nzlatic

20 minutes ago, League one forever said:

Agreed, Mellon alluded to it his presser and said they wanted him on the ball more and overlapping - so they played Gardner on his side to help get him forward more. 

1 minute ago, BradKnowles1 said:

We were discussing this in the ground, I don’t think he’s a wing back. His best games have been as a left back with someone in front of him. 

Yeah what Mellon said made sense. If he’s going to play wing back then either a forward or midfielder needs to overlap occasionally. That hasn’t been happening recently. I think Hammond might have done it a bit at Eastleigh but not 100% on that. If he’s left by himself out there he’s ineffective. So Gardner playing in either a 4 or 5 on that side should really help him out. 

I’ve been critical of Kitching recently but I thought he had a really good game today. 

All in all a good set of results for us today

1 minute ago, LightDN123 said:

Great team performance today and was worthy of a win. Actually a game of football that we as fans could get behind, support and be involved with. 
 

Shocked to see people buzzing with Sheron. Gave the ball away every time he got it. Him and Hogan the weak links today. 

Sheron showed his pros and cons in the same passage of play a couple of times. Did something great then gave the ball away too easily. But I think he earns a place when trying to pick a balanced midfield out of our squad. 

5 minutes ago, GKing521 said:

No gloating. Frustration.

Really? The performance and result must be much better than what you were expecting. 

.

26 minutes ago, AndyB2 said:

I haven’t done the maths but with our Mellon record applied from day 1 I assume the gap would be perhaps 22
-24 points. Still thoroughly depressing and not really acceptable.

 

do you disagree? 

How many games has Cook had in charge of chesterfield? Maybe look at that before crying that Mellon hasn’t got us up to their standard in 20 games. 

Parts of this thread read like a four Yorkshiremen sketch of negativity. 

3-0 defeat? Luxury! I used to dream of getting beat 3-0 at home by chesterfield. We’ll be 6-0 down 5 minutes before the game kicks off. The league will relegate us 2 divisions at half time for playing 15 centre backs and on the way out we’ll be made to lick the boots clean of every chesterfield supporter there. And we’d be grateful for it. 

In contrast to some of the miserygutses on here  I'm actually really looking forward to this one. Think it has the potential to be a really exciting game.

I don't think we'll see much different in the line up, but for what it's worth this is what I'd go with. It's pinched from how Stockport lined up and where they played Madden...

Hudson

3 - Hobson, Raglan, Hogan

4 - Gardner, Sheron, Conlon, Kitching

1 - Norwood

2 - Garner, Dallas

Norwood naturally drops deep anyway, so him coming late into the box during attacks could cause a bit of trouble. This could create more of a link between midfield and attack. Madden played this role for Stockport so age shouldn't be a problem.

Wasn't 100% on Gardner but he's played that narrow right side role before and done reasonably well if I remember right.

But, like I say, I don't think he'll move from the 352 with Sachdev coming back into the side.

28 minutes ago, TheBigDog said:

I’m driving up for this one, leaving at 8:00am - we had better turn up and play some football

Well, I'm not sure I'd be expecting to see us playing football necessarily! Having a good go at it would do me.

Chesterfield will be feeling the pressure a bit. They might be champions later that day with a win so we should see this as a real opportunity to go at them from the start. 

1 hour ago, deyres42 said:

I wouldn't shed any tears if he went today.

 

Missing out on the playoffs would have to seen as a failure given our resources and the position we got ourselves into just a few weeks ago.

Yeah I assumed you’d be fine if they did let him go. I was just asking if you think they should let him go if we don’t make the play offs. That’s ok if you don’t want to give an opinion. 

Just now, deyres42 said:

I never wanted him in the first place and said so at the time so my stance is pretty clear.

 

I don't think for one minute he will be.

 

I do have growing concerns about the people making the football related decisions.

I know your thoughts on his appointment. Can’t change that though.  I was asking whether you think he should be sacked if we don’t make the play offs. 

