This one will sort the wheat from the chaff - on sale tomorrow.

Last midweek away of the season barring any postponements.

We’re depending to much on other teams fucking up. 
 

Our run in is a shocker 

Just now, RUREADY2ROLL said:

Reading won’t be in the playoffs

Yeah - they won't get in there. How are we doing on the 3rd place never go up curse?

We've improved from the Evatt era in so much that we're now very difficult to beat and not a soft touch away from home, but our finishing has let us down again.

We have to put games to bed like Cardiff & Lincoln seem to do.

That said, the playoff teams don't scare me and I think we win them if we have to.

We're on our way...

Just now, royal white said:

We’re depending to much on other teams fucking up. 
 

Our run in is a shocker 

100% nailed on we'll beat Cardiff. Just to really annoy us.

21 minutes ago, Arrested development said:

Lincoln will have a bad run it's just whether we are too far off to capitalise. 

I don't think there are enough good sides for Lincoln to have a bad run.  They are clearly a class above any other side we've played, I'd include Cardiff based on our game against them but presume they are usually better than that.  Lincoln miles better than Bradford, Stockport and Hudds etc, and look about 20 places better than Reading!

Just can't see anyone stopping Lincoln because they could drop off 30% and still get results against the poor sides they're up against.

We’re really close to being a very good league one team. Just might be too late for this season. 

5 minutes ago, royal white said:

We’re depending to much on other teams fucking up. 
 

Our run in is a shocker 

Cardiff will be promoted by the time we play them and will be in beach mode.

Chance for a few partnerships to gel. Would not swop any squad in the play-offs for ours. Seen enough of the new players to think we will finish strong this season. Apter i will call now who will do well for us. ACD coming back fresh in April will also be a boost. Rodriquez, Apter, Kenny and Taylor-Blackett are not match fit yet and all look good signings. 

 

Top 4 in the form table are Lincoln, Cardiff, us and Reading.

We've just played 2 of them away and not lost.

After our massive post Christmas slump, we've turned things around nicely. Probably too far gone for top 2, but we could be building nicely to piss through the play-offs. 

32 minutes ago, onefinfrandsen said:

Points always a good result away from home, but they were there for the taking tonight.

It really isn't, not saying we should be winning every game away, but Cardiff, Lincoln and Stockport average 1.7 points a game away, so every draw (we've had 8), means we drop another 0.7 points behind the rest.

Agreed they were there for the taking, same as 6 of the other 7, the only exception being Lincoln which was the only one I'd say was a good point.

45 minutes ago, Mounts Kipper said:

Don’t think we will get 3rd with the teams around us having games in hand. 

We play Stockport and Bradford so in the run so beating them would help massively

26 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

Yeah - they won't get in there. How are we doing on the 3rd place never go up curse?

Well, in my lifetime we’ve finished 3rd 3 times and gone up twice, so not too bad 🙂

25 minutes ago, Traf said:

We've improved from the Evatt era in so much that we're now very difficult to beat and not a soft touch away from home, but our finishing has let us down again.

We have to put games to bed like Cardiff & Lincoln seem to do.

That said, the playoff teams don't scare me and I think we win them if we have to.

We're on our way...

And, we’re still going, and always looking likely to score in the 90 oddth minute.

35 minutes ago, Lostock Whites said:

I think for me personally I'm just looking at us consolidating play off now and 3rd place if we can. Anything else would be a bonus, still lots of football to be played however.

We're all dreading the thought of play offs, but I'm more confident under Schuey and this team, who's to say we can't win it 3rd time lucky.

Lincoln & Reading Away back to back is tough and we haven't lost. Not good enough for top 2 but let's try and get some wins now starting with the Donkeys on Saturday.

Gonna try and keep as positive as I can. No point being all doom and gloom to be honest as frustrating as it is.

Think this is where I’m at more or less, let’s Finnish 3rd, get Rodrigues and Kenny integrated and maybe amario back in time for the playoffs.

23 minutes ago, masi 51 said:

Chance for a few partnerships to gel. Would not swop any squad in the play-offs for ours. Seen enough of the new players to think we will finish strong this season. Apter i will call now who will do well for us. ACD coming back fresh in April will also be a boost. Rodriquez, Apter, Kenny and Taylor-Blackett are not match fit yet and all look good signings. 

