Saturday 16th November

[WhiteRussian]

I text my mate at 2-1 down in the second half that we were going to win. It was a blistering start by Cheltenham but we seemed in control for a decent chunk of that game, definitely once it ticked past 60 minutes.

If we don't stop conceding goals like we are it's going to bite us pretty soon. We can't rely on outscoring the opposition.

 

[dannyc5]

Never heard of any of them apart from Hemming and he's crap.
Crewe are the dirtiest of teams on their little subbuteo pitch.
The ground and general area is a dump with few refreshment opportunities apart from the usual chippy and rip off tip of a boozer.
Oh and I got a 30.00 penalty charge for parking

The prosecution rests.

 

[Stocky]

Still can't work this league out. Which will surprise some people as I usually know everything. Or claim to.

What is this I'm hearing about Crewe deserving to go up last season? I'm not having that. The best three teams went up automatically and then they barely landed a punch against Crawley at Wembley. They're telling fibs to show off to the Port Vale fans.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

Cry some more please

The prosecution rests.

It's a kangaroo court

 

[Wootball]

Still can't work this league out. Which will surprise some people as I usually know everything. Or claim to.

What is this I'm hearing about Crewe deserving to go up last season? I'm not having that. The best three teams went up automatically and then they barely landed a punch against Crawley at Wembley. They're telling fibs to show off to the Port Vale fans.

We didn't deserve to go up. If we hadn't got 15+ injuries to the point where we couldn't even fill our bench and were having to play 5 of our starting lineup on pain injections for every game, we probably would have done.

 

[RavenBish]

Hope everyone acknowledges all this squabbling is pointless, we’ll have Jodi Jones back in a month and the weird brothers’ secret machine learning models will find us a couple more Jattas in January.

 

[lordofthepies]

Still can't work this league out. Which will surprise some people as I usually know everything. Or claim to.

What is this I'm hearing about Crewe deserving to go up last season? I'm not having that. The best three teams went up automatically and then they barely landed a punch against Crawley at Wembley. They're telling fibs to show off to the Port Vale fans.

If we carried on how we were going up until March, we'd have won the league. The only thing that slowed us down was an injury crisis which would make a Notts fan weep.

 

[Ainsty]

Town delivered a strong performance with a 2-1 home victory against Chesterfield, securing three vital points. This result was a fair reflection of the match. While Chesterfield had more possession, the Tea Shop boys put in the effort and defended effectively, limiting their chances.

Berry’s goal in the 77th minute was outstanding, especially since it was his first touch after coming on as a substitute. It will be interesting to see if he can manage at this level long term. What a shame Dobra's acted like a big baby, he rolled around on the ground and left his team down to 10 men at times while he play acted. That type of behaviour would be unacceptable in my grandaughter's girls team. He didn't add much to the attack, at least twice keeping the ball instead of passing to Mandy who was in a better scoring position.

For us, Duke Mckenna, Asare, and Cornelius all played crucial roles, but Duke Mckenna is my clear choice for MOM. Folkingham also deserves recognition. He has been with Town since National League North days and was playing in his 300th match. Despite being 34, he shows relentless determination, constantly harassing the opposition and controlling the game. Last year, he struggled for minutes, but this season, amid injuries and the sale of key players, he has proven to be a great asset to the club. It's a pity there aren't more players like him in League 2, happy and grateful to be playing professional football and prepared to run through a brick wall for their club.

As demonstrated in our matches against Bradford, Doncaster, and Wrexham, if you’re not the most talented team, you must be the hardest working, and that’s exactly what we’ve did this week.

 

[Cloudy]

Yep, looking forward to having him back properly. If, and it's a big if, we can keep him fit from now until the end of the season then we have a much better chance of a decent season. Had a day off Town today so didn't see the match. How was Luker when he came on?

It's a solid point, isn't it? Still in the top 7, players coming back, chance to turn around the home form in the next couple of matches. Current situation definitely feels like an unexpected Brucie Bonus.


Yep, horrible lot. All us BELTs told you so.

Great goal that.

Thompson back is a huge plus. Think it will be a few weeks until he is capable of 90 minutes but with Green out suspended next week he may start and McEachran pushing further forward.
Luker looked good to me in the 2nd half although I thought he was dire and totally disinterested in midweek in the BDSM trophy. I’d start him ahead of Svanthorson next week.
Barrington was very good imo.

Either side could have won it, they missed a sitter and Rose again missed the target from 6 yards. At least we were still trying to win in the last 10 rather than trying to hold on for the point.

First draw of the season. I can see several more before the turn of the year.

 

[Stocky]

If we carried on how we were going up until March, we'd have won the league. The only thing that slowed us down was an injury crisis which would make a Notts fan weep.