2 minutes ago, deyres42 said:

We were eight points behind Bromley at the time of his dismissal. We are eight points behind Bromley now. 

 

Makes you think.

Does it make you think though? Do you have an opinion? Should he be sacked if we don’t make the play offs?

16 minutes ago, AndyB2 said:

Will Mellon be sacked if we don’t make the playoffs?

 

 

No. 

21 minutes ago, LightDN123 said:

I do struggle with the current fan mood, we are absolutely shit in some game, but overall we are an above average football team in the national league. 
 

For years we have been battling relegation, literally years, apart from last season. This year we are 9 games away from the play offs and it seems more depressing than relegation fights. It’s weird. 
 

The football is shit, but that’s the league, let’s enjoy the potential play off campaign. 

This is where I'm at. If you put our current position in a long term context of where we used to be etc, then I can understand why it might be hard to get excited. But I'd rather look at it in the here and now... we're in with a shot at our first promotion in 33 years!!

15 minutes ago, yarddog73 said:

You could argue we've got worse for the batch of new signings.

Possibly. But it's hard to pin on something simple because the team has changed so much game by game. Whether that's deliberately or forced.

He might look to settle the team down going into the last few games. I think he'll need to if we're going to build enough consistency to win 3 play off games.

5 minutes ago, trickyrickyholden said:

Dont really disagree with the last paragraph, just such a shame we haven't had a good run at 3rd place which would've significantly increased our chances of success.

I thought we were heading that way but form has fallen away. If we'd carried on Mellon's 2 points per game from when I started this thread, including beating Bromley, then we'd only be 3 points behind them with 8 to play. But I think the gap is too big to the top 3 now without a serious upturn in form.

My prediction is that we'll be 5th or 6th, but it looks like it'll be really tight so could be anywhere from 4th to out of it completely.

Thought I'd have another look at the form table seeing as we're on a bad run with no win in the last 3. Despite that we've not been too badly affected when it comes to league position.

Over the last 4 games, only Barnet (3rd), Aldershot (4th) and Halifax (5th) are in the top 7 of the form table out of the play off contenders. Solihull are 8th and the rest are miles off including us unfortunately... Bromley (15th), Oldham (16th), Gateshead (18th) and Altrincham (22nd)

Over the last 10 games, only Aldershot (4th) and Gateshead (6th) are in the top 7 of the form table. Barnet (9th), Halifax (10th), Solihull (11th), Oldham (14th), Altrincham (16th) and Bromley (18th).

When looking at the 4, 6, 8 and 10 game form tables, only Aldershot are in the top 7 for all of them (4th, 5th, 2nd and 4th respectively). They're the only truly consistent team over that time, others have had good runs over a smaller number of games.

I'm going to do that thing that loads of people hate... put a positive spin on things!  Putting the quality of football aside, there's nothing in that data that suggests we're at serious risk of dropping out of the play offs. Purely because almost all the other teams are having equally iffy runs. So it still looks like there's every chance we'll be in the play offs. Then you look at the potential opposition and there's no one there that you'd expect would blow us away - even the best form team Aldershot only just edged us and we were absolutely woeful.

I'd imagine that Mellon is looking at the end of the season as 8 build up games before a short end of season cup competition. And the only things he's bothered about achieving in that time are 1) enough points to make sure we're in the cup comp and 2) win the cup competition by whatever means necessary.

2 hours ago, BP1960 said:

 

If Frank produced products like we saw yesterday he'd go bankrupt, he didn't make his fortune with shoddy workmanship, which is unfortunately what we see on the field of play.

He also didn’t build his business into a big success in a few months. It would have taken time, wrong turns, ups and downs. 

