Can you hear me Paddy Ashdown?

What a difference 3 days makes! Not really - but what a difference 5 changes made:

Alnwick: exudes confidence, the defence trusts him, kicks well, claims crosses. Saved one certain goal. 7.

Spillane: I'm not convinced he's really a right back, but they couldn't best him. I have no idea how he didn't score - he struck it perfectly, and the one he chased down in the second half was a brilliant effort too. 7.

Doherty: better than Saturday. But the usual Doc really. 6.
Askou: looks to be by some distance the best CB we have. Calm under pressure. Good in the air. Twats the ball or opponents if he needs to. 7.

Drury: Solid again. Got forward more than Saturday. Shows the benefit of not having a useless lump inside you. 7.

Whalley: hugely improved on Saturday. I think he is not actually a replacement for Croft - he tracked back and inside a lot - a right-sided Lappin perhaps. But two games one assist suggests that he may be more productive than his predecessor too. 7.

Gill: pretty quiet first half but second half buzzed around as we totally dominated midfield. Again a huge improvement on Saturday. 7.

Adeyemi: I thought was completely anonymous first half and began to fear he was another over-hyped Academy lump. WRONG! He ran the second half. I haven't been so excited about an Academy prospect since, er, Chrissy Martin. 8.

Teapot: Once again no assists. BUT he worked his socks off, played some good football and contributed as much as anyone to exhausting and demoralising Yeovil. If this is how he responds to a run-in with Selwyn then we need to make that a regular date. 8.

Cody: Ran them ragged and created the gaps in defence for Adeyemi, Whalley and Holt to destroy them. Hugely unlucky with the one that game back off the underside of the bar. The boy is a gem. 8.

Holt: Worked hard throughout the first half. And in the second half he bullied them, and harried them, and got his just rewards. 10.

Hughes: came on and did very well. Perhaps not enough to judge him on, since by the time he arrived Yeovil had pretty much gone. 7. (but he doesn't half look like that f**king Chadwick)

Lappin: as good as Drury. 7.

Maric: f**king hell you wouldn't want to get in a fight with him. Anybody less like Strihavka you could not wish to see. Hardly on, but still had time to head the ball on for Holty's third. And I don't care what he says - I bet he will be sent off more than once this season. 7.

So what have we learned? Well Gunny has been rightly berated for the past few performances, but he got every single decision right last night The 5 that came in were magnificent, and the 6 that survived were all better, in some cases (Whalley, Hoolahan) unrecognisable.
And some questions are answered. Maric and Martin will do a job, but Cody and Holt have the look of a great partnership in the making.
As it stands the centre midfield will be Adeyemi and someone else (although I guess it's not reasonable to expect a callow youth to start for the whole season)
At the back it's probably Askou and Doherty (although Nelson is a reasonable substitute for the Doc).
In goal it has to be Alnwick. Priority must be to get him in at least for the season.

I don't believe we should be thinking about promotion, but if this 14 stay fit I don't see relegation as an issue. The goalkeeping situation worries me - if we can't keep Alnwick then it seems a big responsibilty to put on Rudd.. I'm not convinced about Spillane at right back - I think a pacy left winger might beat him up, and I think he will move inside. Right back cover is needed because of that, and because it then makes Spillane the centre back cover we need. MIdfield looks sorted. Up front the main two look good, but haven't really seen enough of Maric to form an opinion.

Team for Saturday: as long as they are all fit and available to make any changes at all would be ludicrous.

Posted By: Chester Drawers on August 12th 2009 at 14:05:16

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