menzinho

Scott played well in the National League playing in an attacking midfield role and he still scored a good number of goals. I think he's still capable of playing that role for us along with playing as forward too (good luck getting in a head of Jatta and Didzy there though). But the injury has been a massive setback, even over pre-season he didn't score and he looked like a player that hadn't played for a year. And then in his competitive return he's not looked quite on it but that is to be expected with all the football he's missed. I think he just needs a bit more playing time and with our injuries to Jodi, Grant and Edwards he's got more of chance than ever now. I don't think it matters too much where he plays, he's played enough in the attacking midfield role he knows what to do, he's just got to take his chance when he gets it.

I get why we play with just the one forward and two behind is because it gives you a “box midfield” which can effectively result in 4 central midfielders (2 CAMs 2CMs) so it’s much easier to control games as you can really outnumber the opposition’s midfield. That said I think a Didzy and Jatta paring is a good shout, especially against teams that do sit back and defend deep. We wouldn’t need to really take control of a game because the opposition have almost forfeited that battle by letting us have so much of the ball. I think a front two can still be very flexible too because like any forward pairing one can drop in to help with the build-up play. I’m expecting Wimbledon to play a similar style of sit back and look to counter and given our recent struggles to break these teams down I think it would be a perfect time to play them both.

I’d say we had lots of solid performances but no-one stood out for me. I liked Austin today, off the ball he was full of running and generally tidy on the ball too maybe need to see a bit more threat on the ball from him. Gordon had he played the whole match I might have given it to him, Mandeville had a bit of nightmare against him (but he is an attacking midfielder so more questions on the manager about why he played him there). But given Abbott was playing in a RWB role for the first time I think I'll give it to him. If I was being really critical he wasn't enough of a threat going forward, but he did get through at lot of running, supported the play well and defended pretty well.

Feel like there was a slice of lucky at the end there, it was a close game but I think had Chesterfield won it I wouldn’t have felt that aggrieved. Those penalties are ones I don't like to see given, not sure what he’s supposed to do with his arm when it’s booted at him from 3 yards but there you go. We had zero luck when it came to pens last season so maybe this season we are making up for it! Just didn’t really deal with some the big moments in that game, especially their 2nd goal. We looked so comfortable again at times but we didn’t create that much, especially in the second half, their keeper didn’t have a save to make until we scored the penalty. At times we seem to over-do the passing, especially short balls to feet. I liked seeing Crowley higher up the pitch, just didn’t have a good game today. Probably held on to the ball for too long at times and I didn’t like him screaming at Tsaroulla at the end for making a run in behind. That was actually a good run, we don’t need to constantly pass it short and to feet all the time! Hope he gave him a bit of stick back… A good point though, think Chesterfield will be in around the play-offs at the end of the season. Some interesting results today too, Port Vale with another 1-0 away win, Gillingham and Barrow lost to the bottom two at the start of play in Accrington and Morecambe and our next opponents Wimbledon smashed Carlisle 4-0!

Fingers crossed @Robbie I'd take that! We've defended well away from home this season (Bromley first 5 mins excluded!)

Does feel a touch death by midfielders looking at that side! I know Austin will likely play LWB or RWB, but Abbott, Palmer and Robertson... I know given the injuries we are a touch light in attack but I just hope Jatta doesn't become too isolated.

Crawley Town 2-1 Shrewsbury Town Peterborough United 2-2 Rotherham United Barrow 2-0 Morecambe ???? Cheltenham Town 1-0 Swindon Town Doncaster Rovers 2-1 Crewe Alexandra Harrogate Town 1-1 Newport County Salford City 1-1 Grimsby Town Tranmere Rovers 0-0 Bradford City

In a weird way this competition is turning out to be quite handy, I'm not fussed about winning it but given our injuries it means we can get players back playing proper minutes. Training is a necessity but there's nothing quite the same as a competitive match against opposition. It will allow the players who haven't really featured to get more of understanding of each other and those connections in our patterns of play.

