Daggers match thread

[football19]

Missed the game today,and was reliant on dans commentary,but must admit I fancied us for three points.Was surprised at the line-up,but my main concern is us persevering with 4-4-2.
We just get over-run in the middle,as today,who would be tucking in to central areas?,boco,linney or podge dropping in ??,
With the players we have,4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 would be more solid,as our extra striker just ends up doing Beatties running for him.
Being positive,think these lads can get us six wins,which I think will be enough,and start again next season --- keep the faith !!!!

[Reamer]

I've never booed at a football match in my life, Yonmon, but today after dags scored their second goal there was a spontaneous outcry of 'Rubbish' from the Clayton End, letting the players know exactly what the paying spectators thought of our defending. That's as it should be. Don't agree with your second paragraph about naming individuals who don't perform, we praise em when they play well, why not give em stick when they don't. Lots of us have probably played the game, albeit at a lower level and got a slating, it goes with the territory.
The ' keep the faith' and 'we're all in it together ' mentality thins a bit after watching a performance like today's. Having said that , I'll be there against Wimbledon, I've got two weeks to recover

PS thought the on pitch leader today was Boco (by example) but our senior players didn't seem able to respond

MOM - the guy who said 'Get Proccy on' after half an hour

[Greeny]

Agree it was a very poor performance yesterday but what good is booing, if you don't like what you see either leave or don't applaud , booing is for the baddies in pantomime.
and before anyone else says it , yes it was a pantomime yesterday but its been, gone today is another day .

[accybeme]

Originally Posted by Greeny

Agree it was a very poor performance yesterday but what good is booing, if you don't like what you see either leave or don't applaud , booing is for the baddies in pantomime.
and before anyone else says it , yes it was a pantomime yesterday but its been, gone today is another day .

the attendance was only 1031 yesterday telling fans to leave is not a good option,

[football19]

Must agree greeny,we know anybody can beat anybody in this division.You need all your players on song,if not,you will get beat.
Normally it's the young ones who dip in form around this time of the year,and the experienced players come to the front.
It seems the reverse is happening at the moment,the older ones need to step up to the mark,and the younger ones will follow

[shakermaker]

To say I was frustrated after the game yesterday would be an understatement and I must apologise to anyone who was within earshot of my expletives between Accrington and the journey home to Salford.

Put simply, everything went wrong. We started brightly and then petered out into a shameful mess.

Team selection - Laurence Wilson does not have a right foot yet was played at right back and was subsequently annihilated time and time again. Beattie was a dead weight, embarrassingly trudging around in a ten yard square, winning about 10% of the balls put to him and failing to hold it up when he did. We seem to be making a lot of people unhappy and making our own team worse in order to make space in the team for him.

Shape - I don't know what the instructions were for the left flank but needless to say it was a horror show. Boco started on the left but kept drifting inwards to a centre forward position, which meant him and Podge were going for the same passes - this meant our wide options were minimised. Not only was Podge doing the running for the oil tanker that is Beattie but was also covering Boco as he showed the positional sense of a bluebottle. Amond's injury meant that Boco was pushed up front which allowed him the free role in which he is best applied.
On the right, Lindfield seemed to be played as an inside forward but spent most of his time tracking back to help out the hapless Wilson. Lindfield worked hard but lost the ball often due to having no outlet.
When the ball was in the opposition's defending third we failed to close the ball down with any tenacity. Look at how the other team act when we have the ball on the edge of our box compared to how we do - we sit and wait for the ball to be played. This is criminal.
Neither Miller or Joyce imposed themselves on the game which meant we were overrun. When Dixon came on - stampeding through the middle and causing the Daggers all manner of problems - this difference was highlighted.

Individual errors - our marking was horrific at set-pieces, gifting free headers to the opposition with a cringing regularity.

Application - there was no hunger, fight or desire to win the game from any player on the park. That fact is the most disappointing as it is the only thing Stanley fans demand from their team. The only positive comment I have on this subject is the way Dixon and Clark played like they want to be in the team, well done you two.

Yesterday was a reality check. We did not turn the proverbial corner we all hoped we did on New Year's Day. We shouldn't need the petulance of a former manager returning to the ground in order to stir up some desire. If we play like this again, we're well on the way to getting relegated. Get another gate like that and I don't want to say where we'll be.

I feel for Leam as he has inherited a team with hardly any experience in it but he's going to have to pull something out of the bag this month.

[Redraine]

Great post, Shaker, but I must disagree with your comment that we showed no fight or desire to win the game. It's just that we weren't good enough!

[football19]

I can't believe we showed no fight, get out played ?,that happens,but there are a few fighters in our team.Looking at there team,they have some really good players,including Doe,who's a rock at cb for them.
Looks like there left winger kept cutting inside causing havoc.

[yonmon]

Originally Posted by Redraine

Great post, Shaker, but I must disagree with your comment that we showed no fight or desire to win the game. It's just that we weren't good enough!

Nail on the head Red !... We were worse than The Daggers in every department, worst of all in Midfield and in the 'lets win this one' area where the spirit and desire to succeed was so obviously missing. Then again Cameron Belford had little to do apart from pick the ball out of the net twice and boot the ball long and high to strikers who were SO inept on the day that the prospect of them scoring a goal was a distant possibility and allowed their Centre Backs to enjoy an extended Christmas Holiday !, so was the gap between he teams that wide after all ??...
Again I remember Sir Bobby Robson's oft quoted maxim...
'Score goals...win matches...win Trophys..... No goals...lose matches...get relegated '... Simplistic maybe, but seeming ever more relevant to life at The Crown , for where will the much-needed goals come from ?.....I am perplexed !... and must say that there is some crescendo in the squeaky murmurs emanating from my gluteal region !.

