Cod Almighty | Match Stats

Saturday 25 September 2010

Conference Premier

Altrincham 2 Denham (53), Densmore (90)

Grimsby Town 2 Bore (28), Connell (77)

Attendance: 1364

An oddity this, for two reasons that maybe cancel each other out. Ridley shared blame for the first Altrincham goal and the second came out of his quarter of the field. It is of course unusual for men of the match for home and away sides to be announced; perhaps the away award is on the basis of their contribution to the home side's cause.

A few mentions in despatches -€“ Bore looked a class above most, but now and again played as though he knew it, and ultimately it cost us a win; Connell, short of service and betraying a heavy touch in the first half scored a fantastic goal; Carlton was quietly, intelligently and unselfishly effective; Wood worked hard; Kempson swatted out most threats on the Town goal and O'Donnell had little to do, but was suitably angry at having to pick the ball out of the net -€“ but no medals.

"They didn't look like scoring until we gifted them their first goal. We've talked a lot about dealing with pressure and I felt we did that in the first half and came back well when they equalised."

"We looked all-in, as a part-time club that had played three hard games in a week. But we desired that goal and it came. Our strengths are that we can defend well and hit teams on the break and we showed that, again, today."

It's hard to see Altrincham doing anything other than struggle, but forget the pub team jibes. They tried to create chances, and when that failed, snaffled up the two chances they were presented with.

Huge numbers watched in apathy until things began to go wrong, whereupon we got so caught up in moaning we almost failed to notice we had started to put things right again. One can describe countless details- the match balls with "Alty FC" marker penned on them, the hoarding for MUFC.com behind one goal, the broken bits of chipboard covering a pothole near the corner flag, the break in play to allow repairs to the linesman's flag -€“ that highlight the modesty of the environment in which we are playing. It is because we have a lot to be modest about. The sooner we stop playing lip service to this and actually start meaning it, the sooner we might get behind our modest team and help it become a bit better.

Mr T Harrington (Co Durham)
Anyone thinking Town were lucky not to concede a first half penalty was not there, although a radio listener might be in a better position than someone in the away end to judge whether Carlton fouled the Altrincham goalkeeper before Bore's goal. He was fine. 7 out of 10.

Fat chance.