Absolute delusion this. We had shit loads of injuries too.

You were a hard working side who did well to get into the play-offs but you had nowhere near the quality of us, Wrexham or Mansfield.

 

[GEORGE]

Bit of a weird one, the Vale games. I always used to see it as a bit of a friendly rivalry, we were almost united in an anti-Stoke alliance with them. Over recent years, as they haven't played Stoke for years and we haven't played any of our bigger rivals either, the atmosphere at the games has got nastier. I grew up in Alsager, which is partway to Stoke, so there were loads of Stoke and Vale fans at my school, and we always wound each other up. But if you live in Crewe or Stoke, you probably wouldn't know m/any fans of the other team. I'm a bit old and stuck in my ways, so although I enjoy a bit of rivalry with Vale, I don't hate them, and it's the closest thing either side has to a derby at the moment, I dunno if I'd quite call it a derby.

No way Crewe / Vale is a derby. Vale only have one derby and that is Stoke.

 

[Scum.]

I text my mate at 2-1 down in the second half that we were going to win. It was a blistering start by Cheltenham but we seemed in control for a decent chunk of that game, definitely once it ticked past 60 minutes.

I thought the same. Even at 0-2 I fancied us to overturn it. Under Williamson, not a prayer.

 

[mozzavale]

From an outsider's perspective I'd have definitely said Crewe Vale was a derby but I don't claim to be an expert. Vale fans, other than Stoke, who would you say are your other local rivals are?

No one.

There's a historic rivalry with Walsall that was a bit before my time.

 

[JJ1990]

Absolute delusion this. We had shit loads of injuries too.

You were a hard working side who did well to get into the play-offs but you had nowhere near the quality of us, Wrexham or Mansfield.

And yet, we went 2-2-2 against the three of you, including being unbeaten in all 3 away games. We had the quality, we just lacked the depth and the consistency at a couple of points.

 

[JJ1990]

No way Crewe / Vale is a derby. Vale only have one derby and that is Stoke.

What is a derby then in your eyes?

 

[jacobncfc]

Seen a couple of clips from our game that are probably going to be retrospective bans. One in the first few mins where Crewe’s number six pretty clearly stamps on Abbott, and Bedeau definitely throws a punch at the guy who scores the penalty while he’s celebrating.

No idea why it was so bad tempered, but with that and the penalty farce it wasn’t a great day for the ref on his EFL debut.

 

[Mid-Cheshire-Alex]

Seen a couple of clips from our game that are probably going to be retrospective bans. One in the first few mins where Crewe’s number six pretty clearly stamps on Abbott, and Bedeau definitely throws a punch at the guy who scores the penalty while he’s celebrating.

No idea why it was so bad tempered, but with that and the penalty farce it wasn’t a great day for the ref on his EFL debut.

I did wince when I heard it was his debut!

 

[Bianconeri 1862]

No way Crewe / Vale is a derby. Vale only have one derby and that is Stoke.

Ours is of course Forest though Mansfield it's there big day out when they get let out of their caves, similar to crewe at vale

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

Seen a couple of clips from our game that are probably going to be retrospective bans. One in the first few mins where Crewe’s number six pretty clearly stamps on Abbott, and Bedeau definitely throws a punch at the guy who scores the penalty while he’s celebrating.

No idea why it was so bad tempered, but with that and the penalty farce it wasn’t a great day for the ref on his EFL debut.

EFL debut you say? Poor chap doubt he will get a good review from the stands.

Losing the excellent to date Bedeau would be most unwelcome. As I'm sure whoever Crewe No.6 is will be for them.

Fingers crossed they show mercy you know with all things considered

 

[dannyc5]

I've watched the alleged stamp back. I'm not going to get into an argument over it, but there's no way in a million years Sanders will get a retrospective ban.

 

[valefan16]

From an outsider's perspective I'd have definitely said Crewe Vale was a derby but I don't claim to be an expert. Vale fans, other than Stoke, who would you say are your other local rivals are?

It’s all about Stoke really, others come and go. It was quite intense with Shrewsbury around 2008-10ish after a bad tempered game but that died out quickly, Wrexham in the past, historically it was Walsall and that died years ago but since we took DC they have made it one from their end again but that one confuses us as much as anything as they said they didn’t care he was gone then decided to make it a rivalry. Only Walsall fans can answer why a large proportion of their fan base are like that since then.

One of our ex players or someone making out they are him, has a Port Fail twitter and Saddlers fans are all over it.

The Vale - Stoke one is really intense and pure hatred both ways so nothing else comes close, we don’t for example sing about Crewe in a standard game or anyone else.

 

[Optipez]

Hope everyone acknowledges all this squabbling is pointless, we’ll have Jodi Jones back in a month and the weird brothers’ secret machine learning models will find us a couple more Jattas in January.

