Players gave everything for the shirt

Game No 9


Opponents Walsall Home League 1 Won 2-1


Team Performance                                                                                                                                                                                            Mark out of 10

Slocombe   Not overly confident on crosses but OK. Sold down the river by Leadbitter and IMO the red card was correct                                                   6.5


Partington On present form the best right back at the club strong in the tackle,reads the game well and stays calm.Went into midfield then in a back five   8.5  MOM
Lockyer An assured performance from our skipper against good opponents.Good to see him back to form.                                                                        8
Sweeney Looked tired and not yet up to the form of last season but an OK perfprmance in what was a defensive battle.                                                    7
Brown Another who is struggling and slows the game down too much in possession and gives opponents too much space.                                                 6.5

Lines Set up the early goal with a great pass and tried to get us moving forward but would like to see him further forward.Hope injury is not bad.               6.5
Sercombe Caught in possession too often and a performance below his best. Not really suited to the way we allow the opposition to come at us.                 6
O Clarke Livened up when we went down to 10 but largely missing up until then. Good to see him in position to volley home the late winner                       6.5

Bodin  Some neat footwork and you always expect something to happen but yesterday little did and a bit greedy Couple of good shots.                              7
Gaffney Took his goal very well dinking the keeper after a heavy touch. Battled hard for every ball on limited service                                                        8
Nichols Sacrificed after the sending off but flattered to deceive until then. Formation doesn't suit him IMO and time for Telford to be given a chance            5.5


Subs:

Harrison   Came on and worked very hard to win the ball at both ends and looks on good form and unlucky not to start                                                    7
Leadbitter Terrible control and back pass sums up his form this season but in his favour set up the winner for Clarke                                                        5
Andre Very agile and saved us on three occasions. Needed to be a hero and on the day he was. Handled very well and seemed confident.                          7.5

Crowd Stuck with the team and was the 12th man that saw us battle out a superb but undeserved result.                                                                        9

Ref Probably got the red card right but in all honesty little else and was not helped by his linesmen either. We won so the mark is not sour grapes.             3 
Walsall  A good team who won the tactical battle until we went down to ten players. At 1-1 there looked only one winner and they will be disappointed.      7.5

Team Performance summed up Played like the away team after an early lead but cannot fault the efforts of the players battling for every ball 10 out of 10 but quality 4 out of 10
Defence summed up How many more are we going to concede from set pieces. Slocombe seems unsure on crosses and this unsettles defenders , midfield players are struggling to mark.
Midfield summed up Seems to be p-laying to a plan that limits their chances to show their true ability.They battled well but were closed down to the point of creating little
Attack summed Up Our attack very much played on limited service and at the moment we look so short of real quality that there is not enough to really rate our attackers
Man of Match Andre probably had the biggest effect on the result but Partington was outstanding from start to finish. 8.5

Final Comment I cannot help but feel that DC or the owners have left us very short in both numbers and the balance of the team. Last season we could and did play many formations but we now seem limited to 4-3-3. Those who say we are 
stronger than last season are kidding themselves. We had Mansell, O Clarke, Lines, Sinclair, Colkett,and Boateng all pushing for midfield places and Easter also more than capable of dropping back and Montano, Moore, Bodin and Broom providing the width to go to 4-4-2.. Hopefully today DC will be going through the Unattached players for a couple of midfielders if Lines injury is serious but also getting a keeper in on loan. 

Oldham; despite their position; will be no pushovers especially if we allow them the space as we have in all our league games this season at the Mem. UTG