This season man. Itโs like getting blue balled for months on end. How the hell have we not won that.
Quite surprised seeing the comments saying the starting XI was vindicated. I thought the midfield three didnโt work at all. RR and BB did very little all game for me, neither really got in the game. Murphy on the right was a bright spot because he was a winger - that first half especially, the combination of Leigh and Bennett just didnโt do anything for me. Why was a left back picked over any one of our fit wingers? A couple months ago fair enough, but itโs inexplicable given we now have wingers available. I really donโt think having another winger on the left would have done us any harm. Was Leigh really a better option there than Dale, Goodrham or Burey?
To be fair to Des, the subs worked - MacEachran had the time to ping the ball about and Dale and Goodrham both caused problems (Daleโs contribution in particular I was really pleased with). The Goodwin goal was brilliant, and the Goodrham ball in that was just missed by both Leigh and Goodwin deserved a goal. The save made by their keeper when TG wriggled round their defender was also understatedly brilliant. But itโs still very frustrating that our best chances, against a side that was doing absolutely nothing, came from turning the ball over from a high press, rather than us playing through them. We created so, so little with the ball.
Long is getting pelters for the goal, and that back pass was mental, but Negru HAS to do better there, offside player or not. He also gave the ball away a few mins earlier in a manner very similar to the Reading goal. Heโs not looked the same player he was at the beginning of the season, and you have to say itโs costing us.
Fair play to the Northampton fans. Turned up in numbers and made really good noise throughout. Their team also did what they came to do fairly well - stifle us and take half chances. But itโs still wildly frustrating that both their goals came from us literally gifting them the ball out of nothing.
Also worth noting I thought the ref had a good game. Didnโt have much to do but got the main calls right and carded appropriately. Not going to get worked up about the offside. Probably should have been called but we had about three more opportunities to deal with that situation, not an officiating issue at all.
I feel like weโre getting blueballed because I really feel this team is so nearly really, really good. We have little flashes of intricate passing, moments of individual quality and enough general defensive solidity to feel like we should be winning a lot more games than we are. I think Iโm seeing enough to keep faith that things will โclickโ over the next few games and weโll hit form, make the playoffs and peak at just the right time to make a good fist of them. But itโs hard not to feel like, in the here and now, this group of players should be consistently performing a lot better than it is.