game v maidstone

Can anyone explain why we boot the ball straight into touch from kick off. What clever coaching ruse is this. It appears to just give the ball to the opposition,

Bugger 0-1

I am guessing the team is Philips. Gallinagh Simpson Batten Greenslade Adelsbury Kington Bowman Artus McCootie Watkins

Oof cleared off the line we are being unlucky

Well, BenE perhaps you should get your boots on cos it sounds as though your namesake would struggle in a pub team.

We have said before in my little group that he doesn't look as though he is going to make it. He scores a spectacular goal now and again but overall his contribution is not enough. You have to admire the way he has stuck at it though.

0-2 all over now.
I am getting a bit fed up with the suggestion that city can't find a full size pitch to practice on. Twerton Park looks full size to me is there a ban on training on it?

They trained on it last week.

2 wins in 4 months in the league and we enter the fifth with another defeat.


This is testing for City fans. We have had nothing to cheer at Twerton for months.

Yet the fans are still turning up. Another good crowd today.

200 of which were away fans

Where were you today, BenE? Didn't see your spectacular hat.

At the end of the game there were a couple of guys clapping the team and saying they played well and deserved something from the game, well that's there opinion and they are entitled to it but I think they will be in a very small minority of those at the game.
Did we have plenty of the ball? Yes. Did we do much with it? No. Maidstone were content to sit deep and defend in the knowledge that we are toothless and lack any spark. Lots of sideways passing, which is great for letting Maidstone sit even deeper.
When Maidstone got the ball they were more incisive and moved the ball quicker, helped by our usual defensive mistakes.
Are we in trouble? Yes, deep - and anyone who tries to say otherwise must be watching a different City team to what I am watching.
Dan Bowman deserved the man of the match, he never gave up trying to provide some width. Expect he will be dropped again next week.

I thought the team showed a big improvement today. Greenslade looked promising and we played with width when he was on. Can't quite fathom out why he was replaced though.
However I can't see where a goal is gonna come from at the moment.

Enough is enough surely!!! How many other management teams would survive 2 wins in 4 months!! The team look clueless at times and there seems to be no sign that we are even close to turning the corner. The first half today was as bad as I've seen it this season, yes we fought back a bit in the second half but I never thought we were going to score. Please Britton and Howells, do the decent thing and walk away to give us a fighting chance of turning this season around. I fear the worst if these two stay in charge!

Maidstone were no great shakes we gave them two easy goals, we couldn't score in brothel at the moment and Hemmings should take up another sport. Maybe knitting.

Reminiscent of so many recent home games - concede an early goal, huff and puff without ever really looking like scoring and then concede another goal because of a horrendous error.

The frustrating thing again was that we were beaten by a team who for most of the game didn't get out of second gear. It was only during our flurry of pressure in the second half (ironically just before Maidstone's second goal) that they didn't look to be in control, and to be honest they could have won by more.

On Thursday in the Chronicle Adie Britton said that we had a fully fit squad to choose from, yet there was no place in the matchday 16 for Dan Ball - presumably he must have suffered a late injury, because if he is fit you have to play him. Mind you, last time Adie Britton said that we had a full squad to choose from we ended up only fielding four substitutes.

I was surprised at the formation - the Chronicle reckoned it was 3-5-2 but for most of the game it was hard to tell if there was one! We didn't seem to have a right back - although Dan Bowman deservedly won mom for his efforts on that side of the pitch. I think Sekani is wasted in the middle, although he is a good enough player to do a job there, and it wasn't clear where Batten was supposed to be playing. I have to disagree with comment above about Greenslade - I thought he looked out of his depth for most of the game, but wonder whether the change in formation was to accommodate him? If it was to stop us conceding goals, it certainly didn't work!

It seems at the moment that we have a real 'double whammy' - we can't stop conceding goals but we can't score them either. Apart from the two chances that fell to Nick McCootie - he should have buried the one in the second half - we never really looked like we were going to score.

