Swindon Town (A) League One, Tue Nov 24th, 7.45pm

[otiswfc]

How long does cook have left on his deal???

6 month's or around 30 more appearance's 25 of those as substitute,

[JonnyOwen]

Bizarre game, should have won but individual mistakes and odd line up decisions lost this one. Cook literally did nothing all game except make a few neat passes - I have no fudge clue how he started of Milan or Morris, so weird. Play one of those two and maybe we win the game, all of our play went through the right hand side through Forde (Who was our best player by a ways) or through Sawyers.

Still should have won, but some lazy finishing with some ballooning efforts on goal and one pass to many really scuppering our chances. It was almost like at times in the first half that we weren't just trying to score, but trying to score in a fancy and nice looking way by either belting it or playing Barca esc passing moves. It was no surprise to me that our goal from our first effort where Tom had a cool head and placed it in. No-one to blame but ourselves really, no time to feel sorry for ourselves, got to pick ourselves up and give Bradford the hammering we have deserved out of the last 2 games.

[IHTC.]

How long does cook have left on his deal???

End of the season :( , even if it was next week it would be too long.

[BathSaddler]

How long does cook have left on his deal???

Too long, but probably the end of the current season. He can then buzz off to Hartlepool or Accrington Stanley.

[Sadders]

Walsall do attract some funny onions.

1) The aim from this position, regardless of the start to the season is to scrape 6th place on the final day.
2) With that in mind, a team finishing 6th can actually have periods in the season of 1 win in 8, or 3 wins in 12 - especially with our start.
3) Swindon were always going to have an answer tonight after the Fleetwood result and winning their last home game.
4) Anyone that expected or still expects us to get automatically promoted is insane, it was obvious after slow starts that Wigan, Coventry and Posh would have the budgets to go and sign X players in January or loan players in between - to a degree, finishing in the top 2 is out of our hands.

The teams with good budgets and valid expectations are coming on strongly now - with a tough run ahead of us, lets see if we are within touching distance of 8th after January with Tom, Romaine and Rico intact.



6th would represent a brillant achievement all being said and done....

Especially when half of you had Smith down for the sack by this point in the season...

Enjoy the ride and GET BEHIND THEM. Poor/awful results will happen.

We are as good as anyone in this league.

Bonser needs to stick his ond in his pocket and get a couple of quality players in key positions , that is all.

If we are as good as anyone then why do we need another couple of quality players? We need them because our team is currently doing well and is very good, but not good enough to fulfil the hopes of excited fans with heightened expectations.

Will Jeff get the players in? - No.

Will we get automatically promoted? - No, never ^ because of the above.

And there you have just answered your own question, unfortunately.

We are as good as anyone in the league on our day, fortunately we are what we are as a club and over a 46 game season, other teams will have 'days' more consistently. Such is life with a club of this fan base and a chairman that isn't a foreign oil merchant who will happily lose £20m on a project like us.

[moaning saddler]

Walsall do attract some funny onions.

1) The aim from this position, regardless of the start to the season is to scrape 6th place on the final day.
2) With that in mind, a team finishing 6th can actually have periods in the season of 1 win in 8, or 3 wins in 12 - especially with our start.
3) Swindon were always going to have an answer tonight after the Fleetwood result and winning their last home game.
4) Anyone that expected or still expects us to get automatically promoted is insane, it was obvious after slow starts that Wigan, Coventry and Posh would have the budgets to go and sign X players in January or loan players in between - to a degree, finishing in the top 2 is out of our hands.

The teams with good budgets and valid expectations are coming on strongly now - with a tough run ahead of us, lets see if we are within touching distance of 8th after January with Tom, Romaine and Rico intact.



6th would represent a brillant achievement all being said and done....

Especially when half of you had Smith down for the sack by this point in the season...

Enjoy the ride and GET BEHIND THEM. Poor/awful results will happen.

We are as good as anyone in this league.

Bonser needs to stick his ond in his pocket and get a couple of quality players in key positions , that is all.

