Just back

Quoted from DB

Regrettably, I don't think, even with a freebie, I'll be attending anymore before the late spring. The weather brought on too many health issues but at least I enjoyed the game and Towns' goal; more so than the 100's who left the ground when they scored. A game is 90 mins, not 79!

Ony ever done it once, a couple of weeks ago at Ho Chi Minh CIty.  However, that was there was a downpour , we were 1 - 0 down and the ball wouldn't roll anymore. By the time I got home, we had conceded another two!

Quoted from toontown

The trouble with efete is that ifhe has the ball the moment a man is stood in front of him he stops and plays it sideways or backwards and the forward momentum ends. It's every single time and it means we are dysfunctional in possession on the right hand side when he's involved.

It's very frustrating.  I'd rather him take the man on and lose it. Run to the byeline and at worst you could win a corner.  He's a good player so why aren't management on his case about it?

Quoted from 140381

It’s easy to criticise the officials, I’ve always thought it was an excuse. Put away your chances and the officials are irrelevant.

Not today though. They were as much use as a marzipan dildo.

Only saw the 2nd half, but thought the ref did ok. I think there's a huge influence that we watch the refs as Grimsby fans, so stuff that doesn't go our way is judged as poor refereeing when a lot of it is niggly.

Can't say he got anything badly wrong in the 2nd half. A little inconsistent in what he'd give for pushing but Waterfall benefitted from that too.

Quoted from pen penfras

Only saw the 2nd half, but thought the ref did ok. I think there's a huge influence that we watch the refs as Grimsby fans, so stuff that doesn't go our way is judged as poor refereeing when a lot of it is niggly.

Can't say he got anything badly wrong in the 2nd half. A little inconsistent in what he'd give for pushing but Waterfall benefitted from that too.

He was less bad 2nd half to be fair but when the Main Stand sings *You don't know what you're doing' for about two minutes at half time, I'd say you've had a bit of a shocker.

Quoted from Mayaman

It's very frustrating.  I'd rather him take the man on and lose it. Run to the byeline and at worst you could win a corner.  He's a good player so why aren't management on his case about it?

They are. I remember Hurst saying after the Torquay away game last season when Efete scored they were drumming into him how he should believe in himself more, and go on surging runs because they knew he could do it.

The trouble is managers always think they can get players to do things that do not come naturally and we are still saying similar things about Efete and always will.

He is a decent player and we will get some games where he is really great going forward but he is what he is. Eventually if we need more from that position he will be moved on.

The trick is to get a better right back/wing back when the time comes and not just a replacement.

I love McAtee, he's easily one of my favourite ever Town players but for the love of god take him off pens, he's useless at them.

Quoted from Chrisblor

Efete was hesitant going forward, he always holds the ball up instead of playing crosses in behind defenders.

This has always been my criticism of him too, ever since early last season. He doesn't get to the goal line and he doesn't often cross early. It's been glossed over for so long because he's had a few marauding runs in his time, but we don't see that anywhere near enough. What we get most of the time is him turning back on himself or inside and playing an easy pass and then we have to build again.

I think he's been solid/fine defensively for most of his Town career though, so we can forgive a little slip.

I kind of a agree on the hesitancy argument, but I don't think there is more than one town player in the box half the time. Maybe he's instructured by PH not to cross in those circumstances, as we could then get caught on the counter?

To say he never gets any crosses in is simply not true, he usually puts in a couple of quality crosses in every game, but usually no one is on the end of it.

Quoted from Roast Em Bobby

I kind of a agree on the hesitancy argument, but I don't think there is more than one town player in the box half the time. Maybe he's instructured by PH not to cross in those circumstances, as we could then get caught on the counter?

To say he never gets any crosses in is simply not true, he usually puts in a couple of quality crosses in every game, but usually no one is on the end of it.

Yeah that's fair as well, his delivery is decent when he does cross. I think that's what is frustrating about him. We know he can absolutely burst past a player and we know he can put a ball into the box. And yeah that's another fair point about lack of bodies in the box too.

Quoted from The Yard Dog

The game was effected by the officials being not able to officiate the game, every time a Stevenage went down the ref gave a foul, yet allowed the Stevenage players push over our players and still no foul given (the push inside the penalty box, and 5 secs later actually shoved Clifton over yards from the lino). On the replay it looked that Etefe was pulled inside the penalty box in the second half, ref was giving those decisions to Stevenage all game.

Spot on. I thought we heard the other week that Hursty was learning a little of the dark arts of the game but we seem determined to stay on our feet. A case in point was 2nd half when Simmonds beat his man on halfway and bolted down the line, 3 opposition players in persuit. I was urging him to do down, as it was obvious what would hapen if he didn't. Sure enough their player nipped in front of him and went down. Free kick to them.
We barely had 2 minutes of possession in this game as they constantly broke up the flow with, seemingly, innocuous free kicks that the ref bought.

Good display from Town who tried to play football, spoiled by a team and a ref who didn't.

Hadn’t occurred to me we could switch to three at the back again yesterday but I do think it suits us. It gets the best from Efete and tbh the foothold we got in midfield didn’t seem compromised too much either. We aren’t really a side that play 5 across midfield and make it count so I would like to see us give this another go.

Quick one on Efete again. I think it really plays to his strengths with the extra centre half. At times he was our main outlet and furthest player forward. I did have a bit of a facepalm moment when (I thought) he got stuck under the ball in the first half but after seeing the highlights it looks like a difficult ball to deal with in all fairness and you could say Max should have taken responsibility for that. As for him slipping before the goal… have a day off moaners, he slipped like many others yesterday. None of them did it on purpose.

Looking back I think we could have afforded Holohan next to Green. Not knocking Morris who wasn’t bad but I think Holohan offers that bit more on the ball in terms of carrying it forward.

Evans is a scumbag but I thought he was on his best behaviour yesterday (for him). His interview was poppycock though. I liked the player on the right, Wildin, and Reeves in the middle. We were the better side though and it would have been a travesty to have come away with nothing. Not a bad day and hopefully something to build on.