Dr Balls

All bigger than Nailsworth… Must be hard for Gloucester City fans considering all the trouble that their club has had in recent years with their flooded ground (now all hopefully sorted) to have not just Cheltenham lording it over them but also Forest Green Rovers. Imagine that - being a “City” fan with a local “Rovers” team above you in the league…. On the other hand don’t bother. As far as Bristol is concerned, It’s not worth wasting your time on something so ludicrous!

Weren’t they in the Conference at some point, along with Bath City? My impression was that they had a few bad seasons recently but agree that given the population and catchment, they could be a lot higher up than they are. As for Yate Town it’s great to see them doing well. And the reality is that with a bit of money and some behind the scene pushing the club forward, you can achieve things at this level of football. Forest Green are absolute proof of that.

Yes it was. It was the repeat of the JPT Final at Wembley, and Flint scored in both iirc. The interesting thing is that Dean Smith as Walsall manager has gone on to much more managerial success and profile than Steve Cotterill since May 2015.

Having been involved with Paediatric Major Trauma for a while, I can tell you that knife crime and stabbings are a huge problem in London particularly, and the age of those involved is dropping, such that it’s now not uncommon among 13 and 14 year olds. It is a huge societal issue which feeds into poverty and I also hate to say it, race and ethnicity. Family breakdown is another big problem as are the gangs with their involvement in drugs and other crime. Anything that highlights this issue and tries to reduce its incidence is good, but unfortunately until many of the wider problems are resolved, then it will be impossible to root out completely.

Apart from historically Bournemouth wasn’t part of Dorset, unlike Poole. All changed in the 70s reorganisation, when Avon was also created. And agree, Plymouth - fair play to the Janners. Bournemouth agree - broke the rules on FFP but made back far more than ever paid out in fines. Sums up everything that’s wrong with football in this country. And if we are upset about it, fans of Yeovil (their traditional “local” rivals) must be extremely angry, especially considering the way their fortunes have diverged in the last few seasons.

Joe was always better going forward than defending, because he was really a midfielder who had been shunted backwards on the pitch, whereas Cam is clearly a very good defender who comes forward well. If he could start scoring goals like Joe has done through his career that would be great.

A central defence of Liam Fontaine and Lewin Nyatanga was not going to provide much cover at the back even with Tom Heaton in goal. There were decent players in that squad, but it was unbalanced and there were a number of injuries to important players e.g. John Stead. Plus we had another loanee cursed with injury during their first match in George Elokobi from Wolves. And his was a bad one that I think kept him out for the rest of the season. The only 2 regular players who came out of that season with much credit were Heaton and Albert, both of whom were promptly sold when we were relegated.

The curse of Ashton Gate strikes again! To be fair, he was given an impossible job by Steve Lansdown. Cut the wage bill by 50% and keep us in the Championship. It explains why he brought in so many cheap (and fairly useless) Scots. I quite liked him as a bloke (remember the Brum minivan incident) he kept us up in the 2011-12, season, and in better financial circumstances with a bit of patience, he might have been a success.

Skeggy is for those from Nottingham and Leicester, rather than Yorkshire. Stokies traditionally went to Rhyl for “Potters fortnight”. To be honest, they can have Rhyl to themselves, because I don’t think anyone else wants it. A lot of the time it’s like a wet winter midweek in Stoke, so I guess they feel at home!

Some harsh comments on here. Both Towler and Benarous were pulled at half time for a tactical change. Plus Afobe and Bradshaw is one of the harder pairs of strikers to face in this division. Thought the first goal was a great cross but O’Leary should have come out for it. As for the penalty, Afobe did what Afobe does so well, running into a through ball ahead of the defender. Did Towler need to dive in? Well if he didn’t, Afobe was about to shoot anyway and would likely have scored. I think Towler has something about him that gives him a chance of making it at this level. He didn’t get done physically, which is something for a 19 year old centre back, he looked comfortable on the ball, and as noted already, he looks like he can play a good long pass. There is plenty there to build on to improve his game further.

Much though Semenyo did do some good things today there are some other bits that can’t be avoided. He is not a lone striker. His control at times is woeful - at times the ball bounces his off his feet. He does scare defenders by running on to balls or with ball. His best position is playing with at least one other striker, who can actually put the ball in the net, such as Weimann, Martin or Wells.

For all there playing it out from the back, Guardiola’s Man City team sometimes play it long from Ederson but usually a punt from the ground rather than out of the hand. The player I remember with the biggest kick out of the hand was Ray Clemence. Just this lazy swing of the leg but it usually went miles.

There were huge gaps across all of the stands today. At most 12k but more likely 10k actually in the ground.

Agreed he was much better today. However having seen him in the warm up, he clearly needs to spend a lot of time practising his shooting. Until he can more consistently hit the target, he will remain a nuisance to oppositions rather than a threat.

Agreed. Scott has got away with it to some degree as he is such a good player, plus he has Vyner behind him, who is willing to slip into playing as a right back. The reality is that both Scott and Benarous are excellent young players that we are lucky have, but neither are nor ever will be wing backs.