 

That's the positive bit to take out of a frustrating night, we have an opportunity over the next 8-10 games to really bed the new lads in, build relationships and get the best out of them and their existing team mates. If we do we'll go into the play offs in form that will put the wind up the others

27 minutes ago, Traf said:

We've improved from the Evatt era in so much that we're now very difficult to beat and not a soft touch away from home, but our finishing has let us down again.

We have to put games to bed like Cardiff & Lincoln seem to do.

That said, the playoff teams don't scare me and I think we win them if we have to.

We're on our way...

 

Not to make it about Evatt, this week of all weeks. But in 23/24 we averaged 1.61 ppg away from home and 1.4 goals per game. GD of +10.

This season we're at 1.18 ppg scoring 0.8 goals per game. GD of -6. We are a soft touch away, teams take points off us in just about every game.

We're not as good as the last team we had which finished 3rd. Maybe we won't need to be.

If we do finish 3rd like others have said, we most likely won't get as high as points as we did under Evatt, but I'd be so much more confident under this team with Schuey.

Under Evatt we were better at smacking the poorer sides but would get battered in virtually all of the big matches including the local derbies as we well know.

Play offs is a lottery, we know better than anybody with regards to Oxford. But I am confident.

Schuey has had to completely change the team in just over a year, 2 windows was always difficult and I think we are only going to get better under him and as the new signings gel.

Comparatively we are only behind 2 very good teams. One side that dropped down from the Championship with a team full of Championship players and we beaten btw deservedly so. And the other a very well organised team, that has had a manager there building the team for 3/4 years now (also haven't lost to them either).

I think with us you can tell that we've got a great manager and team, but it's just not there yet, the key thing we need is a bit more time. But there's no reason why we cannot get promoted this season. Keep the momentum building.

Edited February 17Feb 17 by Lostock Whites

43 minutes ago, boltonboris said:

Dempsey has scored 34 goals in 450 games. That’s roughly 3 a season 

I’d expect more than that from a centre back 

13 goals in 114 appearances for us. So one in 9. So on roughly 5 per season which is steady but doesn’t suggest someone we can rely on for goals. 
 

I like Dempsey. I just don’t think he’s that good. His corners were right on the money against Barnserley though 

Not saying he's prime Nolan from midfield, but how many games has he started to bag the goals he's got for us?  Its a low bar, we generally don't sign midfielders that score, the last one's were in the Dapo, Kieran Lee, Sarcevic era; now we sign players that pass or tackle, but not score.

Purely for goalscoring, Dempsey is as good as it gets, and as we don't have strikers that score many since we could do with as much scoring potential as we can.  

Bottom line is it would be good to sign a midfielder that likes to have shot from the edge of the box, and can execute it, we see other teams do it in all divisions.

I cannot see us catching Cardiff or Lincoln but then again last season I thought we was nailed on for the play offs so what do I know. 
I would love it just once that SS played the wingers on the correct side and tell them to get the ball in the box! 
RR for me should start on Saturday looks a cut above even if that means Kenny , Burstow and Macatee have to fight for a spot on the bench. 

20 minutes ago, Johnnyrotten said:

It really isn't, not saying we should be winning every game away, but Cardiff, Lincoln and Stockport average 1.7 points a game away, so every draw (we've had 8), means we drop another 0.7 points behind the rest.

Agreed they were there for the taking, same as 6 of the other 7, the only exception being Lincoln which was the only one I'd say was a good point.

If we had lost tonight I’m pretty sure you would have said a draw would have been a good result.

 

4 hours ago, Zico said:

Point away and late goals always good 

But same old

They take their chances 

We don't

The top two with convincing wins 

Aim for me now is 3rd with momentum going in to play offs

on the lines of "same old"

should also say

another late goal

fair play, they never stop going at it

We went into last weekend knowing that 6 points were required if we wanted to close the gap and apply pressure, we got 2. We had a chance to make Lincoln question themselves but we didn't take it, couldn't make them nervous and they smash their next opponents 4 - 0. I can't see them dropping anything like enough points for us to catch them. Work our new players into the team, hopefully find some composure in front of goal and be the side everyone else worries about in the playoffs.

7 hours ago, Marc505 said:

Only problem is, we play all of those too 😀

Our bad run is April to end the season. When they have their bad run we play Wycombe and donny at home and Rotherham away. That spell is our last chance to reel them in closer. 

Gutted we’ve lost more ground on 2nd but pleased we didn’t lose and also pleased for burstow getting another. 

Certainly had chances early on last night to win it, but that’s been a problem for a while now.