As for the midfield, whichever combination out of Adelsbury/Kington/Hemmings we play it is equally ineffective - I really do think that if we are going to bring anybody else in on loan it needs to be a dominating midfielder and not a teenage defender or a striker who hasn't kicked a ball for 10 months.

I am sure we will be told that we can't match Maidstone in terms of resources, what they pay players etc etc, but the fact is that from the third minute today it never looked remotely likely that we would beat them. We have now won just 2 out of 16 league games and got 11 points from a possible 48. Although we are still 11th we are only 7 points above the team in 20th (yes Yuffie, I know we are also only 7 points off the play-offs) and the teams behind are closing on us - I see Margate are only a point behind us now - and after Dartford next week the games against Concord and Eastbourne are becoming '6 pointers'.

Apart from on a continuing downward spiral, hard to see where we go from here.

I heard that Dan Ball was injured, but otherwise you're spot on in your assessment of our performance today and the wretched predicament we have been in for several months now. The tendency to start slowly is not just apparent in home games - goodness knows how many games that is where we have conceded in the opening minutes. Everyone knows my feelings about loan signings and the failed policy of developing our own players, while it has been clear from the season's opening that our midfield is just not functioning. After the start we made, it would be criminal if we slipped into a relegation battle but there seems no end to this dreadful run. He's just one player, but the lack of leadership, lack of height in the middle of defence and determination to keep things simple suggests to me that Coupe should return to the team at Dartford. An improved performance there might just set us up to give the long suffering Twerton fans something other than yet another defeat when Concord visit.

I really must stop reading Lee Howells' comments late at night (or probably at all!)

I am not totally sure he saw the same game as me, although I suspect the view is better from the Popular Side than the back of the dug out!

His comments that we lack a leader are ironic, in view of what Martin has said in the previous post.

Time for bed.

LB wrote:I really must stop reading Lee Howells' comments late at night (or probably at all!)

Howells felt that it stemmed from a lack of vocal leadership within the defence.

He said: "It's a good ball in to start with. It took us forever to shut him down so he had all the time to cross the ball, and we're far too deep.

"Steve [Phillips] isn't renowned to come for them anyway, so you could say he could have had it.

"And you could say the back four or five should have moved out a bit more and then they'd probably have caught somebody offside.

"That's the responsibility that somebody has got to take in there. One thing we don't have at the moment is an out-and-out leader, because one, we can't afford it, and two they're not going to come here.

"We've got a few lads who aren't bad, but a bit quiet. You can't make them what they're not.

"To get a leader who will shout and make them do things, I'm afraid costs money, and that's why they play for other teams. It's as simple as that, so there's no point going onto that situation."


= C+O+U+P+E

We can all talk until the cows come home about a painfully uncreative and slow midfield and an attack which doesn't score goals, but it seems daft to me that we do have someone sitting on the bench who can address those problems highlighted above.

To be honest I don't bother to read what he says as I have so little respect for him. From what Martin says he is back to his usual tactics of blaming the budget, people not taking responsibility etc - in fact blaming everything except himself. His job it to get the best out the players available in the squad and he is clearly not doing that - when is he going to take some RESPONSIBILITY.

What really bothers me is the apparent fatalism of the management. We have got what we have got and no one wants to join us. That's that then.

In most football Clubs the Board would have said something by now but it is clear that we are most definitely not normal football club.

But this is the best squad (on paper) we've had since they've been here!

Elmore James wrote:But this is the best squad (on paper) we've had since they've been here!

Exactly. I don't think anyone is complaining about the squad we have. We don't seem to be getting the best out of them and that's down to the management.

Martin said "...but it seems daft to me that we do have someone sitting on the bench who can address those problems highlighted above."

But yesterday Matt Coupe wasn't even on the bench, Smith presumably being considered a better option if one of the defence got injured.

What about making philips captain. He is certainly vocal and in my experience the goalie is in the best position to see how things are panning out on the field. Give him the authority to organise the defence.