If we are as good as anyone then why do we need another couple of quality players? We need them because our team is currently doing well and is very good, but not good enough to fulfil the hopes of excited fans with heightened expectations.

Will Jeff get the players in? - No.

Will we get automatically promoted? - No, never ^ because of the above.

And there you have just answered your own question, unfortunately.

We are as good as anyone in the league on our day, fortunately we are what we are as a club and over a 46 game season, other teams will have 'days' more consistently. Such is life with a club of this fan base and a chairman that isn't a foreign oil merchant who will happily lose £20m on a project like us.

Is it because other teams will be looking to get better quality players in the transfer window, Tone?

[sallian]

We keep on blowing it when there are chances to climb or consolidate...I didn't think we would win after the failure to win the Sheff Utd. game, but there is much less excuse against relegation zone sides.

Still we are struggling in most games and struggling to score and defence isn't as good as it was earlier on....all the other teams now have caught up and we are fading away.

Dean Smith said we need to stay at the top, but still looks like the attacking formation is wrong and leaving the attack all on the bench...

Regardless of bigger budgets, crowds and stronger teams on paper.....still think with better decision making and strategy we would have been on top by a few points, but now I think we will do well to make 5th or 6th position.

Makes me laugh when people say we can't win them all etc... We are nowhere near winning them all! We've only won half our games and only won 1 of the last 4, we are leaking goals and not scoring many and are struggling against all teams.

Possession isn't worth two dead flies if we are only scoring one or two goals at most and often conceding the same.

How much do the manager and players want it? If they really want it they need to be ruthless and concentrate and be determined like psychos. Finishing outside of the play-offs will be a big failure when could have finished in top 2.

Baxendale wasted big time, just like Grimes wasted last season.....but why leave Lalkovic and Morris out when we are struggling to score goals? Seems we are determined to undo what we build all the time.

[moaning saddler]

You don't always get what you deserve in football....I know how Southampton must have felt when they left Bescot a few years back after losing 1-0 after dominating the game!! As for the team selection Dean must have felt the 11 chosen would do the job and he could have been right looking at the stats. 60% possession,19 shots and 11 corners!! Listening to the commentary I got the impression that two of our better chances fell to Evans who missed the target...now he is a very good player so I suppose all we can say is that it happens to the best of players sometimes. I do hope we can bounce back against Bradford and the Shrews...UTS .]

The difference between Southampton leaving the Bonks'sssss with nothing and us leaving the County Ground tonight was that Walker made "several fantastic/miraculous saves", and that Butler "was immense" against Saints, whereas the Swindon goalie tonight was hardly called into anything beyond routine action - his main task being to retrieve umpteen wayward Saddlers shots from behind his goal - and their defence didn't really need to make any heroic last stands - for the most part, they merely had to remain upright while we contrived to discover new ways of avoiding hitting the target.

[Welsh_Saddler]

As my old Uncle would have said if he'd been there...."We wuz robbed". :evil:

Swindon's opening goal looked offside by about a country mile. There were three of their players virtually goal-hanging, but perhaps they weren't "interfering with play" - I'll see the video replay with interest. Tom's goal was sheer class, he looked to have over-run things slightly but managed to slot the ball neatly in the corner despite the attentions of two of his marking thugs, which brings me on to the Swindon Town all-in wrestling team........

Honestly, what do all-in wrestlers have to do to get their marching orders these days? Swindon had 5 players booked, each one for the offence of physically (and blatantly) manhandling a Walsall player to the ground. There was honestly only one team trying to play football at the County Ground tonight, and it must stick in Dean Smith's craw that we lost to a collection of gorillas who weren't even trying to disguise their actions. Hey ho.

On team selection I was as surprised as anyone to find out that Morris and Lalkovic had been reduced to the bench, but I assumed that Deano made his choices after possibly under-estimating the opposition (who had been thumped 5-1 only 3 days earlier).

