You conveniently forget Barton that he took the job with most of the squad already assembled, and what a shit show of a squad he inherited; Throw in half the team decimated by COVID for 2 weeks and it was a recipe for disaster.
Since getting his senior players back the transformation is there for all to see. His enthusiasm for hard work, team spirit and a genuine passion for the club comes through in the players performances and his interviews alike. The port vale performance proved how much the players were willing to put it on the line.
More of a question then who goes out rather who comes in; the squad is still far too big.
Keepers: send one of the young lads out on loan.
Right back: Fine.
Left back: would be tempted to send Butroid on loan, but with Brown’s injury record that could be risky
Centre backs: Bedeau is a suitable back up.
Wingers: strength in depth there. Dales is surplus to requirements so he can go.
Centre mids: I’d be tempted to send Vincent back. Leaves us with Beestin, Spence, Taylor, Hallam, Hornshaw.
Striker: far too many strikers on the books. Olomola and Turan can go for me. Leaves us with Loft, Van Veen, Jarvis, mcatee, Jessop.
Recent weeks have proved this squad are good enough to compete in this league and I’d like to see the players given chance to develop. Players like O’Malley and Beestin would have never been given the opportunity without injuries and they deserve an opportunity to have a sustained run in the team.
Cracking result, and against a decent looking Orient outfit.
Loved the simplicity of our first goal, Just the simple things executed to perfection. O’Malley looks a real asset and his delivery was top notch.
Howard’s few saves were crucial,
No coincidence our form has upturned since he arrived.
Spence was brilliant and is what we’ve missed since bishop, perfect player for this league.
Just overall a smart, organised performance and a good indicator to show how Cox has transformed the team. Just to think that a couple of weeks ago people were calling for his head, mind blowing!
Same team as Tuesday for me- Brown > O’Malley depending on fitness.
No need to rush Van Veen back- Mcatee put in a good shift on Tuesday, I would like to see him play slightly further up the pitch in general as his finishing and dribbling are an asset
Thoroughly enjoyable to watch.
Quicker, sharper, more intelligent all over the pitch. Making the correct passes in the final third and players being in the right positions off the ball.
Good to see the full backs pressing forward and giving Eisa and Gillead more space and time on the ball; Eisa was excellent and has clearly been told to stop cutting in every time.
Mcatee was up for it and linked up brilliantly. Good to see Loft and Jarvis get on the scoresheet too; want to see Loft in those areas more often now.
O’Malley impressed and will serve as a suitable deputy for Brown.
So pleasing to watch us play like that tonight and not retreat into our shells after going 1-0 up.
it’s not exclusively a Scunthorpe problem by no means- a decent majority of Codheads were calling for Holloway’s head after Saturday, Ian Holloway FFS!
It’s an argument been done a death and I can’t be arsed repeating past points, Jon B sums it up eloquently above.
We might go down this year with Cox but I can be fairly certain we will definitely go down if he goes.
Didn’t feel such a kick in the teeth to concede late on when in reality we were fortunate to take anything from the game.
Defending was resolute again against a fairly decent morecambe side; however I was disappointed we didn’t do enough attacking wise, want to see Brown and Rowe supporting the wingers more often, the one time Rowe bombed forward we forced a save out of their keeper. Eisa is getting doubled marked every game now and needs support.
Unfortunate that Van Veen went off so early as he is the quality we need- Loft is what he is and needs someone to nod the ball down too and link up with. Playing Hallam in the ‘number 10’ role is a waste of a position. Get someone running in behind and force a centre back to defend facing his goal.
Positives are we have a committed, hard working team who finally look organised and clearly are playing for the manager. 7 points from 9 is a respectable return.
I think Cox got it right last night, we sat back and they couldn’t break us down. I have a feeling if we went all out attack we would have been picked off.
Ideally we all want to see attacking football but I feel last night was one of those games we simply needed to dig in, they’re more than a decent side at this level. Top 6 side after 10 games so they were no mugs.
Also, we have a number of players who aren’t even fully match fit…they’ll get better with more games.
100% agree.
Sometimes performances like last night need to put be into context: experienced players with hardly any training/games behind them; sat in the relegation zone; manager under pressure.
I don’t want to be watching that in 3 months time IF we are sat mid-table, but last night was a crucial win.
Massive win, huge credit to the team for the shift put in tonight.
Back 4 were outstanding. Mcghaey MOTM.
Jai Rowe did well considering Vale were relentlessly pinging balls towards the left winger all night- clearly targeting him. Rowe looks a suitable understudy to Clarke.
A fit Van Veen and we may have shown more attacking intent ( didn’t think he looked fit at all tonight), but for a team shipping 3/4/5 games every week to bring home 6 points and 2 clean sheets since returning, is a fantastic result.
I don’t know what the average figures are in league 2 but I was expecting far more too be watching than 466. We’d usually get more actually travelling to Oldham and watching it live.
First 30 minutes we would’ve folded in previous games; players stuck with their shape and grew into the game well. Shows what abit of experience gets you too; Onarisie and Brown were superb at the back. Thought Clarke looked massively off the pace but just heard he only trained yesterday, so fair play to him for having the bottle to get Involved straight away, he’ll only get better.
Eisa, Gillead and Beestin impressed; no idea why they didn’t double up on Eisa second half? Van Veen proved what the difference is at this level, those moments of magic which can turn a game which we have been desperately missing. Great finish for the 2nd.
Only complaint today is that we need to stop letting teams get easy crosses in the box, on another day Oldham would’ve scored from one and it seems to be a recurring problem.
The proposal of fans representation at boardroom meetings is a start; the key is appointing someone with the understanding of what the majority of fans are feeling and the confidence to challenge Swann.
The rest of the statement was just bluster and didn’t address the root cause of this shambolic start-the scatter gun transfer policy
This is a massive game for us and no exaggeration to suggest it’s a must win. Oldham, like us, have been a poor side for some time now; they were dreadful when we played them earlier this year.
Hard to suggest a line up with so many injury and fitness concerns but a half fit KVV trumps any other fully fit striker. I’d like to see Hallam featured in some capacity too.
Rob was superb.I agree with him 100%.Swann is the definition of incompetence.
On the other hand i thought Matt Dean was pathetic.He seemed terrified to let Rob say what he,and a lot more people,think of Swann.
Understand the need for balance but he couldn’t wait to interject the caller; probably anxious about the wrath of Swann.
The guy on the radio summed things up well and did well to keep his cool. COVID has f**k all to do with our current predicament and everything to do with blinkered decisions at a boardroom level.
