Morecambe (H)

[Traf]

4 minutes ago, Leyther_Matt said:

Can’t knock him for the goals he’s suddenly started to offer, but overall you’re not alone in that view. 

Many of them have been mishit or lucky to go in, if truth be told.
One straight at the keepr, a shinner, one where he virtually stumbled over it to score, but then produces a lovely deft header. I think he might have ability, but lacks application? He doesn't read the game vewry well and is often caught a yard short. A better reading of the game gets him another 4 or 5 goals already this season, like the one last night.

[Traf]

2 minutes ago, gonzo said:

I wasnt there but going off everything Ive read the second half last night was just a repeat of the match at theirs.

We just cant handle shithouse in your face teams.

Dont know much about Plymouth but Im hoping they come to play football.

Correct, we're a bit soft/weak against shithousing.
Plymouth will come to play and they'll be good at it, so could be a decent game.
Crewe will be awful, have you seen their pitch?

 

[Leyther_Matt]

I wouldn’t necessarily say last night was a case of being soft as they couldn’t live us with for the first 40 minutes and, after watching the highlights, we really should have been three or four up before then. They all grew a foot apiece when they went 1-0 up and had something to defend while our confidence often seems fragile at the best of times.

That first chance for Charles was a howler. Incredible build up though. 

[Burndens Bogs]

4 minutes ago, Leyther_Matt said:

 

That first chance for Charles was a howler. Incredible build up though. 

He often seems to try and rip the back of the net off, but steering it into the bottom corner will do the job.

[jmjhb]

21 minutes ago, Traf said:

Many of them have been mishit or lucky to go in, if truth be told.
One straight at the keepr, a shinner, one where he virtually stumbled over it to score, but then produces a lovely deft header. I think he might have ability, but lacks application? He doesn't read the game vewry well and is often caught a yard short. A better reading of the game gets him another 4 or 5 goals already this season, like the one last night.

He has a knack of being in the right place at the right time. The way we play, he's much better suited as an impact sub against tiring defences.

Edited March 9, 2022 by jmjhb

[batton carrier]

9 hours ago, paulhanley said:

They're not a bogey team. We have played them four times: Won 1 Drawn 3 Lost 0 .

However (and apologies as this is a bee in my bonnet that I've written about on here before) our record in derbies in recent years is utterly shocking. Just this year alone against other Lancs teams (Wigan, Fleetwood, Accrington, Morecambe) we are won 0 drawn 2 lost 3 . We've managed two Papa Johns wins (Rochdale and Fleetwood) but if we are talking cup games then the Stockport fiasco has to be lobbed in.

I'll know Bolton Wanderers really are back when we start bullying local also-rans like the ragbag assortment of nobodies mentioned above. We are highly likely to be in League One again next season and this needs setting straight. Before we return to the Blackpools, Blackburns, Prestons and give them a sharp reminder of what they've been missing.

have a +1

[radcliffe white]

Baka works best off the bench when defences are lagging why change it, plus we’ve previously won 3-0 away why change the team 

[Tonge moor green jacket]

14 minutes ago, jmjhb said:

He has a knack of being in the right place at the right time. The way we play, he's much better suited as an impact sub against tiring defences.

He does. Better suited to playing on the shoulder, attacking balls played across.

Not sure about the lucky finishes though- being in the right place at the right time often yields 'scrappy' goals but that's precisely what you want from a striker. Gary Lineker scored plenty like that.

Conversely, Doyle got pelters for not bagging his chances. 

I do think there is a case for perhaps not rotating quite as much though up top. 

[Casino]

Iceman mentioned in his interview that last time he did 3 in a row he was fucked by game 3

He might be getting better but evatt makes the calls and we didnt miss 4 in 20 odd minutes cos of bakayoko

Id sure iceman was starting v plymouth whatever happened last night

[marple whites]

Game should have been over in first half hour.

celine should have had 4 in last 2.

stopped playing second half.

25 shots, 4 on target - not good enough.

always seemed to want a touch too many.

80% possession - a lot was in front of them, so they let us have it.

shot ourselves in the foot, as when they scored, they tried every trick in the book and why wouldn’t they in their position?

baka lost the ball at least twice on half way and never tracked back

we stopped playing fossey in second half

dapo was ineffective

apart from that, we have robbed them of 4 points - hope it sends them down.

