Rovers v Notts County

[Boz]

Another game I'll be missing. Given that a game against Tranmere seems to be a cure for all ills for struggling teams this season, perhaps we should be worried about the visit of the Magpies on a winless run, in this 6-pointer.

It's likely that Les will stick with a similar line-up to Rochdale. Alliyu will have returned to West Brom, so assuming we play 3 up front, one of McGurk, Akins Morrow or Robinson to step up. It doesn't sound like Robbo is fully fit and of the others, Adam would be my preference. If Goodison isn't fit, I'd like to see Ash dropping back into central defence and start with Fraughan, but expecting Wood to be called up instead. Think the other longer term injuries aren't yet in contention.

Prediction. Gut feeling we'll lose this one in front of 4.5k fans

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

I hope Boz is wrong with this prediction as defeat would be seriously damaging.

The results last night have actually boosted my confidence that we can survive this season. There are teams below us struggling desperately (Bristol Rovers, Swindon), and you could argue that the loss of Austin to Swindon is a bigger blow to them than losing Moore is to us, while problems continue to mount for Plymouth. If finding four teams worse than us rather than being a convincing side ourselves is the order of the day, then so be it.

Regarding Saturday, I would expect Robinson to start on the right and play 60-70 minutes. The loss of Lateef could hit us quite badly, however, as he has been our best attacking player in recent matches.

I wouldn't hazard a guess at the scoreline given our inconsistency, but hopefully County will be distracted by their cup exploits.

 

[bigmart]

I think Lateef is still here for saturdays game, im going for a nervous 2 1 home win

 

[Boz]

The results last night have actually boosted my confidence that we can survive this season. There are teams below us struggling desperately (Bristol Rovers, Swindon), and you could argue that the loss of Austin to Swindon is a bigger blow to them than losing Moore is to us, while problems continue to mount for Plymouth. If finding four teams worse than us rather than being a convincing side ourselves is the order of the day, then so be it.

This league is really tight, I don't think there are any sides that are well behind the rest in the way Stockport were last season. Don't dispute that Austin is a bigger loss to Swindon than ITM is to us, BUT they've bought a decent replacement in Elliot Benyon, whereas we haven't replaced ITM at all. I think we desperately need to put a few wins together and start pulling away from the bottom, we're just not making any headway at present.

Good news if bigmart is right about Alliyu, would agree he's been one of our best players lately.

 

[Rockford's Love Child]

This league is really tight, I don't think there are any sides that are well behind the rest in the way Stockport were last season.

I agree that our position is far from secure, but we have actually managed (just) to stay outside the bottom four since October. I don't see us going on a run that will take us into mid table, but despite our inconsistency we may take enough points to finish fifth or sixth from bottom at least.

While there is no Stockport in the division this season, I think both Daggers and Walsall will go down given the points they need to make up, and Bristol Rovers are in a dodgy position too.

But it is difficult to make any predictions with three months of the season to go. :shock:

 

[Rob]

Not holding out much hope because the Manager/Players seem to be incapable of working together tactically.

I think we have to go all out attack for the entire game.

We are never going to win a game that requires prolonged periods of defending/holding the ball because we are crap.

Where we might win a game is with two decent skillfull wingers tearing the full backs to pieces and peppering in crosses. More crosses means more attempts at goal and provided the squad dont fluff everything like they did on Tuesday then we will win.

 

[Ian]

Goodison should be OK to start and Mahon should be on the bench after a successful 90 minutes in midweek. Lateef will also feature..

Reading Ash's comments, I totally agree with this:

"We're starting to create more chances and keep clean sheets. There's a lot of togetherness at the moment. Our work rate has been a lot higher in recent weeks

Let's get behind the lads, hopefully they can convert a few and we'll win 3-0

 

[Boz]

I think we have to go all out attack for the entire game.

We are never going to win a game that requires prolonged periods of defending/holding the ball because we are crap.

Where we might win a game is with two decent skillfull wingers tearing the full backs to pieces and peppering in crosses. More crosses means more attempts at goal and provided the squad dont fluff everything like they did on Tuesday then we will win.

I disagree.

Setting aside the fact that we haven't two out and out wingers, let alone decent ones, the match stats suggest that we created about a dozen chances v Rochdale, which is not bad going. The fact that only 3 were on target and only one of those resulted in a goal tells it's own story.

Also we've defended leads and kept clean sheets before. The problem comes with defending too deep.

 

[og in oz]

im going nil-nil, as i dont see us scoring a goal, but i can see us keeping them out, well keeping them out because they dont seem able to score either.

 

[Rob]

I disagree.

Setting aside the fact that we haven't two out and out wingers, let alone decent ones, the match stats suggest that we created about a dozen chances v Rochdale, which is not bad going. The fact that only 3 were on target and only one of those resulted in a goal tells it's own story.

Also we've defended leads and kept clean sheets before. The problem comes with defending too deep.

I would rather we attacked constantly and at least kept the ball in the other teams half. I dont expect us to score tons of goals.

For the last few games we have allowed the other team to attack almost constantly for lengthy spells during the game and that only ends badly.

 

[Rob]

im going nil-nil, as i dont see us scoring a goal, but i can see us keeping them out, well keeping them out because they dont seem able to score either.

In their last 5 wins they scored 13.

They have only failed to score in a game once since the back end of November.