City v Basingstoke

Agree with most of what has been said. My personal observations:-

We should never start with half fit players - Watkins should have been on from the start - McCootie was a waste of space - Chas was little better - Barrow should now be given much more game time - Davies was better than he has been - we should have played 'proper football' (on the ground more) then we may have won.

Twerton Park Magic wrote:Can't wait to see Simmo back in action again.

Straight back from a longish injury and played nearly 90 mins, plus MOM! Coupe still doing a good job - but nearly gave me a heart attack with that mistake towards the end!

Comrade, Basingstoke put in 3 or 4 good crosses in from our right back position that, had they had taller players, would been great headed goals. They also put us under more sustained pressure than we did them. It's not just about shots on goal

Not sure which comment of mine you are responding to there! But I was clearly absent for the sustained pressure you believe they put us under, while putting in good crosses for players you haven't got seems more misguided than having a couple of shots on goal...

Simmo returning makes the loss of nicholson slightly less devastating, the back four and Phillips look pretty sound. Everywhere else we seem to have problems, heaven knows what has happened to big chaz over the summer but this season he has been poor, his lack of legs also has a negative impact on Kington and artus as they need to cover his ground as well as there own. The forward line looks unbalanced as when mccootie and pratt both start we play far too direct, pre season Davies played on the right and looked excellent, since the season started we have used him on rotation with watkins down the left and he had been disappointing, we are not far away from a very good side, just a couple of changes to make us a little more balanced.

Basingstoke looked fairly well organised but offered little threat up front.  Not surprised they've drawn so many games.
We were never in much danger of losing this one but need to up it a bit.
Yes, a few tweaks needed.  We could start by keeping the ball on the deck as there were a couple of moves there where we looked dangerous, especially when Dan Barrow came on.
John Davies does seem to have shooting boots and I think he will eventually do well for us.

That Havant game seems like 5 years ago not 5 weeks!

Seems to me that most of our problems stem from midfield - Kington is far too negative and Chaz seems to be back to where he was at the start of last season; I lost count of how many times he gave the ball away yesterday.

Two things I don't understand. Firstly, why all the fuss about the problems caused following Nicholson's and not knowing who to play at left back - didn't Gallinagh play there most of last season, so I don't see the difference. Secondly, when play was so narrow yesterday why did we put Watkins on in the middle - would have been inclined to have put him on the left and moved Davies inside.

Hopefully we can put things right at Harlow on Saturday at stop the season from unraveling further.

I think you answered your own question regarding nicholson, Gallinagh did play there most of last season and whilst he does a job there he certainly isn't a natural left back, having someone regularly overlapping down the left was a breath of fresh air as opposed to cutting inside and making us seen even more narrow.

I think Nicholson's departure is more likely to be felt when we face stronger teams than Basingstoke, especially away from home. He certainly stood out in the recent trip to Maidstone and I have a feeling Phillips is going to be much busier now he is gone.

Having said that, it's not in defence we have had concerns and its tightness so far should be encouraging us to play a more expansive game.

I suppose with the budget and resultant squad we can afford we should expect some games which are frankly pants. However, why are we always unlucky enough to perform like that when we get a decent crowd.