Edited March 9, 2022 by marple whites

[MickyD]

3 hours ago, Traf said:

despite only having 18 career league goals to his name?

Eighteen goal, eighteen goals, Bakayoko!

[Biggish Dave]

5 minutes ago, Mr Grey said:

.......  and let's not play in yellow at home again.

AGREED

[MickyD]

7 hours ago, Mr Grey said:

.......  and let's not play in yellow at home again.

Absolutely this. Apparently it was in aid of a charity but I don’t get how “Wear an away shirt at home” actually generates any income.

[bwfc2003]

16 minutes ago, MickyD said:

Absolutely this. Apparently it was in aid of a charity but I don’t get how “Wear an away shirt at home” actually generates any income.

This should have been done on Boxing Day and I think the idea was to generate awareness - maybe if the game had been played at Xmas they would have had bucket shakers outside the ground tapping into Xmas goodwill

[Zico]

27 minutes ago, MickyD said:

Absolutely this. Apparently it was in aid of a charity but I don’t get how “Wear an away shirt at home” actually generates any income.

Probably just to raise awareness 

Though i thought it was to do with Ukraine  

 

[Leyther_Matt]

There was quite a bit of PR about it over Christmas to highlight homelessness at that time of year. The Premier League rejected the club’s requests to join in though. 

[MickyD]

Just found this. Perhaps it ought to go in the “From the other side” thread. Perhaps it has gone in there and I missed it.

I don’t think I’ve ever read anything as one-sided; even on here.

Funny as fuck though. It’s long but it’s worth reading just to see what they think.

Bolton Wanderers – Do the Ends Justify The Means? – Discuss…

I’m not very keen on Bolton Wanderers to be perfectly honest.

There it is – I’ve admitted it.

They are cheats. They cheated last season in the penultimate game of Morecambe’s League Two season as Oladapo Afolayan winked at his team-mates to say `Job Done!” as the alleged perpetrator  of the `foul’ on him –  Kelvin Mellor – was sent-off after just 23 minutes. Morecambe’s Manager, Derek Adams, made his displeasure about this development very well-known at the time.

Bolton, though, were promoted as a direct result of what happened. Against a ten-man team, they won 0-1. Morecambe, on the other hand, had to endure the ordeal of the Play-Offs to join them in League One this season.

Tonight’s game should have been played last Boxing Day. But Bolton mysteriously were unable to raise enough fit players out of one of the biggest squads in League One to fulfil the fixture. A cynic might suggest that the fact that key players would be unable to play on the day had more influence on the decision to postpone it than following the rules in place at the time concerning Coronavirus and whatnot. Whatever, a lot has happened in the meantime…

There was already No Love Lost when Stephen Robinson’s Shrimps hosted The Trotters at the Mazuma Stadium last February. In the 76^th minute, Bolton were behind, had seen one of their number sent off and were being overrun. At the Away End, new Morecambe goalkeeper Adam Smith – on his debut – was struck by objects thrown at him from the massed Trotters’ ranks behind him.

In his head at this moment, Bolton Boss Ian Evatt must have been fearing that his team was heading towards defeat on the field. Off it, he must have also foreseen the potential of sanctions being taken against his club as the Referee made a note of the missile-throwing incident.

What should he do? Go onto the Back Foot and take the defeat on the chin? Have the backbone – as a Role Model for Bolton fans – to criticise the behaviour of a minority of their number for unacceptable behaviour towards the end of the game?

It is a matter of record that he didn’t – even though several of their alleged `supporters’ ran onto the field once the game was stopped as Shrimps’ fans looked on and commendably did nothing to react.

Instead, Ian Evatt chose to go onto the Front Foot and completely ignore what had already happened. He has a right to do so. He also had a right to spin a different version of events which everyone who was present at the match saw with their own eyes. He had a right to claim – instead – that Morecambe fans had abused one of his substitutes in a racist manner. Some people would see it as actually clever of him to get the game abandoned for a while as a result – and then go on to take advantage of the loss of momentum by the home team to undeservedly equalise late into the game.  

