Bath City at Home - 28th February 2023

[Curtis]

It looks like this will be a finely balanced match.

Bath have been in good form despite losing to a late goal at home to Tonbridge on Saturday, & seem to be a good footballing side that have been playing well on 3G surfaces. On the downside for them, they appear to have a very thin squad & this will be their sixth match in three weeks.

Despite our 5-1 defeat in the away fixture in August, we have good reason to be optimistic as we have won our last three home league fixtures against them & are coming off an excellent win at St Albans.

Prediction : a late goal against them in the last 10-15 minutes as they run out of steam, and hopefully it will be a winner.

[Reading Rebel]

Bath City's top marksman Cody Cooke scored a hat trick in the 5-1 battering they gave us earlier in the season.

He didn't play Saturday so hopefully he won't be available tomorrow night.

Both reams like to play football so should be an exciting encounter with the rebels coming out on top.

[Reading Rebel]

Team selection wise there could be some tired legs after playing on a sand pit so I would freshen it up a bit.

[Ian g f]

I watched their managers interview after their defeat on Saturday apparently they have only 11 fit players 

[Reading Rebel]

2 hours ago, Ian g f said:

I watched their managers interview after their defeat on Saturday apparently they have only 11 fit players 

That's what they all say after a defeat 😏

[Irishadrian]

Disappointing but in some ways unsurprising Bath have lost just one of their last 6 away league games and tonight was their third consecutive away win   Once again no serious damage done by other results Chippenham drew and H&R lost

 Max points from our two early March games with Hungerford and Concord become more important Essential imo as the season winds down.

Edited February 28, 2023 by Irishadrian

[GlenSTFC]

How disappointing was that? I’m sure Scott will hold his hands up (pun unfortunately intended…) but what were you thinking? Just let the ball in, ok we’re 0-1 down but at least we’d have a chance with 11 players. We just didn’t have much of an attacking threat and it felt like we could play all night and not score. Bath had nothing really to play for and we had just come off the back of an excellent win so it’s absolutely gutting to watch that performance. Temi rightly man or the match as he must have made 3 or 4 goal opportunity tackles and clearances, plus he was rallying the troops and showed some passion which was sadly lacking in others.

Edited February 28, 2023 by GlenSTFC

[Irishadrian]

As a result of tonights game no team in our league  has a worse GD!

[Curtis]

Well that wasn’t very good!

[bonjour]

I came away from the ground fuming last night. I watch the rebels home and away and will continue to do so until my last breath.

All i can say is how many more times this season are we going to gift the opposition a victory when they come to Arbour Park.

I will await HR for a more level headed report.

[Scott Davies]

If I had time to think then I would have just let the ball go in, but the problem is that you don’t have time to think. It’s just pure instinct.

I’ll always be honest, whether it’s good or bad, and I think last night was a huge opportunity missed. We weren’t anywhere near our best in the first half but still comfortably the better side with the chances created/missed.

If someone had said to us on Friday that we will win and lose one against St Albans and Bath then we would have taken it. People would look at two draws in those games and say we have stopped the rot, but we obviously a point better off by getting the one win.

My biggest frustration is that two back to back wins would have seen us in a really comfortable position going into the weekend. We’ve missed massive opportunities against Dover, Welling and Bath now in the last 3 home games, and I think that’ll come across in the interview I did.

I apologised to the group for my part to play in what made it a difficult night thereafter, but as I said above, back pedalling, desperate for the ball not to hit the net, instinctively you react in a way that has ultimately cost us but it’s not like I stood there and thought I’m going to handball this.

Apologies for what was a disappointing night, which I expected a lot more from. On to Saturday where we can hopefully cause an upset. 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Scott Davies

[Reading Rebel]

What to make of the game.

The first 45 minutes was probably the worst half of football that I've seen in a long time.

Both sides were guilty of not being able to pass the ball over a few yards to a fellow team mate.

We should have taken the lead when the best chance of the half fell to Matt Burgess who only had the keeper to beat but shot wide with the keeper possibly getting a hand to the ball.

Other than that it was a half to forget.

Second half was marginally better but ended as a real contest when we lost possession of the ball in our own half, not sure if it was a foul or we just lost the ball, which resulted in a handball on the goal line and Bath scoring from the penalty.

We then pushed forward in search of the equalizer resulting in being caught on the break and but for some heroic defending the score could have been a lot worse.

The scoreline sounds like a thumping but on the night Bath were no great shakes and imo were there for the taking but unfortunately we were just as poor with the sending off the deciding factor on the night.