Positives - outstanding performances from Rico Henry, Jason Demetriou, Tom Bradshaw and the defensive powerhouse that is Chambers and O'Connor.

Negatives - Romaine Sawyers - NOT because of his play which was a joy to watch at times, but for the position he chose (or was instructed) to play. He was virtually playing at right-back for a lot of the game, and his talents are far better utilised further upfield assisting or scoring. The other constant minus point for us, I felt, was that we hardly won ANY headers, and one of Swindon's frequently employed tactics was the hoof ball for an onwards header to set up an attack, and to be fair it usually paid off for them. We didn't have the same success rate, largely because any lofted ball to Bradshaw saw him left sprawling on the turf following the attentions of his marker(s).

The social positive of the evening (in addition to accompanying my good friend chestersaddler to the game) was to meet belgian saddler for the first time, with other sensible UTS-ers in the "Merlin" pub pre-match. Great bunch of lads.

So, a good performance from us which didn't bring the right result this time. That's 3 games I've seen this season, which have resulted in 1 draw and 2 defeats - I obviously jinx them......onwards and upwards to welcome Bratfut on Saturday - UTS !!! :D

[Mazza01]

Our resistance to invest in a striker will always come back to haunt us over a long season! UTS

[PT]

We've bounced back well from disappointment so far this season so hope that we can do the same on Saturday and next Tuesday.

The lop-sided nature is the squad assembled in the summer hasn't restricted us as much as I though it would, but occasionally it has popped up and hurt us. You look at last night's team and the options on the bench and there's not a lot of variety in terms of a type of player that can add something a bit different. This season Smith has changed the formation around to good effect but that is just using the same type of players in a different system rather than having a different type.

I think Manset was meant to be that kind of option for us but didn't work out (though at times having his big physical presence definitely helped us find a different way - have a look at the build up to the goal at home to Bristol City - a big diagonal that he bullied his way into winning before Sawyers sublime finish). Our goalscorer against Chesterfield demonstrates that sometimes politely tapping on the door for 90 minutes isn't enough.

Like I say, we've bounced back well so far this year. Let's do it again.

[NEWPORT SADDLERS DAD]

On Saturday Morris had a bit of an off game.All the more reason to start him last night.If Deano thinks he can rotate his squad and not play his best team he is wrong.Last Saturdays starting line up would have won last night.And last but not least Flanagan shouldn't be anywhere near the fist team he simply isn't good enough.

[Mazza01]

Kind of agree I can't imagine for one moment that Cov, Gillingham or Burton fielded weakened teams last night?

Lesson learnt hopefully

UTS

[maximus]

We keep on blowing it when there are chances to climb or consolidate...I didn't think we would win after the failure to win the Sheff Utd. game, but there is much less excuse against relegation zone sides.

Still we are struggling in most games and struggling to score and defence isn't as good as it was earlier on....all the other teams now have caught up and we are fading away.

Dean Smith said we need to stay at the top, but still looks like the attacking formation is wrong and leaving the attack all on the bench...

Regardless of bigger budgets, crowds and stronger teams on paper.....still think with better decision making and strategy we would have been on top by a few points, but now I think we will do well to make 5th or 6th position.

Makes me laugh when people say we can't win them all etc... We are nowhere near winning them all! We've only won half our games and only won 1 of the last 4, we are leaking goals and not scoring many and are struggling against all teams.

Possession isn't worth two dead flies if we are only scoring one or two goals at most and often conceding the same.

How much do the manager and players want it? If they really want it they need to be ruthless and concentrate and be determined like psychos. Finishing outside of the play-offs will be a big failure when could have finished in top 2.

Baxendale wasted big time, just like Grimes wasted last season.....but why leave Lalkovic and Morris out when we are struggling to score goals? Seems we are determined to undo what we build all the time.

Morning Sound-Out !

[Aldridge_saddler]

Starting to think if Milan and Morris don't play we should revert to 3-5-2.

I am told that Scunthorpe away Cook played very well, why not utilise this again?

