Cod Almighty | Match Stats

Saturday 23 September 2017

Division 4

Newport County 1 Amond (63)

Grimsby Town 0

Attendance: 3356 (243 away fans)

You know it's not going to be a good day when the Virgin trains platform staff on Stockport station omit to inform you of a last minute platform change. The result you miss your train and have to get one later and stand amongst the Blackburn fans on their way to Shrewsbury. The Peroni consumed on the way and in the Spoons failed to dull my senses enough to make the 90 minutes offered palatable.

There is absolutely nothing worth reporting of the match from a Town point of view.

Jaiyesimi came on for his customary 10 minutes and did more than the others had achieved in 80. He at least managed a shot; the BBC claim we had eight with four on target - I suspect they are counting overhit punts forward.

That this side and players are capable of playing football, proper football, was proven at Accrington. Faced with a Force 8 swirling gale and driving rain they got the ball on the floor and played. It was our best performance of the season. But on Saturday Newport chased down the ball like a dog chasing a leaf. Our response was to panic and lump the ball aimlessly forward or pass back to the goalkeeper so that he could.

Only Summerfield attempted to bring a bit of composure and find some feet. When he did both Dembele and Woolford failed to escape from the pocket the Newport full backs had been keeping them in. Our midfield were for whole periods irrelevant and bypassed both by our long balls and Newport’s midfield with the same sense of resignation. The front two were starved of any service and the back four faced with a ball returning as quickly as they lumped it forward.

To their credit, Town managed to keep the score to 1-0 with a mixture of good keeping, last-ditch defending, a slice of luck and Newport's inepititude. The fact that they'd succumb and that it would be Amond who flicked home the winner from 5 yards had an inevitability of night following day.

It is seldom I can find no positives to take from a game but this was certainly one. I don't criticise individuals but it is clear two defenders are not worthy of their place at present and we have two sat on the bench who are. We shall skate over the one allowed to leave. We have players capable of playing. We have good ones close to returning or sat on the bench. If, either by design or because of our inability to cope with high tempo opponents, we continue to throw the ball forward, bypassing midfield in the process, it will be a long season.

None of the players deserve much credit. The bloke in front of us with the haddock or the young kid and three lasses to our right who kept trying to get songs going take the award.

I thought we created our own pressure. 'They looked like it was chance after chance but actually we were creating those chances through making poor choices or poor decisions.

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Grimsby had a header first half and maybe a little scramble in the second half but we should have been out of sight. I think they cleared three off the line in the first half.

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There is nothing positive to be taken from this performance. We failed at anytime to even try to string five passes together. We lumped it forward and they came right back at us.

We were truly awful. It is impossible with words to describe how awful. If it is the manager's instructions to play like that he should dump 4-4-2 and just go 4-1-1-4 because we don't need anyone between the keeper and the target man.

Newport are better than last season, and at least they have sorted their pitch out, but they are still only an average side. Even so, they could have had four or five goals but for goal-line clearances and Jimmy Mack.

It is possible that eventually the players we have will adapt to the way the manager desires to play. In the meantime, the fans are voting with their feet: we had only 48 more fans present than on a wet January Tuesday night the last time we played Newport, and we didn't sell out at Mansfield. We may win a few games and some will say success will bring them back; it will be, if it happens, success at a price. How many will be willing to pay it remains to be seen.

Mr A Coggins

I didn't notice the referee, so 8/10

Lump, lumpy and lumpiest.

In a word: Lump