2 minutes ago, Frankly Mr Shankly said:

Keep

 

Hudson

Hobson

Raglan

Kitching

Sutton

Conlon

Green

Hammond

Norwood

Fondop (Only if we don’t go up)

Sheron (as a bench option only)

Not renewed

 

Tollitt

Cuoto 

Gardner

Dickenson

Windass

Hogan
Hope

try to move on in loan or transfer

 

Norman

Ward

Lundstrum

Sheron

Reid

Nuttall

Willoughby

 

Jettison into the nearest orbiting planet 

 

McGahey

 

Shopping list

 

2 strikers, one with pace.

2 wingers, one of which can play left wing back

2 centre midfielders, one of which can tackle / holding midfielder

1 right back or right wing back

any others can be loanees.

 

Agree with almost all of this except Kitch. I’d make available. I might be being harsh because that’s based on the last few weeks. He might have a knock or it could be to do with the Reid situation but I’m not convinced he’s dynamic enough for the role he’s currently being asked to play. 
 

I was going to say release but I looked it up and he’s contracted til next season. I was also surprised to read he’s only 28! I assumed he was older. 
 

We need a squad next season that has flexibility and variety. We don’t have that now. 

20 minutes ago, oafc1955 said:

These are a few comments from impartial Shots fans to put that performance into context…….

 

 

Oldham were a disgrace and got everything they deserved. Very little attempt to actually play football, constant feigning injury, taking players out off the ball. God help their fans, watching that crap every week!

 

Was expecting a really hard close fought game but shocked at how bad Oldham were, i'd be really pissed off if i'd made that trip down to watch my team not even try to play football, surely they can't usually play like that? they're 5th ffs?

 

Oldham one of the poorest teams at the Rec this season. Goalkeeper superb and their back 3 was resilient but they offered nothing in attack

 

If I was their coach Id be mortified with the goals and how they let us score and played into our hands. The physical stuff didnt work and backfired as they dived in all over the pitch and yet marked space for the goals. If I was them id get over to the Med for an intense sweat camp for a solid few days as they are clearly carrying to much weight and bulk. 

 

Oldham were absolutely pathetic today but if you fast forward 7 weeks and we’re playing them at home in a playoff game they would be Bayern Munich in disguise whereas today they would have lost to a team of pissed giraffes! 

 

Oldham were very disappointing because

 

1. They didn't really have a game plan.

 

2. And even if they did, the Shots never gave them enough time or space to execute it.

 

Can't see Oldham winning at Halifax if they play like they did yesterday, they looked one of the worst teams we've played this season, imagine travelling half the country as an Oldham fan to watch that! 

They’re accurate in how badly we played yesterday but they lost 5-0 at home to fylde the other week so should have some idea of how inconsistent all teams are in this league bar Chesterfield and Oxford!

48 minutes ago, LightDN123 said:

Kitch has been asked to carry us all season, I’ll let him off. 

I don’t know why his form has dropped but it has. He now rarely tries to go outside and his crossing and set pieces are ineffective. Aldershot gave him room yesterday but he still offered little. 
 

But prior to the last few weeks he’s been one of our most important players. If he was on form on one side and Green hadn’t got injured on the other side then we’d be looking a lot better. 
 

I don’t think he’ll be here next season though. We need young dynamic players down both flanks. Ones who can play 352/343 or in a back 4. 

6 minutes ago, LightDN123 said:

Disagree. The following players have all proved they are capable to fight at the top end of the NL. 
 

You will notice a clear lack of width, pace and creativity in the below, which is the major issue. 
 

Hudson

Kitching

Hogan

Hobson

Raglan

 

Conlon

Lundy

Gardner 

 

Norwood

Garner

Fondop

Dallas 

And unfortunately the one wide player on that list has had his form drop off a cliff in the last few weeks. 

I do agree that we’ve not signed in a couple of key areas but for me the blame lies with the summer recruitment team which I believe was Unsworth and Thompson. Yes these areas could have been addressed since Mellon came in however it is possible that the right players haven’t been available for the right money. So we signed a young loan and a young permanent to right back and midfield. 
 

No manager will ever get 100% of signings right so before writing off recruitment under Mellon I’m happy for him to have a summer moving players on and bringing in better quality into the first team.