It is very early doors but there are definitely some encouraging signs. Defensively we are a lot better and that has been helped by the recruitment and Stuart has had more time to really drill into what he wants his team to do off the ball. We couldn't go in the same vein as last season, I'd never thought I'd say this because I'm a 4-3 over a 1-0 type of guy but even for me it was just too attack minded. The balance seems better now. We seem to be able to deal with the weaker teams, we've got enough quality for them and they are more likely to make mistakes/open up at the back. So right now the biggest issue seems to be breaking down teams that sit back and are good, especially at home. Our next home game will be Wimbledon and I'd stick them in the bracket of good and I'm fully expecting them to play like that. That will be intriguing because we do need to adapt a slightly different approach, another 1-0 loss or similar won't be good. And a big factor on determining where we finish will be how we do against these better teams. Last season our record against the top 10 in League 2 was bad; P20 W5 D4 L11. It'll need to improve this season but we're not off to the best start there... We've only beaten 1 team in the top 10 this season, it's hard to say where everyone will end up but Gillingham, Port Vale and Fleetwood who we lost/drew to are likely to finish top 10. We did beat Grimsby but I think they're more likely to be out the top 10 come the end of the season. I guess if we finish this season higher than 14th and with more the 61 points, we've progressed. I'm confident we'll do that but I'm hopeful we can exceed it and stay in and around the play-offs.

From what I can recall Lucas Ness had surgery on his ankle when he was still at Charlton, but I've no idea when this actually was. Guessing we're just waiting until he gets the OK from the doctor. Good that McGoldrick will be back in contention for Chesterfield though.

We are going to have to work on a few different strategies/ideas to break down the teams that just put everyone behind the ball and are actually well organised because the space won’t just open up. That’s going to happen again against the better teams this season. I thought we were too slow and didn’t try to be creative enough we kept opting for the simple pass to feet. We were taking 3 touches at times when we needed to take 2 and even sometimes try 1 touch stuff around their box to break through. We had them more stretched with our wing-backs on their natural side but the two attacking midfielders closest to them didn’t really link up with them that well. We are usually so good at slipping the ball in behind and I think we did it once or twice. Still think we need Crowley higher up, look at last season he was making runs into the box and scoring, other than his chance early on I think he was far too deep. At the end it looked like he was partnering Platt at the back! I will say I was quite surprised Port Vale adopted the low/mid-block approach, thought their team had enough quality in it to come at us a bit more, but there you go. Definitely got a tad lucky in that they barely ventured forward and still scored but they did defend their box very well. We didn’t do enough to win, far from it, given how much of the ball we had we were pretty toothless with it.

Tough today because we didn't really have much defending to do, but at the same time none of our attacking play was very good. Probs have to say Crowley but please can we get him closer to the opposition's goal than ours!

Good idea to have this, I'm always losing track of who is and isn't it fit. As for signing additional players for cover under the new rules we can't sign anyone on loan now, that has to be done in the window. You used to be able to as it was classed as an emergency loan. Essentially we can now only bring in free-agent/unregistered players. I'm hoping we don't pick up any more major injuries, knocks and strains are always going to happen and I'm sure Grant and McGoldrick will be back pretty soon.

He might not be as skilful as our other attackers but you can always count on him to press, make good forward runs and get into good goal scoring positions. Plus he can play out wide as he's capable of putting in good crosses. I agree he’s definitely underrated.

I don’t see why it caused such a big complaint after their initial allocation had sold out. No idea why some of their fans thought they'd get the whole stand. We aren’t ever going to offer that when teams won’t fill it due to the need for extra police and the closure of the road behind. To be honest I thought our initial allocation was fine, that’s still a lot of tickets at this level. Will their fans be moaning when they don’t get 2,000 tickets at Accrington, Bromley, Barrow, Carlisle… (add pretty much every other L2 club here!) Anyway, as for the match itself, I think Port Vale will be more focussed on their off the ball tactics for this one. I could be completely wrong here but I’d expect them to press us man for man like Morecambe did and look to take the ball off us high up the pitch. I’d be surprised if they adopt the sit-back with a low block approach, they are too good for that. There’s a possibility George Byers won’t be fit for them and he’s a very good player, but they have a good squad for this level and can bring in someone like Croasdale to replace him if needed. As for us, I’d like to see Crowley switched with either Robertson or Abbott, I think we’ve got to trust Palmer a bit more to be able to keep the ball moving in the deep midfield role. We over-did in terms of passing in midfield and went nowhere at times against Carlisle. I’d like to see Tsaroulla as the LWB and Gordon on the right (I don’t think it’ll happen though). Austin and Crowley behind Jatta with Abbott or Robbo supporting Palmer. Back 4 picks itself, McDonald will push someone for a first team spot soon though. I think it’ll be a close game, if it ended in a draw it wouldn’t surprise me.

