Pre season performances to date

Everyone’s thoughts?

It’s only Pre season but I have been slightly concerned by our overall performances. First half v Frome we spent most the game without the ball (they never threatened). Bristol City should have been out of sight in the first half although we got better. Last night was a mixed bag too.

Not worried but was hoping for a bit more.

Never, ever take any notice of what you see in preseason friendlies. The first 45 minutes of the Dartford match will tell you (and the manager) far more.

I think you can get a feel for how the squad is shaping up. Whether it is successful will be more evident first league game, as you say, but you can see the shape of the team and the style of play.
So far I have gauged that we are should be more solid defensively. The opposition isn't going to come straight through the middle like they have previously. But so far we haven't seen much on the attacking front apart from what we are used to. Quite simply because it is the same personnel. Having said this both Smith and Hayfield now have more opportunity to get forward, but we haven't seen the benefit yet.

Having taken a quick gander on the Chippenham site they seem extremely excited by their pre season form however I'm more with Powell on this one and will wait patiently for the season to start before making any rash judgements.

PHILB1973# wrote:Having taken a quick gander on the Chippenham site they seem extremely excited by their pre season form however I'm more with Powell on this one and will wait patiently for the season to start before making any rash judgements.

yep apparently they beat Swindon submarines 4-0 and now they are going to win the league

They gotta better chance than we ave.

Digger wrote:They gotta better chance than we ave.

I think you are probably right mate

We are a defensive team set up not to lose. While trying not to lose we hope that Cooke or Wilson produce something. We have been very poor against very average teams.

Not the Jerry Gill Bath City way of the past.

Zzzzzzzzz

It was fortunate that we had a reliable defence for most of last season and Wilson eventually came good after Christmas. I thought last season’s NLS was the weakest since our relegation a decade ago and can’t believe it won’t be stronger this time. If so, we will need to improve.

I can't help feeling that the reason we retained most of last season's squad is that we know that they should be capable of keeping us in the division - not a great target perhaps! I haven't been able to get to any of the friendlies, and I accept what Martin says about not reading too much into them, but even so you might hope that we could beat Westbury.

With less than two weeks to go to the Dartford game hopefully Jerry is getting somewhere towards knowing his preferred starting XI.

Having seen, very unusual for me, a few pre season friendlies, including Westbury, i would say we will not no anything about our prospects until 5 o'clock at Dartford.

I know we do not read too much into friendlies but it is interesting to see that Dartford haven't had any good results in their friendlies so far: Played 4, lost 3 and drawn one, goals for 3 and goals against 11.

kermit wrote:Having seen, very unusual for me, a few pre season friendlies, including Westbury, i would say we will not no anything about our prospects until 5 o'clock at Dartford.

And probably not even then. Sometimes it takes three or four games to get a true measure, although some teams don't get going until September and then blitz it.

While others, like ourselves a few years ago, start the season with an unbeaten run then crash.
Most seasons we have at least six new players to bed in but that doesn’t appear to be the case this time so perhaps one can draw conclusions about our prospects a little earlier.
I hope to be proved wrong but I have little optimism for the league season so I will pass judgement at the end of September when hopefully we have survived two rounds of the Cup!

I've only seen a few matches so far and squad looks ok solid, especially the defence albeit with two holding midfielders.......the one thing we seem to be short of at both the back and up top .......drum roll please is ......... PACE !! I appreciate Jordan Thomas has not been available but it's hopefully its an area which Jerry can address in the loan market as I'm sure visiting SW managers ( and there's been plenty of them ) will have noted in their Don Revie dossiers !

Hopefully I'm proved absolutley wrong once the season begins...

Why has Thomas 'not been available'?

Thomas has been on holiday - it was pre-booked before he moved to Bath.

I see that Thomas appeared in the first two friendlies and in the last one. Always seems strange when players take a holiday in late June/July when there must have been some eight blank weeks after the season ends. His previous team played their last game on 22 April.

daven wrote:Thomas has been on holiday - it was pre-booked before he moved to Bath.

Thank you. That's ok as long as he smashes in the winner at Dartford.

Having seen us at Westbury and last evening it is difficult to imagine 2 such differing performances. As an earlier posts mentioned  concerns over lack of pace it would seem yesterday rendered those worries unwarranted.  One highlight was how Jordan Thomas totally left a defender in his wake despite initially looking favourite to get the ball.
As with others am holding back on any prediction on our prospects but believe we will be competitive. However apart from the full-time sides we also have, as PhilB highlighted, Chippenham claiming  they will be the coming season champions!!!

Please don’t tar us all with the same brush! We have one or two deluded supporters who know the square root of diddly squat, but I’m sure the vast majority of our sane followers (no jokes please) are far more realistic. It’s the same every season for me - I’ll take finishing one above the dotted line right now thank you very much, and watch the big guns at the top end of the table slug it out - it could be very entertaining.

I hope that Chippenham ( and ourselves) finish above the dreaded dotted line. Over the last few years our Xmas/New Year battles have been the most worthwhile fixtures. With a 46 game league the full=time sides will have an advantage but it's teams like us and Chipp who can put a dent in their ambitions
The one thing we really need is a long overdue cup run but we say that every year. The problem this season is that the early localised based round will include a significant number of Nat South sides.