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Yes it’s true that Tsaroulla, Grant and Bennetts all have ability but one thing they all have in common as well is the missing end product. With Tsaroulla and Bennetts it’s the final ball, the cross and particularly last season for Tsaroulla It was his shooting. He would dribble past three players and then sky it over the bar. If he could work on that he would be real player for us . With Grant he just lacks that ruthless streak. If he had it he could be our top scorer. What I’ve like about Bennetts is his willingness to take players on and her crosses in. He has the technical ability that some of the others lack. I could vote him as a man of the match but he has to do it more consistently and with more assists. Having said all that, I would like to see Kouyhar get a start, to see what he could do. It’s the same with Jarvis they need a consistent run of games to bring out the best in them. I think after Saturday’s performance, Martin Paterson might be willing to make a few changes.

nick tsaroulla for me. i felt disappointed when martin paterson took him off, but i can understand that keanan bennetts looked good attacking. i just thought tsaroulla was superb all over the pitch.

i left the game feeling very frustrated in roos, to the point i felt like i had little hope in his ability. i watched the extended highlights yesterday, because i dont want to be harsh or rely on my thoughts after the game because i realise my perspective could be more based on what i felt i had seen. i do wish he would stop being so eccentric, focusing more on playing it safe. notts looked very good until his decision to come rushing out, when i saw it live i wondered why the hell he did not just kick it out for a throw in. i thought he slid in trying to leave something onto the colchester player. for me it was the biggest turning point of the game, and rewatching it. i think the idea was probably right, but the execution being poor and unfortunate. until watching the extended highlights, i thought we had some good chances that just did not fall but there are efforts that we should have done much better with and one came from a cross from lewis macari where conor grant back flicked the ball, it catches a deflection and tyrese hall is stretching to get on to it. its unfortunate, as grant may have scored but i do wonder if being more aware and passing it would have been different. to their credit everything happens in a heart beat, but there are chances where we really should be more clinical. i think we need to be more mindful when going for it, because it ultimately left us short at the back. poor defending, and i do think roos could have done better but i would acknowledge one on ones are hard. our problem is the defending and decision making when it comes to the opposition having chances. i thought we played very well attacking wise, but it counts for nothing when you cant manage a team of thugs and dark arts specialists.

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Colchester have a habit of playing well against us. Whether they'll challenge further up the table remains to be seen, but they looked useful yesterday. They got a bit of luck with their first goal, but they made the most of it and it was a well-earned win for them. We started brightly but I felt we eased off after going ahead and handed the initiative to Colchester. After that it was a question of scoring against a very deep and compact opponent, which is tricky at the best of times. In the last couple of seasons we've become reliant on Jones and McGoldrick to unlock the door for us, and without them the end product is a bit lacking. Add to that the constant mistakes in goal and we're dropping points in winnable games.

There's a couple of things here for me. I thought Colchester was everything I'd expect from a Notts side this season. Remember when we were sold the idea of "dark arts" and being physical and more direct? I didn't see that against Colchester. I thought they were probs the best side I've seen at Meadow Lane and that's including us against Shrewsbury. They were disciplined, drove some good passes behind our high press and the front three bullied us all day long. Also helps when you've got a good keeper who catches and doesn't have a 60% rate of giving the ball to the opposite side. I think that a large majority of people within the club and watching now think that Roos is the biggest hinderence since Alan Smith's days of being a statue. They have to act or watch us lose more money by not achieving promotion and Paterson sacked as he can't navigate a boat with a gaping hole in it. Two tactical issues stand out for me which I think is on Paterson. We are easy to counter and break the lines of. We do have good defenders but some times I think we'd be better with three in midfield with someone screning the back line and Palmer and Robbo abit pushed up. Secondly, we fall off a cliff when it gets to the 25 yard area. The amount of players which get to just outside of the area, all of a sudden are hit with a moment of indecision. Grant is the worst for it but Hall is a very close second. Jarvis has shown that he might be capable but I dunno. This Jan is huge, but I do find comfort in the fact Montague is at the club. I hope/reckon that we'll see signficant changes to our team in Feb to now.

Tsaroulla for me Grant showed some nice touches but we need someone who can shoot with power in that position

Tsaroulla & Grant were head and shoulders ahead of anyone else but Robbo, Palmer both put a shift in and Ness was combative and solid again. Bennetts - really? I’d have carted him & Jatta off first, closely followed by Hall. All 3 of them were almost completely anonymous after our goal. Between them, Bedeau and Bennetts made a right horlicks of marking their 14 for the 2nd goal.