Coventry City 2-0 Sheffield Wednesday ???? Watford 1-2 Middlesbrough Mansfield Town 1-1 Blackpool Rotherham United 1-0 Reading Accrington Stanley 1-1 Morecambe Swindon Town 0-0 Harrogate Town Eastleigh 2-1 Forest Green Rovers Halifax Town 1-0 Tamworth

In a way it was kind of nice to not have Jodi as an option, even though he won it in the end we all know how good he is!

Yeah, as a comfortable as we were at times and even though Crowley got applauded off by the Carlisle fans, Bass was crucial for us especially in the later stages of the match.

Great result in the end but I felt like that was a weird game. We were in total control for 60 minutes, having actually rarely attacked them. It was like a training session at times, but then we just stopped playing for that last 30. Crowley was great on the ball, but at the same time he was so deep at times, he was just basically toying with them and taking the p*** out of their players. But I’d have liked to see him doing that closer to the opposition goal, he’s too good to not be used as an attacker. We did defend well, but at times it was far too easy from them to get balls into our box and I feel like a half decent team could’ve punished us. Maybe after watching us defend last season I’m not used to us being able to deal with any sort of attacking pressure from the opposition!

Honourable mention for Abbott, really impressed considering he is so young and hasn't played competitive football before. But it's between Platt or Bedeau for me, I think they've both been as good as each other really so it's really hard to say! So in the hope of causing a tie, I've voted for Platt.

Norwich City 1-2 Leeds United Sunderland 1-0 Derby County Birmingham City 2-0 Huddersfield Town ???? Crawley Town 1-2 Mansfield Town Leyton Orient 1-0 Exeter City Doncaster Rovers 2-2 Barrow Newport County 0-1 Salford City Tranmere Rovers 1-0 Swindon Town

The players at some of these Premier League Academies are just a lot better than the younger players we have and that is just a fact. Abbott hadn't played a proper competitive match before he came to us (I'm not counting 1 minute v Leeds!), yet he looks like he's played in League 2 before and is a lot better than hundreds of players at this level. He's a very good player and Spurs will be hopeful in a year or two he'll be good enough for them in the Premier League. I think a lot of our young players show a lot of promise and I'm hopeful one or two will break through into the first team in the future but that doesn't mean we can't also sign other young talented players on loan too. I think we'd be daft to turn up the chance to sign good players on loan and at the same time I don't think it will greatly impact the chances of our own youngsters getting into the team.

I'll say Gary Liddle, a player who was very good for us in League 1.

By the sounds of it Morecambe came with plan to press and disrupt us all game and it worked. Playing direct to McGoldrick isn't his game, that's why Jatta is vital in helping combat teams that do press. He's got both the physicality to compete and a bit of pace to stretch defences too. We are struggling with injures and that showed in the team, last season I moaned because we didn't play any defenders today we played all the midfielders! All a bit too samey in terms of McGoldrick, Crowley, Grant, Palmer all like to be on the ball and pass it, a lot! We needed the likes of Jatta, Jones and Edwards who naturally make more runs. I'd like to know if playing inverted wingbacks is helping or hampering. I totally get why Jodi plays on the right, he did it his whole career before joining us and his skill level allows him to. I think it makes it harder for the players not as naturally blessed. Tsaroulla has spent his whole career on the left and likewise LWB is an unfamiliar role for Austin. But credit to the team, for getting the equaliser and keeping at 1-0 gave us that chance. Still need a touch more concentration when it comes to set-pieces, which brings me nicely to the topic we seemed to just totally avoid in the post match interview their "ghost goal". The Morecambe manager claims some of our players agreed it did go over the line. And if it didn't go over the line would their player really have got so wound up to the state he got himself sent off... I'll take that draw!

Now that we’ve had the press conference and heard nothing I’m slightly more positive - in that I don't think it's season ending that is! From what was said in the Martin signing statement they are currently assessing him, which to me suggest they aren't still 100% sure of the issue. Something major like a big tear/snap will be obvious and immediately picked up in a scan.