I don’t think it’s clever, personally: to me, it is blatant gamesmanship of the worst imaginable sort. It is cheating. But this is what Mr Evatt does. He told the BBC after the last meeting between the clubs that there had been a `barrage’ of abuse from directly behind the dugout `from minute one’ and throughout the proceedings. He claimed: “The racism is absolutely appalling. There were eighty-nine minutes of constant abuse before that.” Strangely, there is no evidence to support what he has claimed – either on video or audio. On the contrary, Lancashire Constabulary commented about an element of other claims made by the Bolton Manager just over a week ago: “We are aware that there has been an image circulated on social media of a Bolton player interacting with a man and women in the seats directly behind the Bolton bench. We would like to state that at this stage of the investigation, there is no evidence that has come to light thus far that these individuals have been involved in the racially aggravated public order (offence).”

As we’ve already noted though – this is what Ian Evatt does. He was at it again when his team lost away from home subsequent to the pitch invasion and violence by away `supporters’ at Morecambe. The Bolton News tells us:

“WANDERERS’ complaint against referee Sebastian Stockbridge looks unlikely to progress any further. Ian Evatt maintained after Saturday’s 2-0 defeat at MK Dons that he had been unhappy with something said by the Tyne and Wear official during the game. The Bolton boss refused to go into specifics but claimed at the time that the comment had been heard by the fourth official and that Stockbridge had apologised during the half time break. Nevertheless, Wanderers have yet to escalate the matter at time of writing and have declined to comment further.”

Why not? Former Premier League and FIFA referee Keith Hackett almost certainly provides the answer:

“What that manager has got to have is proof of what that referee has said. Without proof, nothing will happen.”

 And – guess what? – nothing has happened. Nothing will happen, either.

In his pre-match interview on the Bolton website yesterday, Ian Evatt was given a cop-out by the questioner who said of the controversy surrounding their game at Morecambe in February: “We know what happened there; that’s been dealt with – it’s a clean slate so let’s concentrate on the football”.  None of this is true – we don’t know what happened precisely because the police among others are still trying to establish the actual facts. However, Mr Evatt took the cue to avoid saying anything that might embarrass himself further with this response:

“I’ve got no interest in discussing what happened at Morecambe; my focus is on my team and performance tomorrow night to get three points.”

And that was that.

All this leaves a really bad taste in the mouth – the Bolton Manager seems to be an expert in making unspecified and unsupported accusations against third parties in adversity – but pathetically weak in terms of either justifying them or following them up once the heat of the moment has been replaced by a cooling-off period.

But some things are far more important than football, however despicable some practitioners of its Dark Arts might be. In Bolton, there is a significant Ukrainian community. A spokesman from the Bolton Ukrainian Cultural Centre has gone on record to say:

“The Ukrainian community is delighted and thankful for the response from Bolton Wanderers. The club has a tradition of family values and the situation with families in the Ukraine is dire. We want to be in solidarity with Ukrainians in our community at this time. We are one club, one community, one town. We’re all together. Our thoughts and prayers are with all those affected at this difficult time. All our support from our local club, and its fans, is very much appreciated.”

Tonight, there was rare unanimity between both sides of supporters as everyone in the stadium stood to applaud representatives of the Bolton Ukrainian Cultural Centre and the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain prior to the start of the game. They would have probably preferred a No Fly Zone over their country but our own and other allegedly `advanced’ countries have clearly decided that having Ukraine and its population bombed potentially out of existence altogether is preferable to calling Vladimir Putin’s bluff about World War Three.

Anyway – Morecambe have played the Trotters just three times previously. Bolton have won one and drawn two of them. In each game, a player has been sent off: one from Morecambe so far and two from the Trotters. So would tonight’s match break the mould and end with a full complement of players still on the pitch?

Prior to the game, Wanderers were eleventh in League One, having won three and lost two of their last five games , winning away at seemingly doomed ten-man Gillingham by three goals to nil last Saturday.

Morecambe started the game on the back of one loss and a draw in Derek Adam’s second spell at the helm of the north Lancashire club. They remain stubbornly stuck in 21^st position in League Two – which had been departing Manager Stephen Robinson’s legacy to be remembered by. Derek said:

“We obviously need three points. We have got to pick up a good number of wins between now and the end of the season to make us safe. There are two teams above us that we think we can catch. Could we catch a third team above us in Lincoln City? It is a possibility. We can only do that by winning football matches. We have to look at ourselves but we are obviously helped by other results in the league. We are looking to win the game and hope that the teams above us lose to jump those places above them.” 

As far as tonight’s opponents are concerned, he was generous enough to add:

“What I have seen of them, they are a very, very good team. They pass the ball well, their rotation is excellent and the way that they push the wing-backs; I think one of them ended up as a centre-forward in the last game. That just shows the freedom they have got to go and play, they have done that very well and they are obviously high in confidence. They have got a really good squad and they are trying hard to push into those promotion places. They have been on an excellent run and we understand how difficult this game will be.”