Delighted that Bradshaw scored again.

Can someone explain to me the tactical advantage of bringing Flanagan on was?

[Mazza01]

Starting to think if Milan and Morris don't play we should revert to 3-5-2.

I am told that Scunthorpe away Cook played very well, why not utilise this again?

Delighted that Bradshaw scored again.

Can someone explain to me the tactical advantage of bringing Flanagan on was?

I am guessing it was to allow Sawyers to push forward.

[NortonSaddler]

One of our biggest downfalls that has been consistent over Dean Smiths reign is our inability to be dangerous from set-pieces. This plays into the hands of the opposition and swindon plus many teams such as sheff utd, chesterfield and bury have all utilised this season. With our neat passing play that sometimes is unstoppable, teams realise the best way to contain us it to simply kick lumps into us, complete 100s of niggly fouls and to climb all over bradshaw knowing that we'll do absolutely nothing from the resulting set-piece. Therefore, a common tactic of many teams, such as swindon, is to foul and foul with the knowledge that the ref wont book em until theyve either snapped our players leg or its that players 10th foul.

Including corners, we had 28 set pieces last night. Teams like preston last year would have scored 5 with that many set-pieces. Yet we didnt look like scoring one. It generally does feel like the attacks over when we have a set piece. Often our set-pieces result in a dangerous break away for the opposing team.

If we are to make the play-offs this year, we need to improve massively on set-pieces.

Would also just like to have a quick word on the dire refereeing last night. What does it take for us to get any sort of protection from the ref? We should of had a peno, looked blatant from where i was. They should have had two sent off. One for takin down bradshaw on the edge of the box when he last man (the same defender who fouled tom for the penalty shout first half). The other player was already on a yellow and then kicked the ball at rico after rico had being fouled. Could of sworn kicking the ball away after the red has stopped play is a yellow, especially when its kicked in anger at an opposition player whos on the floor. I havent seen cooks "goal" but ive heard it was onside. And lost but not least the anount of niggly fouls that the team as a whole committed. They basically took it inturns to take out one our players every time we broke with the ref not lettin us take it quickly, therefore breakin up any sort of momentum we gain. Absolute rubbish from the ref and a dirty performance from swindon.

Rant over. Onwards and upwards

[sid swifty]

Just enjoy the shots on goal and attacking play while you can,remember some of the piss poor performances that i put up with before i stopped going to watch them,its the Alan Buckley era all over again,which was full of 4-3,3-2 wins and defeats...enjoy it while it lasts.

[Barren Flak]

One of our biggest downfalls that has been consistent over Dean Smiths reign is our inability to be dangerous from set-pieces. This plays into the hands of the opposition and swindon plus many teams such as sheff utd, chesterfield and bury have all utilised this season. With our neat passing play that sometimes is unstoppable, teams realise the best way to contain us it to simply kick lumps into us, complete 100s of niggly fouls and to climb all over bradshaw knowing that we'll do absolutely nothing from the resulting set-piece. Therefore, a common tactic of many teams, such as swindon, is to foul and foul with the knowledge that the ref wont book em until theyve either snapped our players leg or its that players 10th foul.

Including corners, we had 28 set pieces last night. Teams like preston last year would have scored 5 with that many set-pieces. Yet we didnt look like scoring one. It generally does feel like the attacks over when we have a set piece. Often our set-pieces result in a dangerous break away for the opposing team.

If we are to make the play-offs this year, we need to improve massively on set-pieces.

Would also just like to have a quick word on the dire refereeing last night. What does it take for us to get any sort of protection from the ref? We should of had a peno, looked blatant from where i was. They should have had two sent off. One for takin down bradshaw on the edge of the box when he last man (the same defender who fouled tom for the penalty shout first half). The other player was already on a yellow and then kicked the ball at rico after rico had being fouled. Could of sworn kicking the ball away after the red has stopped play is a yellow, especially when its kicked in anger at an opposition player whos on the floor. I havent seen cooks "goal" but ive heard it was onside. And lost but not least the anount of niggly fouls that the team as a whole committed. They basically took it inturns to take out one our players every time we broke with the ref not lettin us take it quickly, therefore breakin up any sort of momentum we gain. Absolute rubbish from the ref and a dirty performance from swindon.

