Following a pitch inspection this morning the pitch has been passed as fit to play and Merthyr will be travelling. There is rain forecast for this afternoon, unless it is severe there should be no need for a further inspection.
Well done all. Just wondering if that wind that is due may just work to our advantage as act as a leveller on the night.
Be interesting to see what Gary does selection wise. I think the inclusion of Bright, Tyrell and Billy made us a little light weight against their strong line up. Would not be surprised to see Harris in for Bright as the only change.
Rain may be heavy but should be be clear by 3. So the wind forecast should help dry the pitch, think kicking towards clubhouse might be tough this evening.
If the pitch is playable,which it appears to be,will the strengthening wind be taken into consideration for safety reasons? Therefore,will the officials need to make a decision on this?
A really exciting game; a credit to both sides who managed to play good football in a swirling wind. We played so much better than on Saturday and although Merthyr still looked the more dangerous side we could very easily have won it had either Harris or Cummins-Bart managed to convert Billy Medlocck's cross after a superb run with a few minutes to go. As it was, a near post header from a corner late into stoppage time made it 2-1 to Merthyr and saved us the bus fare to the valleys........
A very "unfortunate" 92nd minute own goal, that avoided a Tuesday night replay in Wales , that 7 players had already said they couldn't make, and would have added to our fixture backlog. Gutted.
Agree with Geoff in that it was a much better Hastings performance and some very impressive individual performances. Also agree with Dave's sentiments that a last minute goal was probably very welcome-a shame it wasn't at the other end. However, all I can remember is Hastings losing to East Thurrock so perhaps its not a bad thing. Good to see long standing Hastings supporter Roger Sinden at the match.
Geoff my old friend, you will not be surprised that I totally disagree with you and Tim. The only thing I can agree on is that the conditions were dreadful but one side clearly coped better than the other. And I am not sure how anyone can think that was an exciting game. Apart from the opening 20 minutes, of which Hastings were clearly the better side, Hastings barely had another shot at goal until the final 5 minutes against an impressive, well drilled and very well organised team, who once again just looked way too strong and powerful for us..
Defensively we were good, with strong performances from Razor, Ollie and my MOM Alfie Hall (why was he taken off...injury I assume?). The only disappointment there was Sam Crabb, who either side of getting an absolute rocket from Josh and Razor, was at fault for the first and spent a lot of the game giving the ball away. He really must improve the defensive side of his game. In the centre of the park we were very poor last night and that for me is where the game was lost. Sammy, still struggling for form and Simon barely got a touch and Max may as well have not been on the pitch. The best of the lot was Sam Cruttwell yet again and probably looked the most likely of our players to score all night. And up top Billy never stopped running along side a very disappointing Harris, and I cannot help thinking we are still playing Medlock too deep.
So like the Poole game I, along with most of those i was watching with, was extremely disappointed with the performance. Lets keep in mind we were playing a team struggling in the bottom reaches of the league above. They had been on the road for 6 hours, and they left 5 players at home including the Spanish no 10 playmaker and the huge lump at the back. This was another huge opportunity for the club and i don't think we ever looked like we were capable of winning even when we did grab the equaliser. We made very few chances against a makeshift defence and a third choice goalkeeper, who barely reached 6ft and I always felt Merthyr had another gear to go to if required.
Another concern last night was the strength of the bench, . We must get Cole, Vickers and Attwood back asap, and dare I say Walder too. And if we cant, then we need to sign others. As for Tyrell and his exclusion.....well lets wait and see what happens there. The squad is looking very thin at the moment and last night, when we badly needed an injection of quality, we just did not have it and I think Gary knew that. Towards the end our midfield looked almost county league, with what we had available.
So as per the norm, I was watching a completely different game to both Geoff and Tim and left the Pilot Field last night extremely disappointed and thinking that was the second massive opportunity this season for our team to go deep in one of the major cup competitions and pull a big draw and earn some big money.
Are you Max's agent Arrows?? Only joking Tom, but we could all go out there and not stop running all night but there has to be a bit of quality, creativity or end product. I don't see any of that from young Max at present but he's not the only one, and I definitely think he is one for the future. I didn't see him at Crawley but I understand he had a great game so he has something about him but just not seen it since Chatham away earlier in the season.