Under a very dark sky and in freezing conditions, it was soon all too obvious how difficult this game really was going to be for the visitors. Right from the off, the men in the yellow strip went onto the front foot and pressed the visitors back into their own half. The statistics for the first period tell most of the story: Bolton enjoyed 80% of the possession; had 24 shots altogether to the visitors’ four and thirteen corner kicks to Morecambe’s single one. But what really mattered was the shots on target: Bolton had four and the Shrimps had three. The first of these, though, was also the first real chance of the game. After just three minutes, quick winger Dylan Connolly was fed by Adam Phillips to be one-on-one with home custodian James Trafford as he bore down on him just to the right of centre from his point of view. Dylan should have buried the ball but he allowed Trafford to make a save instead. This was right at the start of the half. By the end of it, Phillips was again instrumental in playing the ball across the Wanderers’ area to an unmarked Cole Stockton, who promptly clocked his twentieth League One goal of the season. In the interim, the Trotters could have conceivable gone four up. After seven minutes, good approach play set-up Dion Charles for a shot which he curled away from the target from twelve yards out. Four minutes later, Trevor Carson did well to hold onto a header by Amadou Bakayoko. The hosts came closer still when Charles’ powerful shot bounced off Carson’s crossbar with the goalkeeper beaten and eighteen minutes on the clock. The pattern of the game was thus set early on: Bolton attacked; Morecambe defended and Referee Christopher Sarginson indulged the diving and feigning injury which Bolton predictably indulged in right from the first minute. Marlon Fossey was the worse cheat in a Trotters’ shirt this evening and constantly fell over or dived as the utterly clueless Referee gave a free kick every time he did so. Morecambe Manager Derek Adams appeared to be pushed by his much larger Opposite Number with just over half an hour played as he attempted to protest against the one-sided officiating by the Man in the Middle. What happened? Sarginson booked our Manager. But he seemed to be afraid of Ian Evatt because he got away with it scot-free. Again.

By the end of the match, there were four Shrimps’ players’ names in his little book. How many from Bolton? Not one. Yes, I admit I’m totally biased – but the referee’s performance tonight was completely one-sided and wholly unacceptable.

Right at the beginning of the second half, huge Bolton Centre-Half Ricardo Almeida Santos clearly brought-down Dylan Connolly with a crude sliding challenge which went right through Morecambe’s diminutive Number Eleven. A clearer penalty could not be more obvious. But the incompetent in the middle again inexplicably waved play-on. There’s not a lot more to say. Bolton still dominated the possession in the second half and their players regularly dived and rolled about as if pole-axed whilst the man with the whistle effectively encouraged them to keep doing so by never penalising any of the play-acting or blatant cheating.

The ground was emptying of home supporters long before the end as it seemed that the increasingly effective rear-guard action by the Shrimps was going to reward them with three points. But it was not to be. In the third minute of injury time, Jón Dadi Bövarsson scored a barely-deserved equaliser for the hosts.

There were a lot of positives – and one negative – to be taken out of this game tonight. The negative is that Aaron Wildig twisted his ankle early on and had to be taken off after just over twenty minutes. The positives are how well the team played defensively as a unit but also struck on the break. Dylan Connolly had by far his best game for the club so far tonight. And as for Adam Phillips… He is a changed man since mentor Derek Adams returned to the club and his performance tonight – committed; brave and skilful – made him my Man of the Match at least. Well done sir.

After the game, the Morecambe Manager chose his words very carefully as he said that the Referee has a history of missing big moments in games – citing when a Plymouth ball boy was pushed off the field by a Leyton Orient player in the past but remained on the pitch – and questioned why so many of his players were booked tonight when the behaviour of Bolton players was at times worse for all to see. He added:

“We’ve had a stonewall penalty kick not given at 1-0. I think the referee has to see that it is a penalty. I don’t know if they thought they had to send the player off because he was sliding in. It’s a really bad challenge from their player. Connolly is in full momentum, takes the ball past him and gets wiped out. I don’t understand why the penalty hasn’t been given. We played well tonight and dominated a team who’d won five on the bounce. For long spells we didn’t even let them near our goal. I thought Bolton Wanderers got a lot of decisions going their way for whatever reason. We had a lot of players booked tonight. One of their players on the far side of the pitch actually threw the ball towards – even though he had the ball in his hands – towards one of our players’ faces and pulls it back – and nothing happens. That is a booking. I think that tonight was very disappointing.”

