Got to agree with Scotty, they had plenty of possession but didn't create too many clear cut chances. Danny Haystead made a couple of good saves and they got their goal but they never looked like running in a hatful.
Yes they made us work hard and had plenty of posession as there is space to exploit, Altrincham are a decent side and it's what I expected once Fairclough was sent off. If the shoe had been on the other foot we'd have done the same to them much like we did against Colwyn Bay. I certainly don't agree it was like England San Marino, and if we'd have kept 11 on the pitch I'm pretty sure we'd have won that game as for the first 15 minutes we battered them with their keeper making 2 outstanding saves, but we'll never know now. Fair enough watch the game without bias but sometimes it can go too far the other way. I thought the 10 played really as well as could be expected from 10 and we still caused them problems. If we'd have stayed at 10 it would have been touch and go if we'd got a replay imo but again we'll never know.
When we went down to 9 it was obvious that we'd lose the game, again I thought the 9 did us proud.
As for squad strength? After the 11 on the pitch we have Silk, Wilson who's a big signing who we've missed badly, Stokes and Smith who are all capable of doing a decent job in the first team. Yeah the rest are inexperienced but I had a look at Halifax's forum after we beat them and they could only put out a bench of 3 defenders, a gk and a striker. They only had 2 players out so it's not just us who suffer, Halifax have 1 of, if not the biggest budget in this league and have similar problems to us in that regard.