A fit squad with one half decent striker addition who can stretch a defence and we will go close this season.
We had a poor team out yesterday in our forward areas and looked toothless but we aren't toothless with important players back and they're all back in some kind of training now.

 

[lordofthepies]

Absolute delusion this. We had shit loads of injuries too.

You were a hard working side who did well to get into the play-offs but you had nowhere near the quality of us, Wrexham or Mansfield.

Believe that if you want but we were in a great place in early March following the away wins at Stockport and Notts. Only injuries slowed that momentum - you had the squad depth to cope with it, we didn't and our bench was full of kids who were not ready to play.

 

[Son of Cod]

Thompson back is a huge plus. Think it will be a few weeks until he is capable of 90 minutes but with Green out suspended next week he may start and McEachran pushing further forward.
Luker looked good to me in the 2nd half although I thought he was dire and totally disinterested in midweek in the BDSM trophy. I’d start him ahead of Svanthorson next week.
Barrington was very good imo.

Either side could have won it, they missed a sitter and Rose again missed the target from 6 yards. At least we were still trying to win in the last 10 rather than trying to hold on for the point.

First draw of the season. I can see several more before the turn of the year.

I really can't figure Barrington out personally. He's the sort of player that under Hurst would never have been given as many minutes as he has under Artell. Undeniably technically proficient but not quite there physically yet and I think he's a tad too cautious at times. You could say pretty much exactly the same as JDS. Would love to be proven wrong but I just don't rate them as a three with Rose. Which is arguably harsh as Vernam is clearly ahead of them both in the pecking order and we're missing him but we need something else up there as it's quite apparent that Pyke and Wilson are not really in Artell's plans. So it's good to hear Barrington played well yesterday and that Luker might be able to provide some reinforcement up top.

 

[Soz]

It is weird that Crewe are simultaneously a top 3 team over the last 18 months but also can't compete with the economic powerhouse that is port vale.

We might have the biggest budget in the league but where do people think we compare with Wrexham/Stockport/Mansfield? If you can compete with them then you can compete with us.

 

[Soz]

As for the big derby debate...for me you can have neighbouring towns/cities as a derby but they have to be very close.

So on balance I'd say vale v Crewe is a derby.

Walsall is a rivalry as is Shrewsbury and Swindon will be for a couple of years I imagine.

We don't really class Burton as a rivalry or a derby bizarrely despite us being in the same county.

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

How big is your budget this season?

 

[GTFCfish]

What is a derby then in your eyes?

They are a football club that play at Pride Park.

 

[valefan16]

How big is your budget this season?

Hard to say exactly as everything is undisclosed.

We paid fees:

Connor Hall - Cowley described as a deal they couldn’t turn down.

Lorent Tolaj - Met Aldershot’s release clause rumoured to be 250k but not confirmed.

Ruari Paton - likely 6 figures easily, had interest rumoured from L1

Jayden Stockley - Paid Fleetwood, assume also 6 fig.

Diamond Edwards - No idea on the fee on that.

Would assume easily half a million though on them combined maybe more.

Wage wise we got George Byers ahead of at least Blackpool, Stockley Fleetwood fans reckon was on decent money there so would imagine our wage budget is large, add in DM on a five year deal which he won’t have come for peanuts.

Expect ours is top three, likely top in the league.

In April Carol sold her family business for a rumoured 180 million and rumours before the sale was completed on the Vale forum suggested she was “going all in” to put the errors last season right.

Despite that Vale themselves have remained fairly grounded which is good, Moore was asked about if complacency plays a part and how do you combat that against Morecambe for example and as he rightly put, they are a full time professional football club so we don’t look at positions of opponents but what threats they have and treat everyone opponent the same.

It’s probably the first time most Vale fans have experienced this after years of poor ownership and rightly so we fully backed Morecambe plight and protests yesterday. We know where we’ve been and how easily it could have gone the way of Bury/Macc etc so just enjoying winning games again and see where it takes us. Things can change very quickly in football.

Anyone in this league on their day can beat us and nice versa.

Also worth noting despite the perceived big spending we’ve successfully developed a productive youth system which has made some big money, Bailey Dipepa to Southampton which likely made us 7 figures and more in the future, a kid to Newcastle for 200k rumoured and a record schoolboy sale to Villa in the past 12 months, plus a sell on for Man City’s Joel Ndala who’s gone to PSV on loan with an agreement to buy end of the season.

Oh yeah and somehow got money for Ryan Loft from Cambridge one of the worst strikers we’ve ever had!

 

[Jimmy Anderson]

I think mk Dons have the biggest budget in the league not vale. Darren Moore is on 6k a week and George Byers 5k a week from what I've been told.