My honest opinion is that I think we fell into the trap of playing virtually the same 11 players that put in such a sterling performance against St Albans on Saturday.

By our own admission that game took a lot out of the players and with only a short time to recover I was fully expecting us to utilize the squad and make at least 3 or 4 changes in the knowledge that we have an even tougher game coming up against Worthing on Saturday. 

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Reading Rebel

[Footyfan007]

First half Bath where there for the taking and where not offering much, Slough created 2 great scoring opportunities that stood out for me, one of them goes in Slough win this game imo.
The sending of for Slough definitely a natural reaction, which anyone who has played will know that. 

Have to say Temi was awesome last night. 

 

[3spirit]

5 minutes ago, Reading Rebel said:

What to make of the game.

The first 45 minutes was probably the worst half of football that I've seen in a long time.

Both sides were guilty of not being able to pass the ball over a few yards to a fellow team mate.

We should have taken the lead when the best chance of the half fell to Matt Burgess who only had the keeper to beat but shot wide with the keeper possibly getting a hand to the ball.

Other than that it was a half to forget.

Second half was marginally better but ended as a real contest when we lost possession of the ball in our own half, not sure if it was a foul or we just lost the ball, which resulted in a handball on the goal line and Bath scoring from the penalty.

We then pushed forward in search of the equalizer resulting in being caught on the break and but for some heroic defending the score could have been a lot worse.

The scoreline sounds like a thumping but on the night Bath were no great shakes and imo were there for the taking but unfortunately we were just as poor with the sending off the deciding factor on the night.

My honest opinion is that I think we fell into the trap of playing virtually the same 11 players that put in such a sterling performance against St Albans on Saturday.

By our own admission that game took a lot out of the players so I was fully expecting us to utilize the squad and make 3 or 4 changes with the knowledge that we have an even tougher game coming up against Worthing on Saturday. 

 

You could also argue that sometimes it's better to go again with a winning team.

I wasn't at the match but hope to be at the Worthing game. RR, who were our best 3 players on the night?

Getting to 0-0 at half time I was hopeful Slough could up their game second half but obviously the red card killed all that [though it doesn't always work that way].

The loss doesn't bother me but not scoring again does.

RR, did we get close to scoring in the second half?  Who was our best attacker on the night?

[Holyport Rebel]

1 hour ago, bonjour said:

I will await HR for a more level headed report.

 

 

Sorry Bonjour, I don't think I'm going to be able to give a "level headed" report to what occurred last night.

Probably best i don't make any comments. 

[Reading Rebel]

1 hour ago, bonjour said:

I came away from the ground fuming last night. I watch the rebels home and away and will continue to do so until my last breath.

All i can say is how many more times this season are we going to gift the opposition a victory when they come to Arbour Park.

I will await HR for a more level headed report.

Agree.

Another game at home where the opposition were not very good but come away with 3 points. 

[Reading Rebel]

38 minutes ago, Holyport Rebel said:

 

 

Sorry Bonjour, I don't think I'm going to be able to give a "level headed" report to what occurred last night.

Probably best i don't make any comments. 

I demand that you do a report HR 😉

I don't care if it's hot headed, level headed or what ever headed 😅

Edited March 1, 2023 by Reading Rebel

[bonjour]

Thank you HR.

If you don't mind could you refrain from making any predictions before Saturday's game.

COYR

[Reading Rebel]

56 minutes ago, 3spirit said:

You could also argue that sometimes it's better to go again with a winning team.

I wasn't at the match but hope to be at the Worthing game. RR, who were our best 3 players on the night?

Getting to 0-0 at half time I was hopeful Slough could up their game second half but obviously the red card killed all that [though it doesn't always work that way].

The loss doesn't bother me but not scoring again does.

RR, did we get close to scoring in the second half?  Who was our best attacker on the night?

Of course you could always argue that point of view, you could even quote 'hindsight is a wonderful thing' but in this case I don't think even that applies.

As I said by our own admission after Saturday's heroics players were out on their feet so using the squad and giving much needed game time to some players imo just seemed the thing to do.

Stand out players on the night were Temi Eweka and Matt Lench, which will come as no surprise to Bonjour 😏, a couple of others didn't do a lot wrong but in general most had an off night. 

I think the closest we came to scoring in the second half was a decent effort from Ogo apart from that not much else.

 

 

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Reading Rebel

[PaxtonLee]

Agree re Temi and Lench being our stand out players. Mo was bright from the bench, took players on and was positive. Just needs to add some end product.