Rant over. Onwards and upwards

I'm with you on this.

We don't need anything fancy. We simply need to be a threat at set-pieces and corners. At the very least to perhaps put opposition defenders in two-minds as whether to break play down with a niggly foul or five.

We seem to have improved our defensive frailty against set plays and corners, so I struggle to understand how the same personnel can't do likewise when attacking.

I think we'd have got more points out of the games against Bury, Crewe, Chesterfield and more recently Sheffield and Swindon with a dead-ball threat.

Matt Preston seems more of an attacking threat from defence, shame he's prove a tad unreliable as part of the back line.

[belgiansaddler]

Strange night. Great to see a few people in merlin old and new. Though one of the new ones I met was actually old, top man Welsh :D was really a pleasure to meet you and don't forget to get me same hat as yours nitted :mrgreen:

Match was ridiculous. Rarely seen us dominate a match so much. Spoke to loads of decent Swindon after match at station and they all said how on earth did they win that? In their position they scrapped out a result they didn't deserve. We have done that often enough in the past so fair enough.

Find it ridiculous people going overboard blaming smith. Ok I agree playing that completely useless tosspot cook was a bit bizarre. But we absolutely mullered them for 88 minutes. Unfortunately they scored twice in the other 2. Just one of those days.

[belgiansaddler]

On a more important note it was first away match I have been to in last 4 decades that Kev leach wasn't there. Heard he is unwell in hospital. I don't think he reads UTS but would just like to say all the best fella hope you get well soon. Walsall legend

[sid swifty]

On a more important note it was first away match I have been to in last 4 decades that Kev leach wasn't there. Heard he is unwell in hospital. I don't think he reads UTS but would just like to say all the best fella hope you get well soon. Walsall legend

My son saw him in Morrisons a few months ago and said he really had problems walking,hope you're well leachy,if you read up the saddlers kev,get in touch mate.

[BarnsleySaddler]

We seem to have difficulty in in playing teams at the bottom of the table whereas against those towards the top we seem to be better. This is not just this season but in seasons gone by as well. Wonder why, is it cos we expect to beat them and come up short?

[SWS1]

It's all been said on here already. I would have been there but for an, ahem, upset stomach. Disappointed doesn't quite match my mood after following what appeared to be (and is confirmed as) an excellent footballing performance with no outcome. I'll confine my ire to the referee. What can we do about these wallies not protecting our players? There must be something the management can do to register a protest or, say, request the "panel" to have a look at the replays. Surely?
Yellow cards mean little when the opposition cynically share the fouls around (under management orders? I thought Ling was a mate of Smith's - mind you, that doesn't mean he ain't as cynical as a lot of other managers, and all that matters is results).
Smith said, on the BBC

"First half we weren't clinical, as we weren't on Saturday, but I feel I should get on the phone and call the police and get somebody arrested for this result".

Well, it appears they could start with arresting the booger in the black (or whatever colour the turd was wearing last night). :evil:

Rant over.
For the time being.
I'll be there for Bratfud. :D

[chestersaddler]

Walsall do attract some funny onions.

1) The aim from this position, regardless of the start to the season is to scrape 6th place on the final day.
2) With that in mind, a team finishing 6th can actually have periods in the season of 1 win in 8, or 3 wins in 12 - especially with our start.
3) Swindon were always going to have an answer tonight after the Fleetwood result and winning their last home game.
4) Anyone that expected or still expects us to get automatically promoted is insane, it was obvious after slow starts that Wigan, Coventry and Posh would have the budgets to go and sign X players in January or loan players in between - to a degree, finishing in the top 2 is out of our hands.

