Notts County (A) January 1st, 3pm

The master tactical change was we but a proper centre forward on second half .:man_facepalming:t2:

It’s like all in wrestling now at every corner, not just in our league but through the whole game.You only have to watch how every side get set up for one, at least two or three players trying to pin the keeper on his line, then the same amount of defending players trying to wrestle them away.
The players don’t even watch where the ball is they are only interested in holding and pulling the oppositions shirts, or obstruct them by another means.
I bet out of every corner taken in our league at least 70% if the refs did their job correctly could be awarding a penalty.

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I think having Adomah start was good management considering we we playing tomorrow. It gave Matt 45 minutes off in a game we were never going to go attacking in for the first half.

Matt came on and tore a hole in County.

We’ll lean on Matt and Lowe a lot this season. Any time we can give them a stretch out, we should. DJ and Adomah will help. They already have with cup games and the like.

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I did wonder why. That makes a lot of sense.

Three things that I took from this game
The contribution of Evan Weir, that goal line clearance was stunning and an inch perfect delivery allowing Nathan to grab the winner, what’s hugely impressive is Weir has had hardly any game time.
Mat Sadlers changes that imo altered the outcome of the match.
Finally after being under the cosh in the first half we came out second half and absolutely dominated a very good team.
If that’s not the sign of the league champions elect I don’t know what is.

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Correct first halves never won a game.

My favourite part of the game was when their goalkeeper was going down injured every few minutes. And yet, when we scored our second, there was a miraculous recovery and a sudden sense of urgency about everything he did.

I know it’s gamesmanship and it has always gone on, but I preferred the ‘good old days’ when players felt ashamed to show the opposition if they’d ’winded’ them. We’re talking about grown men saying, “Oooo, me shoulder!” when there’s a coming together for a set piece. Goalkeepers can punch the ball so should relish the contact, I’d say! :smiley:

Simkin has done more than his fair share of this over the season so far :+1:

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Agreed! Doesn’t mean I approve though. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Vale winning is a good result, keeps the chasing pack together.

Still 10 clear with a game in hand.

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Vale winning is better than Doncaster winning, but a draw would have been slightly better.

Two games in hand over a few teams :slightly_smiling_face:

He has but, oddly, usually when we are losing, not to waste time.

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Under the cosh, rather than losing, but yep agreed

There’s only one way to stop all this gamesmanship by goalkeepers (Simkin included,) , ban players from taking a drink and milling around the dugout.

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Talking about gamesmanship. In the first half I’m pretty certain at one of their corners a County player goes over and starts drinking out of what I assume was Simkins water bottle. He obviously reacts to this and tries to get the bottle back and then it gets tossed back into the goal .

Either designed to unsettle him before a corner or to try and get him booked for reacting !

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Yeah, I noticed that - thankfully Simkin didn’t bite…

Bellingham emptied the contents of the goalkeeper’s water bottle onto the pitch (and partly over the GK) in their recent game against Sevilla. He also hit a dreadful penalty but still had the composure to score a last minute winner.

Such a fine line between supreme confidence and petulant arrogance…

By the way, I really like Jude, but he’s a walking yellow card!

Andy cook also launched simkin’s bottle into their fans when we played Bradford at home. Water bottles seem to be a target for shithousery at the moment.

yellow card for messing with water bottles.
Job done.