[FrankMoody]

Originally Posted by shakermaker

I feel for Leam as he has inherited a team with hardly any experience in it but he's going to have to pull something out of the bag this month.

Leam inherited a team that was mid table, still in the FA cup and trying to play some decent football. He has since added 3 players to the squad, changed the way we play and turned us into a pub team heading for a relegation dogfight

[football19]

When cook took over,we were on the fringes of the play-offs,but I genuinely believe it was proccys departure that unbalanced our team,and we have never replaced him.He added presence to the team,screened the back four,and generally led by example.
He may not have been everybody's cup of tea,but was very effective in all areas of the field and never went hiding.

[AccyMad]

Originally Posted by FrankMoody

Leam inherited a team that was mid table, still in the FA cup and trying to play some decent football. He has since added 3 players to the squad, changed the way we play and turned us into a pub team heading for a relegation dogfight

That is a very harsh comment, for a start the season was only 8 or 9 weeks old when cook left for greener pastures so our then mid table position was maybe a little misleading. Based on the 15 games cook led us into this season & the same number since he left that Leam has been in charge, their records are quite similar - we have won 1 less under leam but have lost 2 less & drawn 3 more than we did under paul cook. Ok, yesterday was a bit of a nightmare but there is still time for the lads to turn things round & i for one would rather have a manager who has the club at heart rather than one who cleared off as soon as the going got a bit tough despite all his cliches about wanting to mould his own team.

[Stevo]

Well,well, well, what a difference a game makes , as they say , unfortunately in our case for all the wrong reasons.
Yes I thought and hoped we had turned the corner in January and after the Chesterfield match , great EUREKA ...we had or seemed to have done!
I agree with Smobile's assessment over the coming 3 games ....in fact I felt that if we didn't get 3 points after the Plymouth game...which we didn't ,that would be it the dreaded relegation battle is looming....
Well now we have turned a corner....straight into a cul-de-sac...which is heading 1 way!!
I know and understand why everybody loves Leam and he is such a nice guy ...bla, bla , bla, BUT reality is NICE GUYS especially at manager level , don't cut it in this business, My most favourite manager of all time was Cloughie and HE certainly wasn't a nice guy with players...even now , Ferguson,and Wenger aren't nice guys...BUT they DO get results, and think back not too far NO WAY would you say COLEY was a nice manager , but by hell he DID get results!!!
Just taking the last game as a small example, the change of Amond caused SO MUCH disruption to the team,and let's face it , we haven't had a stable defence for quite some time now,so doing what he did, (LEAM) was stupid.
There is a HELL of a lot of work for him to do this month even if we are to survive in this league, I am in agreement with most on this forum that we NEED a LEADER someone to motive ALL the team, which even though I wasn't a great fan of Proccie, he DID manage to do however he also had the support of Winnard , and Hessey, who were both very vocal, and that is good for a team, it shows commitment, and desire....
the present captain Joyce does not seem to generate any motivation or leadership so Winnard at least should be made captain and GET the shirkers in the side to WORK..
If I were Leam I'd get ALL the team who Played (except Belford...poor guy) to go to watch how Morecambe cope with the Daggers...it's free,
and would be worthwhile to see what a difference it is!!!
Once again like Smobile says, I think this month WILL determine our fate...

[VALAIRIAN]

Originally Posted by football19

When cook took over,we were on the fringes of the play-offs,but I genuinely believe it was proccys departure that unbalanced our team,and we have never replaced him.He added presence to the team,screened the back four,and generally led by example.
He may not have been everybody's cup of tea,but was very effective in all areas of the field and never went hiding.

Got to say that you have that spot on...............

[Jeg Red]

Want to add my twopenneth on Stanley's current plight. Am not going to dwell too much on yesterday, which was awful. Last Tuesday's exult was good, however if we analyse the game it papers over the cracks, as despite a spirited performance, the only thing between us and defeat was a great goalkeeping display by a guy on his home debut and some bad luck on Chesterfield's part.

I'll repeat what I said over a month ago, for me, the manager just hasn't the experience or force of personality to take the team forward and we need to ace up to the fact we're in a real scrap retain our league status. There always seems to be one team who drops from mid table security and ends up in free fall - this year I fear that's us and unfortunately I've seen nowhere near enough in the last 6 weeks to suggest we'll scrap our way out.

I know Rob reads these posts and I'd say to the club hierarchy, what's Plan B as that's vital for continued success at a football club, as managers and players always move on, either upwards and onwards or as a result of not being deemed good enough. So just as football managers have scouting networks for players, are we doing enough to keep our eyes on potential successors - this is not disloyalty to current incumbents, it's good management practice. For example, I know that the FA Cup has given Macclesfield some publicity this weekend, but their manager has had success in his career, we're similar sized clubs with similar budgets, are people like him known to the directors running our club?

Retaining our league status is vital to our club and we need to all pull together to achieve this, and if we do, my plea to the hierarchy is that your job is to ensure we don't get into this position again as it's too close for comfort.