This game was a big test for Notts & it would demonstrate how the squad stand in the League 2 scheme of things, & whether they can compete at a high level against the top sides. With some very tough games to come against the leading sides in December, I believe it was important for Notts to put in a good performance against Colchester, but unfortunately it didn't happen, & Colchester were simply the better side on the day. Why? Because they won the tactical battle. Colchester were another side to come to ML with a plan. A plan that we see time & time again by opponents at ML. Notts couldn't better it once again. I think that Notts have to look at their present style of play, because the way Notts are playing is not good enough to counter the way opponents set up against them especially at ML. It doesn't help when Notts give away goals that could have been easily avoided. Unfortunately, I don't think that our number 1 goalkeeper is good enough & until a change is made, Notts will continue to concede soft goals like they have been doing from the beginning of the season. Another big point, 8 out of the 10 outfield players who lined up against Colchester played under Maynard, & Maynard's team had a poor record against the top 10 teams last season. This side struggled just as the side struggled last season to break teams down. It is also conceding soft goals just like last season. The January transfer window cannot come quick enough.

i might not have liked what i may have posted if i had done it sooner, but i left frustrated and disappointed. we are our own worst enemies when it comes to games like this. if only we could be tighter at the back and more alert, with less jumping in before making a decision on balance. i know football is a quick game, but its costing us and its not just roos, but the defending is not acceptable at times. we manage games unbalanced when the pressure is on. all the good we did in attacking the play, was left undone by the state of the goals we conceded and in a game really notts should have won. i am not being biased saying this, because we were in control and looking good until colchester equalised. we looked destined to draw, until martin paterson decides to go all in and i do think the choice was right. i just think we could have been a bit more balanced at the back, i wished he had kept nick tsaroulla on. keanan bennetts was great running at players, but tsaroulla offered more at the back. only to see bennetts come off, with two fresh wingers even though will jarvis and maziar kouhyar did well. which of those were defensive? neither, both seem to be more switched on at attacking. colchester was better than harrogate town in terms of performance, but they were just as bad with the time wasiting, theatrics and all that ugly stuff cheap teams do to get the upper hand when being out footballed. hes too eccentric, i dont think he puts much thought into some of his decisions. very rash at thinking, i mean he made a good save late on by punching the ball out for a corner, but his first decision was woeful. these decision can prove costly, and he needs to be reigned in. why punch a cross in as if you are superman in the direction of attacking players? especially after choosing to slide into a defender earlier on in the game and being lobbed. its just madness. its nothing personal, but i dont think hes good enough or smart enough to realise.

@McPie I agree with what you have said. Another thing we lacked yesterday was physicality & aggression. We were told that the new players were more aggressive, but the starting eleven was basically the same team as last season apart from Bass & McGoldrick & that team yesterday can't be described as being aggressive. Hall isn't an aggressive player, nor is Bennetts.

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My takeaway from the Colchester game is just how important it is to have pace in the team. Counter attacking is an important part of the game. We don't do it very well. I agree big January coming up. I think Martin Paterson has got just about as much as he can out of the current group. It's amazing that the last two opponents had massive injury problems ad we still couldn't beat them. Maybe time for a re-think about our formation. It was interesting to hear Danny Cowley's interview after the match. He said the injuries forced him to play 4 4 2. It worked well for them, at times it seemed like they had an extra man on the pitch! Food for thought maybe?

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We need more chances to score than our opponents. 2,94 xG vs 0,97 xG. That`s a swing of 4 goals.

I defended Kelle Roos on here. I thought he deserved the chance to overcome a poor start and show what he can do. The goalkeeping style I can live with it. And he did stabilise and overcome what we thought were early nerves to start playing better. But to regress like he did against Colchester? To go right back to those first early games, after a few months of training and a chance to work on your weaknesses and get your mind right? Yes, December is a scary prospect.

I think everytime Maz comes on he is very positive, always driving at players and getting crosses in. I think he shows more determination than many of the players, a bit like Austin used to.

I couldn't agree more Robbie. The more you think about the last transfer window the worse it gets. I was impressed with Colchester yesterday. They were very fit and very organised, but we should have created more and we should be able to beat teams like this. It could be a long 38 days waiting until January. Let's hope not.

Disappointing result but the well organised good teams in this league always are our biggest challenge. That said I wouldn’t start panicking too much yet and I certainly don’t think we need to rip everything up and start again. I thought we created more chances yesterday than we did against Harrogate and at 1-1 we looked more likely to score. But we didn't and after that we looked like the confidence had gone from us. Even breaking it down, their first goal is incredibly lucky it could’ve deflected anywhere, if that had been us the ball would’ve gone to an opposition player! 3rd goal didn’t really matter in the end but that shot should not have gone in. Interesting idea about changing tactics, I don’t think we’ve got the right players to suddenly start sitting back deep and relying on defensive stability and winning matches by the odd goal. I wouldn’t want us to have suddenly defend 10-15 set-pieces every match, it’s bad enough having to defend 5 or 6 at the minute! I just think we need to really focus on breaking teams down and playing quicker and braver, that can be fixed with training sessions alongside a bit of creative thinking from our coaches.

In my opinion Macari, Robertson, Ness & Grant were the standouts in a lackluster performance by the squad today. I think there needs to be a change of approach the way that Notts play because their approach to this game simply did not work for them.

