Wanderlust

Cambridge have signed their own Taylor - 33 year old Lyle - who seems to be enjoying a bit of a renaissance with 3 goals in 4 appearances including a brace in their away win on Saturday. Usually plays with Kacha but it will be interesting to see if Bonne gets a home debut ahead of Kaikai or Lankester - or Kacha. They’ve also bolstered their defence signing Gibbons from the Gas but he can play anywhere across the back so difficult to guess what Harris has in mind - and he’s a canny bugger anyway. No doubt they’re going to make it difficult for us and they carry a goal threat, but providing we play well and don’t gift them easy chances we’ll be fine. PS: Weren’t Taylor and Bonne Charlton’s strike partnership a few years back?

…and that he knows the players personally, sees them every day in training, has knowledge of their mental state, problems they’re facing and what’s on their mind at any particular time, analyses their performance stats, knows what niggles and injuries they might be carrying, sees how they fit in with others and is their boss etc etc….but all that aside, he’s just the same as the fans

I think that Evatt is stubborn but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. He is committed to a plan and seeing as it’s worked well as evidenced by our current position he has every right to stick with it - stubbornly. pointing out that what some fans were doing doesn’t help the team and asking them not to do it is not “having a dig at the fans” - it’s advising the fans how they can help the team. Which is also a good thing.

He was developing nicely as a player and this will take an important year away from him. Gutted for the lad.

Apart from a bit of chasing from their front men when we had it at the back, they didn’t have to move so much because our movement up front wasn’t up to it and when balls were played between the lines they often won it or won the second ball after a miscontrol - less so after the subs came on and we weren’t faffing around so much. Vic and Dion were chasing their CBs too. I guess they knew it was going to be played to feet rather than into the spaces so they just hung around and stuck a foot in. Ultimately it became a game of not making mistakes at the back and we made plenty unfortunately. Thing is, we’ve seen the team play much better but usually that’s when we have a lead. i have faith in the manager and he must surely have analysed the shit out of it, but I think we’re still a tweak or two off it sometimes. Williams must be miffed btw.

We gave them enough clear cut chances to score a hatful and that has to stop, especially when we’re not creating so many ourselves. All that possession using the extra man at the back is fine but when we are being pressed, we have to be accurate and whilst I appreciate the idea is to draw them on and play through the press, the ball has to stick for it to move play up the park and until JDB and Collins came on it didn’t. Evatt has implied in the past that the chasing Dion and Vic do wears the opposition down - maybe it did to some extent - but that first 20 minutes of the second half they’ll still be fresh and fired up and will continue to press, but we often come out for the second half and try to play as if they’re already knackered and we look vulnerable. Not the time to spray it around or make lazy passes. If we can iron out the sloppy play we’ll be fine, but I’m chalking that down as a lucky draw seeing as they had the clearer chances by far. 5/10 must try harder.

Collins first touch an assist

That’s 4 they should have scored - battering us.

FFS - what are they doing?

How many times have we been here? I’m just hoping we don’t concede another early in the second half - which we often do for some reason. Dion looks desperate for a goal but shooting from distance isn’t doing it for him. But somehow we’ve got to be tight at the back and start to threaten their solid defence a lot more up top. We need to be clinical and Dion needs to get himself in the box.

Nearly concede again but we don’t even look like scoring apart from the set piece headers. Definitely need the next goal.

We need to sort it the f*** out and ramp up the pace even more against these. Plenty of subs if needed.

Nightmare. come on!!!!

Erm…

Helluva bench nonetheless

Like it

…as I mentioned earlier but with SK winning he won’t be hanging around doing nowt any longer.

We’ll done South Korea. Geth should be landing in Manchester in a couple of hours.

Why isn’t Geth back? Once again he isn’t even on the bench for the Aussies. He’s doing nowt, so I’m hoping South Korea make a comeback in the second half and he can fly back fully rested.

How many Aussies, South Africans and Kiwis have played for the England cricket team over the years? Gazillions.

Wish we had a full strength squad for this one. If we were in Barnsley‘s position, we’d be desperate to turn us over and clawback the points difference, so beating them takes on special importance. They’ll certainly be giving it everything they’ve got and it’s the kind of game that would suit George if he was available. Still, he’d probably get sent off anyway. Hopefully we’ll play well, get a fair rub of the green and that should be enough to see them off.

Turned out to be a bit of both with decent loanees it seems and Collins being a target for Championship campaign bought early. Taylor was also alleged to be a summer target, but some of the fees suggested recently are perhaps prohibitive. Happy with the window - just wish that Santos hadn’t been injured.

Providing we don’t lose any key players, yes. Clock still ticking….

Are we done now in this window?

Given our prospects of promotion I assumed our “number one targets” would be permanent signings rather than loans. That said they’ve done well to cover injuries - I hope.