[gb007]

metallilad said:

1690485799[/url]' post='1757571']
And yet we still finished best of the rest. Maybe your right and we are susceptible to the ball over the top but we had a lesser attack last season to what we have now. Also we have a better keeper than we had last season now so if the ball comes over he would probably deal with it along better than we did last season. We are going to lose the odd match and we are gonna get caught out by the long ball from time to time like we did last season but I personally think that we're in a better position to still get results out of matches simply because going forward we look so dangerous.

Fully agree with a better keeper and that we have Naylor as better defensive cover in front of the CH s
However the keeper is still learning his role as sweeper/keeper and that has showed in a couple of the friendlies.
League position showed that we finished best of the rest but goals conceded put us in 7th position (just)
I like the fact that we have several players that can score goals but we all know sometimes these goals ‘dry up’ when this happens we need to keep a clean sheet ,get the point and move on and to me this is where we are vulnerable.
If we smash the league by totally out scoring the opposition there will be nobody happier than me BUT I see this defensive fragility as something that will cost us more points that we cannot afford to lose in what could well be quite an open league.

[Brookie]

Other teams will have weak points as well, as ever give it 10 games in the league before committing mass wrist slitting

[metallilad]

gb007, on 27 July 2023 - 08:00 PM, said:

League position showed that we finished best of the rest but goals conceded put us in 7th position (just)

That's just a stat that can be manipulated to prove a theory. Reality is the fact that we finished third on points and the top two went up.

[JonB]

gb007, on 27 July 2023 - 08:00 PM, said:

Fully agree with a better keeper and that we have Naylor as better defensive cover in front of the CH s
However the keeper is still learning his role as sweeper/keeper and that has showed in a couple of the friendlies.
League position showed that we finished best of the rest but goals conceded put us in 7th position (just)
I like the fact that we have several players that can score goals but we all know sometimes these goals ‘dry up’ when this happens we need to keep a clean sheet ,get the point and move on and to me this is where we are vulnerable.
If we smash the league by totally out scoring the opposition there will be nobody happier than me BUT I see this defensive fragility as something that will cost us more points that we cannot afford to lose in what could well be quite an open league.

Goals scored we were comfortably third again though so that’s two stats out of three that sees us third….

[johnd51]

whittman, on 27 July 2023 - 04:49 PM, said:

Oh yes the crowd used to sing Dont have any more Mrs Moore as I recalled back in the day

Just to put it in perspective JQ gets no stick compared with Mrs Moore's lad who was conservatively 5 times better than our current hero. (IMHO)

[DIFH]

JonB, on 27 July 2023 - 08:57 PM, said:

Goals scored we were comfortably third again though so that’s two stats out of three that sees us third….

Couple all that with the period where we only had JQ fit up top then to finish with that stat I’d say we were unlucky again with injuries.

[dtp]

DIFH, on 28 July 2023 - 02:52 AM, said:

Couple all that with the period where we only had JQ fit up top then to finish with that stat I’d say we were unlucky again with injuries.

The very poor run of games without a win cost us dearly last season but having said that we were still miles behind Wrexham and County points wise but ended up better than anybody else.

The basic problem with that poor run was that the team as a whole struggled for form from back to front. Certainly, we need to ensure such a bad run does not occur again this coming season.

This post has been edited by dtp: 28 July 2023 - 08:12 AM

[Goku]

dtp, on 28 July 2023 - 08:11 AM, said:

The basic problem with that poor run was that the team as a whole struggled for form from back to front. Certainly, we need to ensure such a bad run does not occur again this coming season.

Agreed DTP. We should try and not play poorly and try not to lose multiple games in a row any other nuggets of wisdom for Cook and co?

[dtp]

Goku, on 28 July 2023 - 08:15 AM, said:

Agreed DTP. We should try and not play poorly and try not to lose multiple games in a row any other nuggets of wisdom for Cook and co?

I'll accept your sarcasm, mate, but the reality is that it was that run which put us out of the chance to challenge for the top two and made it more of a fight fir third place.

The question asked by the original poster was about how many defeats can we afford this coming season. My thoughts are that it is more about consistency throughout the season and not just for 3/4 of it.

I believe the poor form was not helped by Cook re-instating Covolan which made the defence even more shaky than it already was. If we sign Boot, as I hope we will, then I think our goalkeeping situation will be much stronger than last season. Attacking wise in that spell Dobra was missed and , hopefully, that has now been addressed too.

[Sammy Spireite]

dtp, on 28 July 2023 - 11:46 AM, said:

I'll accept your sarcasm, mate, but the reality is that it was that run which put us out of the chance to challenge for the top two and made it more of a fight fir third place.

if you pro-rata the points scored apart from those 9 games and assume we'd have scored points at our 'usual' rate then we'd have finished on 100pts, still well short of 2nd place.

I know its all 'ifs' and 'buts' but you cannot say with any degree of confidence that avoiding that blip would have lead to the league table final positions being any different.

If the rumoured (yeah, I know, silly me quoting rumours on here!) fall outs amongst the squad at that time have ANY truth behind them, then at least we should take comfort in the fact that they were resolved (seemingly without casualty) and the squad then galvanized and only lost 2 more games til the end of the season.

[baldyblu]

I'd rather win one,lose one than draw 2!so it's not really about how many we lose