I thought a night sleeping on it might make me less irritable, but it hasn't happened. I have only seen the two home games, but I cannot recall watching two such clueless performances consecutively for years. Southport and Chorley were everything we are not: organised and playing to their strengths. Chorley yesterday had two big blokes up front, who knew how to get, keep and lay off the ball. Chorley were quicker to the ball, in front of their markers when the ball was coming to them, and getting in front of our players on the rare occasions when we tried to pass to one of our players. I cannot recall any coherent passage of play from us. We have next to no creativity, and only Crawford showed any, and he at least injected some sense of attack when he got the ball (I thought he should have been man of the match). Cox kept bellowing 'Get your shape!' when they had a goal kick or whatever, but I was still not much the wiser when/if we ever got into this 'shape'. Too often we had clumps of players in the same area which gave Chorley every opportunity to get round/past us (how many of their goals were scored by unmarked players? - two at the back post for a start). We posed no goal threat at all for pretty much all game, and there is no movement to speak of. The idea of pass and move seems to have been missing from our play for some time (and not just during Cox's time). I've no idea why Mbeka isn't playing as an enforcer, and without someone like Scott Pollock in midfield we're hardly likely to create anything. Unlike Chorley, we have no identity as a team. How are we attempting to play? How do we intend to get the ball in the net?
Rant almost over, and I'm immensely dispirited. It doesn't help discovering that Alfreton thrashed Southport 4-0 yesterday, with two ex-Boston players (Southwell and Preston) scoring three of them. The end of last season seems like a different world......
