by Hoop Blah »
11 Nov 2010 10:47
Much improved performance by us against a team that is bascially better than us in all departments but we did a good job at stopping them. They did create a lot of very good opportunities, if not clear cut chances, and most of those came from Burke having the beating of Harte time and time again. Another poor performance from Harte for me unfortunately. Special mention to Griffin for that goal saving tackle!
Kishanishvili had a very good game, although I did think he was in danger of getting a second yellow for a while as he started to rise to Bothroyds spoiling tactics. He's a hell of a player Bothroyd but like so many he distracts himself from his own game by getting involved in things and diving around. Thankfully for us he did it last night.
I thought the midfield worked pretty well, apart from McAnuff having a bit of a stinker, albeit with a few good moments thrown in.
Interesting that there seems to be a lot of positivity about the formation when basically we played the same set up as pretty much every other game, just with Church and Hunt filling in two of the attacking positions. Both did pretty well, although I still don't think Church suits the position but he certainly offered more of a threat on goal than Tabb has the last couple of games.
And finally to Mr Long. For me that was his worst performance of the season. Far too much walking around and failing to get back from being offside and didn't offer as much down the channels as he has done. That would be fine if he could take the chances presented to him or create a bit more (he actually linked up pretty well with Church a couple of times to be fair to him) but if he wanted to prove the critics wrong he failed, and failed big time.
I think a draw was a fair result, and in a way we were lucky, but on the other hand we could so easily have taken all three points. If we can use this as a spring board and keep the performances up instead of pulling one out every 3 games then we might yet really challenge for the playoffs.
Win against Norwich on Saturday and this was a great results. Lose and it's just another couple of points we've thrown away through poor finishing and a lack of true quality.