So here goes. In the first half we started off brilliantly, scoring early, but it quickly became clear that playing Benarous at left wing back was a decision that was going to cost us. Again and again Huddersfield were attacking down their right flank and finding lots of space. And it wasn’t a surprise that they scored in the first half from an attack down that side. At half time, I discussed with a friend how we needed both a proper left back and for Massengo to man-mark their no 8. So the second half starts without any changes of personnel or formation and within a minute of the restart, Huddersfield break down their right and score their second. Yes it was clearly offside, but unfortunately at this level we are still dependent on dodgy officials. Was there a change then from Pearson? No. Yes we went close with Semenyo hitting the post but again Huddersfield break down their right. The deflection of the cross off of Kalas was unfortunate as it set up Ward for an easy header in front of goal, but even so, it again pointed out our problems down our left side. And finally Pearson makes a change bringing on Pring when we are 3:1 down. Benarous is freed from his defensive responsibilities and almost immediately we see what he is really capable of, as he runs at the opposition and starts to cause them significant problems. He is a brilliant attacking midfielder for his age and that’s where he needs to play. Trying to show-horn Benarous into being a wing back does neither him nor the team any good. So in conclusion, I lay a significant amount of the responsibility for today’s defeat at Pearson’s feet. He got the the set up wrong and was lucky that we were still level at half time when he had the chance to change things. However he missed that opportunity and that decision probably cost us the match, or at least not losing. There are clearly things going on behind the scenes that I don’t understand but even then we need to play players in their best positions if we want the team to play to its full potential. I remain unconvinced that we have found that balance yet.

Best performance from O’Dowda for a long time. If he can stay fit and keep up that level for a decent run of games, opinions about him might start to change. That said he was lucky his shot took a deflection as otherwise it was an easy save for their goalie.

Shouldn’t be that hard a puzzle to solve. It only has 4 pieces! However as a club, we have been trying to fit square pegs in round holes for as long as I can remember so maybe a 4 piece jigsaw is beyond us…

Thanks Dave. it was clear so often in the first half how Barnsley had width and we didn’t. There were times that their wing backs came forward and none of our players were within 25 yards of them. What I also spotted is that when they lost the ball, Barnsley’s front 3 dropped back to get behind the ball and support the 4 man midfield. With just our 3 in midfield it was also impossible to play through, and we didn’t have any width to get past that. By contrast, until the Alamo at the end, Wells and Martin did very little to get back and support the midfield, so again we were outnumbered. I am not suggesting that the forwards should go back into the penalty area unless it’s heading away corners, as Martin proved in those last few minutes, being far too slow and giving the ball away in dangerous areas, but we do need to play as a combined team rather than disparate units that don’t seem to fit together.

We were awful for the first 40 minutes and Barnsley were little better, but they were definitely better at passing and pressing. Their goal was no surprise. In the lead up to our first goal, the crowd had got really angry, and you could both hear and feel it. Whether that got through to Kalas, who was really the instigator of that goal, I don’t know, but he was absolutely fuming about something, shouting at the rest of the team, then a few moments later brought the ball out of defence, passed a couple of their midfielders and then played it forward. It was what the midfield should have been doing but hadn’t all match. The biggest problem remains the midfield. They provide next to no cover for the defence and little creativity for the forwards. Marty James had a shocker today, while Bakinson was weak. At his size, he should be dominating like a Vieira, but he was anything but. Massengo runs himself ragged trying to cover for others and at least tries to play the ball forward. However he has proved again that he has zero shooting ability. Lots to sort out from Pearson and his team, but a win is all important.

Not quite. I was the other one wearing one although I try to get through the concourse as quickly as possible.

Just spotted this as well. Fascinating and given the players that we picked up from Scotland and elsewhere in the late 60s and 70s who became the core of our promotion-winning team, presumably on the basis of his scouting, you could easily suggest we owe him a lot more than many of our fans (including myself) have ever realised.

Isn’t transport part of the Metro mayor’s responsibility? Of course, the Tories in North Somerset didn’t want to be part of the “West of England” because it would be too “Bristol-centric” and then Marvin blocked them joining more recently because he didn’t want them hijacking funding. Its the usual spats in local government worsened by having 4 relatively small unitary authorities who struggle to see eye-to-eye on anything, so not much ever gets done. It’s what did for the tram project between Bristol and South Glos. That said it was little better under Avon…

Apparently the money in the West of England is for a “fully prioritised” bus route between Bristol and Bath, whatever that really means. I am guessing more roadworks, and bus lanes, although how that works through somewhere like Saltford I have no idea. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59017503 Of course, there is a decent rail line between the 2 cities that could have a few new stations added, and avoid any of the road traffic issues, but that would be too obvious!

Only being a bit cynical but that’s just slightly more than they “saved” by “postponing” (I.e. cancelling) the electrification of the Great Western lines to Temple Meads, Oxford and Swansea a few years ago. From an environmental perspective, given we really need to electrify all of our railways, it made no sense, and as per usual it’s Bristol that gets shafted. Also from a passenger perspective, it’s now come out that when the hybrid trains run on diesel, passengers on board experience the highest levels of nitrogen dioxide (a pollutant) of any rail passengers in the country. Thanks again Mr Grayling and the Tories - slower, more expensive trains, that pollute more and put the passengers at additional risk, to save less than 1% of the overall cost of HS2.