Sadly, the second half was not as impressive as the first. I’m not sure why – I do think there’s a huge confidence issue. Some of the decisions we made were really poor as well. Jack Moylan is trying so hard to be the guy who curls them in from 25 yards that he occasionally looks a bit too focused. He smashed one effort high and wide and banged the turf in anger. I feel his pain. I feel all the player’s pain. I see accusations of a lack of effort, but I don’t see that in our attacking play. A lack of finesse? Yeah, aboslutely. A lack of confidence? More than anything else. Maybe a lack of belief in their ability, but that’s probably the same as confidence.
There’s also the opposition to consider. They could sit a bit deeper, they could settle with their goal and frustrate us, and they did that well. Credit to them – they’re a good side with a lot of pressure and they did what they needed to do. Their experience shone through, the likes of Santos known exactly how to manage situations. They didn’t come out much in the second, as they hadn’t in the first, but they didn’t need to. They were fighting an opponent without a goal from open play since before Christmas, and it showed.
We tried to force the game by making big changes, but I’m not sure they had the right effect. We lack a bit of pace out wide at present – Reeco wasn’t really on it last night, but there’s no Erik Ring to bring on. Dom Jeffries came on at right wing back and looked solid, but not quick. Ben House came on and scrapped, but I thought Freddie and Jovon had decent games up top. We delivered so many crosses into the box and there, in my opinion, sits on of the issues. I keep hearing we’re not creating enough and I’ve even said it on the podcast, but we put 22 balls into the box, eight of which we connected with in some way or another. We need someone who is going to connect with those and create a chance, either a shot, a layoff, or something, to ensure these opportunities go in.
This season in the Mickey Mouse Trophy, only Birmingham City (123) and Bradford (114) have put more crosses into the box than us (111). Is that really ‘not creating’, or is it simply not having the right profile of striker to get on the end of them? Let me ask it another way – would an old-school Charlie Wyke figure, who did nothing but head the ball and shoot from crosses, have 15 goals for us already this season? Honestly, I think so.
We lost, we went out and it has (understandably) led to anger online, but I’ve seen enough in the Birmingham and Bolton matches to think we’re going to be okay. We need to be active in the market and we need some nous and know-how in the team. Sam Clucas being spotted at the game could be interesting. He might bring a bit of creativity (Oldham fans are raving about him) and a bit of experience to the younger lads. However, the one thing we absolutely need is a striker and I could even live with us bringing in nobody else at all, if we can just get someone who might put a head on the crosses we’re delivering. They’re not all bad, by the way, they’re not all wayward.
We’re on a bad run of form, and it is a concern, but aside from three matches I don’t think we’ve played badly. Shrewsbury, Bolton in the league and Rotherham were bad, but before that, Reading and Huddersfield we played well, and since we’ve shown good patches against Stevenage, bossed Birmingham for 45 minutes and were the better side all night last night. We just need one goal and a bit of belief and I think we can get back on track.
Getting one goal and a bit of belief, that’s a different thing entirely.