Haven't the foggiest what tonight's game plan was.
Started with high balls up to our No.9, with Dymond running all around the midfield.
Brought the substitutes on and continued with the high ball, this time to Coombes.
Then had Dymond and Jebb tripping over each other.
Personally thought the game was dross.
If we plan on persevering with Jebb, give him some game time from the off and build your team around him.
We are crying out for a midfielder with a footballing brain.
The ball was in the air longer than on the pitch.
First half was fast paced and we played some good stuff. Second was a joke, we was second to every ball and didn't really create anything and nearly threw it away when they burst through but blazed it over the bar.the only saving grace is that we never lost. Goldberg said "well see where we are after 10 games" and its looking mid table. Not sure what the attendance was but I thought only 350
On the positive side there was definitely more intent and endeavour than we showed in the second half on Saturday. However we were still not at the races for large parts of the evening and a better side might have made us pay for that. Simple passes were going astray and, once again, players ran up blind alleys and lost the ball when there was a pass on. It wasn't hard to see why Eastbourne haven't scored away from home this season but they did at least test our keeper and asked more questions than we did the longer the game went on.
Not surprised to see a few changes although some were enforced. We at least came out of the traps with a better attitude and Green probably should have scored from a corner early on. Our set pieces were still poor on the whole although the best two dead ball specialists were both on the bench. Also I can't quite fathom that, with three huge defenders and a big centre forward on the pitch, we decided to opt for some short corners?! Eastbourne were not a big side and we should have tested them in the air at every opportunity. Rooney seems to want the whole game to revolve around him and his distribution was well below par last night although he was not alone in that.
The first part of the second half was very poor (from both sides) and wouldn't have looked out of place over Danson Park on a Sunday morning to be honest! Simple mistakes being made all over the pitch and clearly a lack of confidence all round. We did at least change personnel and shape a couple of times to try and affect things but it made little difference. Great to see Jebb back on the pitch but he was obviously rusty and we need to get him fit and firing as soon as possible as he will be a massive asset to this team. At least we took a point (and a clean sheet) from the game.
Some tough tests to come in the next two weekends in the form of Weymouth and Wealdstone and we will need to perform a lot better than we have done in the last two games and hopefully we will!
I though Okosieme had a good game at centre back and felt a bit sorry for Josh Tuesday night. He didn't get much support either physically or vocally from his teammates and at times could have held the ball up but rushed to chest or pass it back as no one else gave him any advice with his back to goal. There were times he was running into blind allleys but I don't think he had much choice as a lone striker.