Yes, agreed - fair point. I am, genuinely, interested to know why Jarvis & Bennetts impressed others in the last couple of games. I’m not seeing “end product” or creativity/imagination tbh. They fit the system and certainly possess ability, I get that. Tsaroulla & Grant were just more effective, productive & inventive for my money.

The best player today was the one MP took off first - Nick Tsaroulla. I would've liked to see him tried on the other side for a bit rather than Bennetts who got that chance. Shout out too to Macari who was much better today and is combining really well with Tsaroulla. Furthest away from MoM today - Roos or Jatta. How can Jatta go from MoMs to 4/10? He challenges for the ball as if it doesn't matter that the defender comes out on top all the time. Not the attitude we need. When the ball's there to be won we need a forward who is as desperate to win it as any defender.

I think if we notched up the tempo and the quickness of our passing and not press so high up the pitch, we might be able to get some balls behind their defense. Otherwise it's quite tedious build up play that gets to the 25 yard area, no one shoots, we play it out wide, we either cross it or call foul and if we do cross it, Jatta's not getting their first. Rinse and repeat.

I think the issue could be more how the safe passing patterns are still ingrained in a lot of our players, like you said the majority of that team played last season. I've not been overly concerned with our physicality this season we stood up to the barrage from Barnet and competed really well against Bromley early this season at home and they are about as physical as you get in this league, so we can do it.

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A very interesting read thanks @Piethagoram

@menzinho You only have to look at the problems we had last season against the top sides, then realise that 8 of the 10 outfield players playing for Notts yesterday were in Maynard's squad last season. Where's the physicality we were promised?

Yes really, but it’s all about personal opinions at the end of the day.

We took off the 2 liveliest and most creative players - that didn’t help much! Jatta was hopeless, Hall was invisible after our goal and Jarvis was completely anonymous . Didn’t get all the praise for him last week either, he can’t beat a man and just passes or runs into trouble. Reminds me of “make it go backwards” Chicksen! We messed up for their first 2 goals and Roos dived over the 3rd. They had 4 opportunities and put the ball in the net 4 times. I’d replace Jatta, Roos, Jarvis & Bennetts with players who know what they are supposed to do!

Poor performance all round. No excuses. Another side comes to Meadow Lane with similar tactics to every other opponent & Notts cannot solve it.

Palmer replaces Iorpenda in Notts's only change from Harrogate.

I agree with @Robbie 's comments above about how Colchester will approach this. I think they are going to press hard for the first 20 minutes with the aim of going 1-0 up. Then I'd imagine they'll sit deep and just play to counter. If they go into half-time 1-0 up, get prepared for a master-class in time wasting. I thought Harrogate were pretty sporting considering they had no subs, a team managed by the Cowleys will go through every trick in the book. I think in the big matches it's important that we get the first goal, then that puts the pressure on the away side, they can't just sit back and that will open up more spaces for us to attack too.

At Brackley definitely. But Ness has done well in the main. For the run in, Ness is clearly still third choice for the CB position. I wonder if he could give Macari competition for RCB? Last 2 away games 0-0 Swindon 0-2 win Walsall, where they were 2 up at HT and dominated apparently, so I think you might be right. Should be a better game to watch

Absolutely (as Stall might say :) ) He's a real game changer. That gliding ability is something else. It's funny because it doesn't look like its pace that's doing it. It was the same with players like John Robertson and John Barnes - it's a pretty rare ability. Why would MP hesitate? Hall and Jarvis? If they both have sleepy games a whole section of our team would be missing and we'd miss Grant's pressing and general defensive work. Jarvis behind 2 strikers? That's a lot to put on a player not known for his work ethic or reliability. I, and many other fans, maybe you too Piethagoram, would do this but I'm not sure MP would.

He definitely can. And oppositions wouldn't enjoy it. No.10 looks a hard position to play in L2. Somebody up your xxx all the time and defenders everywhere you turn. It already seems a long time ago that McGoldrick and Crowley showed they could live with that and produce goals/assists. Hall and Grant are doing OK but are not in that league so things could change there over the course of the season.

We can beat anyone in this league when we are on it. Let's hope we are on it this Saturday. I think our problem is we can't sustain a good performance for the whole game. We either start well and fade of start poorly and give our selves a mountain to climb. We have to start taking our chances while we are top that's seems to be what's missing.

Well I won’t be there for this match so I predict an exciting fast paced match, Notts will dominate for the whole 90+ minutes and we’ll win 5-0. You heard it here first.

Notts need to show more intensity from the word go against Colchester & put them under pressure. I'd play the starting eleven that took the field against Harrogate, but I would play Palmer instead of Iorpenda & put Iorpenda on the bench. We know that Martin Paterson can change things around if things aren't working in the first half. Hopefully that won't happen this time. I'm hoping for a convincing win on Saturday. A 3:1 win for Notts would be a great result & should keep Notts in the top four.

Palmer back in to start for sure. I wouldn't mind unchanged apart from that, we won the second half with Palmer on after all. Jarvis to come on, Jodi as well if he's fit.