The teams with good budgets and valid expectations are coming on strongly now - with a tough run ahead of us, lets see if we are within touching distance of 8th after January with Tom, Romaine and Rico intact.



6th would represent a brillant achievement all being said and done....

Especially when half of you had Smith down for the sack by this point in the season...

Enjoy the ride and GET BEHIND THEM. Poor/awful results will happen.

We are as good as anyone in this league.

Bonser needs to stick his ond in his pocket and get a couple of quality players in key positions , that is all.

If we are as good as anyone then why do we need another couple of quality players? We need them because our team is currently doing well and is very good, but not good enough to fulfil the hopes of excited fans with heightened expectations.

Two reasons. 1. As Moaning replied, because others will strengthen and 2. because in order to go up automatically, we need to be better than the others, not just as good as. We have a very good squad which just needs a couple of additions - a better position than we have been in for many years at this level. I do not think it is about expectations, more about taking what is a realistic opportunity in the current circumstances

Will Jeff get the players in? - No.

Why wouldn't Uncle Jeef put his ond in his pocket given the rewards that await for what would be a modest outlay (compared to what he will eventually receive for Bradshaw and Henry)?

Will we get automatically promoted? - No, never ^ because of the above.

I refer you to my post on the other thread - we split Fulham and Manchester City a few years back - what's the difference now?

And there you have just answered your own question, unfortunately.

I didn't ask a question :wink: :?

We are as good as anyone in the league on our day, fortunately we are what we are as a club and over a 46 game season, other teams will have 'days' more consistently. Such is life with a club of this fan base and a chairman that isn't a foreign oil merchant who will happily lose £20m on a project like us.

[funk_hits_the_fan]

We keep on blowing it when there are chances to climb or consolidate...I didn't think we would win after the failure to win the Sheff Utd. game, but there is much less excuse against relegation zone sides.

Still we are struggling in most games and struggling to score and defence isn't as good as it was earlier on....all the other teams now have caught up and we are fading away.

Dean Smith said we need to stay at the top, but still looks like the attacking formation is wrong and leaving the attack all on the bench...

Regardless of bigger budgets, crowds and stronger teams on paper.....still think with better decision making and strategy we would have been on top by a few points, but now I think we will do well to make 5th or 6th position.

Makes me laugh when people say we can't win them all etc... We are nowhere near winning them all! We've only won half our games and only won 1 of the last 4, we are leaking goals and not scoring many and are struggling against all teams.

Possession isn't worth two dead flies if we are only scoring one or two goals at most and often conceding the same.

How much do the manager and players want it? If they really want it they need to be ruthless and concentrate and be determined like psychos. Finishing outside of the play-offs will be a big failure when could have finished in top 2.

Baxendale wasted big time, just like Grimes wasted last season.....but why leave Lalkovic and Morris out when we are struggling to score goals? Seems we are determined to undo what we build all the time.

Morning Sound-Out !

Afternoon PINNACLE :roll:

[Bee_Leevers]

Feeling very deflated like a lot of fellow Saddlers today but one thing we can't do is let negativity creep in. We need to stick by the team regardless and put all our efforts into supporting the lads against Bradford. We are still 3rd with a game in hand so let's not be too rash with our comments.

How many did we take does anyone know?

[Guest]

http://youtu.be/uVCOaPxTUMY

[scott_powell]

A few things ...

There goal WASN'T offside

Flanagan isn't good enough.

Cook offers nothing

Smith made an error in not bringing Lalkovic and Morris on sooner.

We move on!
UTS!

[otiswfc]

Feeling very deflated like a lot of fellow Saddlers today but one thing we can't do is let negativity creep in. We need to stick by the team regardless and put all our efforts into supporting the lads against Bradford. We are still 3rd with a game in hand so let's not be too rash with our comments.

How many did we take does anyone know?

282 our away support so far this season is barclays
Even though that's more than I expected.
I've noticed our potentially big following to Coventry on January 9th might not happen as it's fa cup 3Rd day hopefully we are going to a big premier league club that day instead.