fifa tackle.

A fun Jake Caprice fact for E10rifle - Did you know... After Caprice's game v Chester he had a 52% pass completion rate?

 

[E10rifle]

A fun Jake Caprice fact for E10rifle - Did you know... After Caprice's game v Chester he had a 52% pass completion rate?

The most fun thing about that fact is that Caprice has comfortably been in our top 5 players this season. Probably top 3.

 

[Luke Imp]

There's an issue straight away. He's not even that good a full back, just a wannabe winger (where he started his career but wasn't good enough there, apparently).

 

[Look Out There Are Llamas]

Luke Imp I agree with E10rifle but, the only reason he's been one of our better players is that he's, now we've lost Brophy back to Swindon, the only player in the team probably who can knock out the 100m in under 14 seconds. Our main offensive move is to get Caprice to run into space on the overlap, and in fairness, it gets us forward. He's top 5/3 by default that he has pace.

The squad has been kinda put together badly which, I can understand time constraints, but even so, there's a lack of balance. We don't have a forward or winger who is going to stretch the opposition, in central midfield we don't have someone who is going to sit and break up the play (how I'd take Paul Terry right now), we elected not to sign an experienced 'keeper and that's costing us, our starting full backs are both wank, but if we play our best full back we lose our main outlet to get up the pitch. The signing I was most excited about is a CAM, we don't play with a CAM...

Most of the players are on two year deals as well, so it's hard to see how we're going to sort this out without paying up four or five contracts, although I fancy David Mooney will probably retire at the end of the season and cut his last year off. As individuals we don't have a bad team, but as a group we're missing key components to actually make a team.

On a happier note, I finally got through the Torquay game. That was probably on par with anything I've ever seen at this level, which is really not encouraging as I saw Welling a number of times the season they dropped and I saw Guiseley lose by six at Aldershot this year. Not even being hyperbolic.