Burnham tonight

[HorshamRebel]

As I'm travelling up from Brighton this afternoon (3:30ish) to get to the match, and with the fact that we've had over 2 inches of rain in the last few hours, can someone confirm that the match is still on tonight.

 

Cheers

[the optimist]

not much rain fell here

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

Smith Sweeney !!! Nbh logie murphy swift coyne Sinclair masala sonner burnell

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

1 down after 1 min haven't touched ball

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

It gets better smith injured on the day fanner signs for marlow as Jamie Jackson watches!!! Irony?

 

He's up!

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

Adam dickens gets away with a leg breaker?!

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

Swift free kick 1 1

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

Defensive screw up 2 1 down against run of play

[Don Juan DeMarcus]

And that's how it ended!!

[Cookham Rebel]

Tuesday night syndrome strikes again!!!

 

The officials were the worst I've seen but they can't be blamed for everything... We were poor and Burnham weren't much better, tonight was always going to boil down too who wanted to win more and unfortunately Burnham wanted it more than us... To only have 1 shot on target in 90 minutes and any team will struggle!!!

 

Like the last 2 seasons, we are to open playing 4-4-2 and I was surprised we switched when the 3-5-2 made us look better as a unit... The worrying thing, we lose Brown and Woozely at the back and Logie from the midfield holding role and the cohesion fades, with the squad we have that shouldn't happen... Yet again, the substitutions were made 20 minutes too late!!!

 

Anyway, 3 points are now a must against Fleet to build some momentum and consistency!!!

 

COME ON YOU REBELS!!!

[Tom]

I think we can all agree we have witnessed some pretty bad officiating at this level but tonight took the biscuit. I've lost count of how many players were booked, you'd have thought it was a blood bath though!

 

I don't think we played too bad in all honesty and were just victims of our injuries from Saturday. Playing with only one recognised centre back was going to be dodgy and I think in the 2nd half the defence did well to marshal Burnham's attack given Smith's injury.

 

My concern at the moment is that in the last 2 games after starting the season defensively strong is that 2 goals have been given away very early.

[Nathan]

At the risk of sounding negative:

 

We can blame the referee all we want tonight (and yes he was extremely poor), but let's not let that distract us from the fact that the team were extremely poor tonight as well.

 

The sooner we get a target striker to partner Sonner or Burnell up front the better. They are simply too similar, and having both of them up front together allows neither to play to their strengths. We could have been playing from now until next week and not have scored from open play. Yes, the partnership can (on occassion) work quite well. We saw that during the second half on Saturday. But what have we got when it clearly isn't working (like tonight)? More of the same (Ben Abbey). Charlie Mpi, on the brief occassion I have seen him play does look quite useful, which is one of the reasons I would like to see him more often, and not for 5 minutes at the end.

 

Both our away performances so far have been (at least for the second halves!) impressive. But the two home performances, quite frankly, leave an awful lot to be desired. That is most certainly not the sign of a team that is going to be promoted.

[Cookham Rebel]

I agree Nathan, can't blame the performance on the officials or the missing players, we have a big enough squad to cope!!!

 

Can see another frustrating season in the offing!!!

[readingrebel]

Fairly even first half with only a gifted free header from a simple cross seperating the two teams.

 

Second half I thought we played well, dominated most of the half and scored from a very good free kick from Swifty but yet again we shoot ourselves in the foot by gifting Burnham another goal from an elementary mistake by a defender thereby ruining a good comeback and hence 3 points were gifted to Burnham.

 

I have to say when we made the 2 subs IMO we should have brought Charlie Mpi on as well. I'm afraid, again IMO, he's not being given a fair crack of the whip. We were losing and needed something different up front and giving him just a few minutes to try and do something is just not on.

[Ian]

Yes we have a big squad but lets put tonight into context. Brown was out. Wooz was out. NBH doesn't look match fit in my opinion. We had to switch back to 4-4-2. We had a central midfielder playing centre back. Sweeney was playing his first game of the season after injury and Adam Martin has only just come back from long term injury.

 

The one area of disappointment I guess was not seeing Charlie Mpi given an opportunity to do something other than a few minutes at the end. Annoyingly St Newts and Rugby both lost so we missed the opportunity to catch up with them. Bedworth are now top five points ahead of us.

[BFR]

And in the battle at the top, Bedworth won at St Neots!

 

My first game of the season tonight, and one that won't live long in the memory.

 

As much as it was a surprise to see Michael Murphy back at the club in pre-season, and then listed amongst our squad for the season, we'd have benefited from him in the team/on the bench with Brown and Woozley injured. Any reason why he wasn't available tonight?

[Martin]

The first goal was sloppy but we were extremely unlucky and injuries have immediately cost us. Two first choice centre backs out and the keeper injured hampered us severely. Smith could hardly run or kick but second half he had nothing to do as we controlled the game. I think their winner came as logie was caught in two minds. He normally would have rolled it back to the keeper to smash away but couldn't and that hesitation cost us dear.

[Cookham Rebel]

Very valid post Martin... Hate losing!!!

 

I just wish we would stick to a system and then change during the game if it's not working... Sweeney, Logie and NBH could easily have played as the 3 centre backs last night with Coyle anchoring the midfield... How we go from being so potent in attack 1 game to not being able to hit a barn door the next is a mystery!!!

 

[Ian]

How we go from being so potent in attack 1 game to not being able to hit a barn door the next is a mystery!!!

 

Well you can't compare Chertsey and Burnham for a start. Chertsey have just come into this division and based on games so far are going to ship a lot of goals. Burham are a better team than Chertsey by some distance (no disrespect to Chertsey) and will always put that extra effort in a local derby. They've done this to us for the last three seasons.

[Martin]

I wouldn't overly worry about the attack. 8 goals in 4 games is a good return and i think we threaten all over the pitch.

 

Bear in mind that in addition to the injuries Sweeney and Martin were both forced to play last night being rushed back from injury. At this level you will occasionally struggle because of an injury crisis and last night many of our problems stemmed from this.

 

We played some good football controlling possession for long spells in the second half. But burnham are a big side and they got men behind the ball and had two rigid banks of four. I think they'll do well this season.

 

Dependig on the extent of the injuries we may have to look at getting a couple of loans in already.

 

Hopefully we will get back to winning ways Saturday. COYR