IlsonDerby

Gone from being a beast vs young skinny lads to being a beast in men’s football. Long May it continue.

Id suggest that post covid the market is completely different. Most transfers in league 1 happen with no money changing hands at all. The odd transfer fee paid by traditional championship clubs but we’d have our hands snapped off for NML, TB, CN, CE, KW, EA, JC at this level.

Who are these ‘bargain basement’ players you’re alluding to? Every player we have signed would have had a queue of suiters in this division lining up for them. Basement bargain signings were what Rooney was using in the relegation season.

Wildsmith deserved that rollicking. He started coming to get it. Was clear favourite to get it and then ran back leaving cash to deal with it and it took a bad bounce and hit him and went out for a corner.

My point was more than the passes that reached their team mates just weren’t good enough. No momentum being built because they were constantly having to stretch to get the ball or turn and run back to get it after it was played 5 yards behind them. The pitch didn’t look great but it’s the same pitch for both teams isn’t it?

My opinion of Warne as a manager is well known and he is what he is so I’m not going to go over those talking points again. I’m sick of slating the woeful tactics so My anger yesterday is directed at the players. Can any of them come off the pitch with any sort of credit? Their goal was Sunday league defending. Bradley letting him get the cross in too easy. Cashin and Sibley breakdown in communication allowing the scorer the freedom of half of the pitch. Passing accuracy was abysmal. Even the passes that went to our players were always causing the receiver to turn back and collect it from behind them or to stretch for it. Wasted the 3 real opportunities we had with awful finishing. Constant hoofed balls up rather than the composure to play it through a pretty crap league 1 press. Honestly a good chunk of the team yesterday printed their own P45s for the end of this season regardless of division.

This is fine if we’re talking about an inexperienced defender learning a lesson the hard way. We’re talking about an experienced pro who was part of a promotion to the premier league last season. He should be thoroughly embarrassed that he couldn’t control himself and in doing so has left the team with 2 centre backs for the next 3 matches. I’d pay him off at the end of this season and cut our losses - dread to think what championship strikers would do to him. This isn’t just about the sending off either. Constantly passing it behind the player he was playing it to. Constant poor touches including needing Wildsmith to rush out and spare his blushes to stop a repeat of match day 1. These mistakes shouldn’t be happening from a player at this stage in his career who has dropped down a level.

We’ve just handed momentum back to our rivals though. Awful. 7 points ahead vs 1 point ahead (they’ll add on the 3 points for a game in hand when looking at the league) is such a blow for us psychologically.

I don’t believe the players don’t care. I don’t believe that they’re not trying so quite simply they have bottled it once we were in a position to go up. Weak mentality. Watching Hourihane against a mobile midfield is like watching your dog limping around before you do the right thing and take them to the vets one last time.

That red card could be a blessing based on todays performance.

Yet another error from Hourihane. Ebou and Smith to start in CM next game please .

This club has perfected the art of building you up with just enough hope that the disappointment is absolutely crushing. A real skill.

Hourihane again!!! Pass not making it to Elder for goodness sake

This is dire. It is honestly so bad. I just don’t know what’s happened to the steel and determination shown in recent matches. If we can’t get up for todays game with so much potential for getting one foot into the championship then what hope do we have.

Every b****** pass is behind where it needs to be. So sloppy.

Get Bradley and Hourihane off. Bradley a different player than before his illness - doesn’t look fit or confident. Hourihane daintily hanging a leg in and losing out to 50/50s again.

3 chances we realistically should have scored from. Waghorn miss, Ebou scuffed shot saved on line, Ebou missed free header. Cannot keep missing guilt edged chances.

Free header for adams 5 yards out 😭😂

Unlucky not to get the free kick but the first 15 minutes smacked of a team who think they’ve done the job after Bolton last week.

Awful awful awful defending.

Poor so far. Pressures getting to them.

Can you list all of your clear cut chances? Between the boxes you were better than us but the free header Wildsmith clawed out and the shot Wildsmith did a great save against are all I can remember. You created other chances but just bog standard chances where we’d have been disappointed to concede. On the other hand we missed a free header from within the posts from 8 yards out and we scored a goal. As I say you were much better between the boxes but that isn’t where games are won and lost. We showed why we’ve got the best defence in the division and then did enough with our limited chances. We have the best goal difference in the league you know. The joint most wins too.

Right - now you’ve done condescending somebody who was there as he is every match I’ll refer you to xG which showed us having a higher xG. They had that shocking miss from the header - we had Curtis miss a free header from 8 yards in between the posts. They had that shot Wildsmith saved well. We had our goal. Chances were few and far between. Other than their chance in the first half and the last 2 minutes of injury time we were completely comfortable until half time despite losing our focal point. They played a better brand of football and on another day they take one of their two big chances and we find it tough. On another day we score the header from Curtis and it puts more pressure on them. At the end of the day they had to bring the game to us. A draw wouldn’t have cut the mustard for them whereas a draw would have been fine for us. Look back at my previous posts since about November 2022 to find my thoughts on our performances under Warne. Im certainly not a happy clapper. Im vocally critical but we did an absolute number on Bolton yesterday.

Overtaken Bryson and Martin for me as Clough juniors best signing for us. The ability to come back from so many devastating injuries. The way we keep buying left backs to replace him and he kept swatting them away one by one. The way he’s reinvented himself into an excellent centre back both in a 2 and a 3. Love the egg!

I don’t think Bolton were miles better than us. The football they play is a lot easier on the eye and is nice to watch as they move it around waiting for space to exploit but I think we were solid and had it not been for the odd poor touch here and there we’d have done a lot more on the counter attack. Anyway players need to forget it and focus straight on to the next match. Only Derby playing on Saturday out of the mini league of 5 at the top. Psychologically could be massive heading into the busy Easter period 7 points ahead of second and 2 points off top with superior goal difference. It turns the heat up on everybody around us when they’re cramming more games into a shorter time frame. We have to back yesterday up with a result at Northampton.