As for Ian Evatt – who cares what he says or thinks about anything?

In the ninetieth minute tonight, Morecambe were nineteenth in League One. Three minutes later, they had dropped back again into the twenty-first position that they just don’t seem to be able to shake-off. However – with rivals Crewe, Lincoln, AFC Wimbledon and Fleetwood all losing this evening – their place among The Damned improved at least a little bit.

“We Wuz Robbed!”

Bolton Wanderers: 19 James Trafford; 3 Declan John; 4 MJ Williams (22 Keiran Sadlier 66’); 5 Ricardo Almeida Santos (C); 6 George Johnston; 10 Dion Charles; 11 Amadou Bakayoko (9 Jón Dadi Bövarsson 71’); 13 Marlon Fossey; 15 Will Aimson; 16 Aaron Morley; 17 Oladapo Afolayan (14 Xavier Amaechi 82’).

Subs Not Used:  12 Joel Dixon; 25 George Thomason; 27 Alex Baptiste; 29 Liam Gordon.

Morecambe:  30 Trevor Carson; 4 Anthony O’Connor (C); 5 Jacob Bedeau (Y); 8 Toumani Diagouraga; 9 Cole Stockton (Y); 10 Aaron Wildig (27 Ousmane Fané 13’); 11 Dylan Connolly (Y); 18 Adam Phillips; 19 Shane McLoughlin; 22 Liam Gibson (Y) (3 Greg Leigh 45’); 31 Rhys Bennett (21 Ryan Cooney 64’).

Subs Not Used:  41 Adam Smith; 14 Jonathan Obika; 17 Jonah Ayunga; 24 Arthur Gnahoua; 25 Alfie McCalmont; 28 Courtney Duffus. 

Ref: Christopher Sarginson.

Att: 14,559 ( 885 from Morecambe).

 

 

 

[Burndens Bogs]

Bitter bitter shrimp eating tossers.

Get to fuck, if just one of our chances in the first half had gone in, you’d have been dicked by 4 or 5. You got lucky, very lucky.

Take the  point, then take the relegation, league one isn’t for you.

[bolty58]

Sinking to the levels of Trampmere this lot. The sooner they are back where they belong in non league football the better.

[Smiley]

On 07/03/2022 at 07:33, MickyD said:

Are you actually going? 

I rarely miss a home game.

[FrancisFogarty]

On 09/03/2022 at 17:37, Johnnyrotten said:

I really like JDB and I've happy to see him start games, but its not long since he had one of the worst halves of football by any of our players this season, I think it was v Lincoln, absolutely everything bounced off him and every pass turned into possession for Lincoln.  So he can have his bad games as much as the next man, added to the fact that Baka is scoring goals as much as anyone over the last month or 2.  JDB scored a nice goals last night, but if the roles had been reversed its easy to imagine Baka would have bagged that chance.     

If we'd carried on going forward after the first 10 mins when DC only went close, and started with JDB we'd have broken them down early and seen them off before half time. It was crying out for JDB.

 

[Max Cherry]

3 hours ago, Francis Fogarty said:

If we'd carried on going forward after the first 10 mins when DC only went close, and started with JDB we'd have broken them down early and seen them off before half time. It was crying out for JDB.

 

I agree. Was disappointed JBD didn't start he was fantastic at Gillingham.  Bakayoko is not good enough to start IMHO. Done well coming on late in games but was a waste of space Tuesday.  Got to be Bod on Saturday with maybe sadlier in for Dapo (bring him on 2nd half if needed) and possibly Dempsey for MJ 

[Steejay]

46 minutes ago, Max Cherry said:

I agree. Was disappointed JBD didn't start he was fantastic at Gillingham.  Bakayoko is not good enough to start IMHO. Done well coming on late in games but was a waste of space Tuesday.  Got to be Bod on Saturday with maybe sadlier in for Dapo (bring him on 2nd half if needed) and possibly Dempsey for MJ 

Dempsey's out.

Otherwise agreed.

[Mounts Kipper]

 

Proper tickled me this, even better it was fat boy Stockton. 🤣

Edited March 24, 2022 by Mounts Kipper