I heard so many different stories last night on Tyrell's whereabouts I don't think its fair to comment as none of us know for sure. What I do know is that he was definitely missed last night and he has clearly become a very important member of this team this season.
I have to say I agree with John. I was a bit disappointed with our performance, along with a few others around me. They were their for the taking last night, missing a few key players but we didn't capitalise on it. May be wrong, but I heard he was their 3rd choice keeper last night, who we didn't test anywhere near enough.
We continue to give away stupid stupid goals which is really costing us. We looked short of width last night, every time we attacked we seemed to narrow the pitch for ourselves. The full backs pushed on but we seemed to be playing with no wingers.
But hey at least we avoided a replay! Fixture congestion will start to get ridiculous with all these cups/games in hands.
Merthyr's keeper certainly looked very vulnerable and they were missing key players. However, I think Jack, Sam and Zac are important players for us. Merthyr's first goal came from a terrible free kick decision by the ref on the half way line. Merthyr took it quickly and took full advantage of some disorganised defending. Personally I thought the inclusion of Jack Harris made a big difference up front compared to Saturday and unlike John, thought he had a good game. Alfie got injured in a tackle half way through the second half and was limping for a while before he was substituted He was having a good game as was Sam Crabb going forward. Thought our midfield was workmanlike at best with Sam Cruttwell being the most creative. Ollie and Sean were excellent at the back but it was another corner that was our undoing. Agree with John that Merthyr always looked as if they had the game under control but was pleased that we were at least in the game for quite a lot of the game. Clearly there is much room for improvement as for much of the time against Poole and Merthyr we didn't look as if we could compete at a higher level. Finally, always interesting to read different views on a game!
Finally, always interesting to read different views on a game!
That's what I always love about football. Find that a lot with my dad after watching a game in the car afterwards. Strange how we can watch the same game and have completely different views on it
Yes, it's interesting that although we can come to radically different conclusions; 'exciting', 'room for improvement', 'extremely disappointed', and so on; when it comes to the specifics though there's probably less between us. Perhaps I have a low excitement threshold; but I found it exciting each time Merthyr had a deadball kick - it looked as though they would score!
I was disappointed by our taking the foot off the pedal in the last 20 minutes of the first half when I felt we should have pressed their inexperienced goalkeeper whilst we still had the wind behind us. But I was impressed how we kept going in the second half in the teeth of the gale, played football, got a goal back and then produced an exceptional run from Billy Medlock which cried out to be converted. Had that gone in - as it undoubtedly should have done and been a goal of the season contender- I feel we might well have gone on and secured the win. Of course, not to be.
I don't wish to ignore the negatives; I don't disagree with John on his assessment of some of the less than special individual performances; but this really was a much better team performance than Saturday's (and certainly far better than the awful one against Poole). We were up against a team (albeit with some players missing) who were still superior in many departments and more threatening, but we seemed to have a shape and a potential to score throughout the game.
interesting reading the 2 views on last night game. Sound as if we was better but not convincing. when i saw the crowd of 150 i thought it was an error but just seen Observer story that lowest since a sussex cup game 4 years ago. given sussex cup not as high profile as FA Trophy it really is staggering how bad crowd was last night even with the weather and England game. Has a crowd ever been that low for a league, fa cup or fa trophy game in the clubs history?
Haha John I just don't think it's fair that he gets pin pointed when he plays and when he has an outstanding game like he did at Crawley providing the cross for Sammy to score the winner I must ad I just don't rate simon johnson don't see what everyone sees in him he's overrated in my eyes
johnw wrote:
Are you Max's agent Arrows?? Only joking Tom, but we could all go out there and not stop running all night but there has to be a bit of quality, creativity or end product. I don't see any of that from young Max at present but he's not the only one, and I definitely think he is one for the future. I didn't see him at Crawley but I understand he had a great game so he has something about him but just not seen it since Chatham away earlier in the season.
I heard so many different stories last night on Tyrell's whereabouts I don't think its fair to comment as none of us know for sure. What I do know is that he was definitely missed last night and he has clearly become a very important member of this team this season.
