Lots of people saying last night that we were outplayed. If we don't make the final, I see this as a good thing. So much less painful than losing to a bunch of cheats with the footballing ability of lemons. They showed why they came third and we came sixth, fair play to them.
Of course its easy to look at the game in hindsight and make judgements about where we went wrong. Looking at our side going into the game I thought it was the best side we could put out. Trouble was, we really missed Long. One thing I kept noticing was Moore and Atkinson looking to play it out wide (as if to Long) and not making the pass as Hanson wasn't where they expected. He was also very nervy looking going forward, again as many have said. Should we have played Forde at RB? It certainly might have been an idea in terms of free kick accuracy. If Longy isn't back for Pt 2 I reckon we need Forde in the side, we can't keep wasting set pieces. Even Kelly does better on set pieces than Henry was yesterday.
Barker? Excellent going forward but didn't do a thing unless the ball was at his feet. Sykes I thought deserved MOTM for his work rate if nothing else, he looked like he gave more than one flying flamingo. Centre backs, solid enough but left exposed by the midfield. Agree with whichever poster it was that said Brannagan's move to almost a quarterback position said something about our confidence. Simms and the other bloke were given far too much room to play with.
Winnall. Christ me. I've never been a fan of his but Jesus wept what a waste of space yesterday! Taylor did nowt wrong for the hour he was on, apart from perhaps getting into a few too many Argie-Bargies with the keeper, but he hardly got a sniff of the ball. Maybe his positional play could have been better but not entirely his fault. As soon as Winnall came on I knew things would start to go to pot, and lo and behold, on he comes, does naff all for a few mins and then wastes another substitution with a soft injury. Story of his season. Having to bring on a CDM chasing a game? Would never end well.
Lord Sir Duke King Dan Agyei had a glimmer of something but as usual was a bit too careless with the ball at his feet. If we'd brought him on for Lee and left old Mr Sicknote on the bench I think that would have been a much better tactical play, as I do think he offers a lot. Quite a few people saying Ruffels looked as though he didn't care - I disagree. He actually saved our bacon a couple of times, with blocks and challenges. Can you really see him getting seven goals, seven assists, helping his team to the playoffs and then giving up? Odd suggestion, I think.
Really disappointed with Henry. Again, unfair to suggest that he's a busted flush as he has helped us a lot this season after he recovered from his temporary mental breakdown but I wonder if he just can't cope with pressure. He seems rather rattled in high-stakes scenarios.
So, what to change? Well, Taylor for me needs to play. Agyei can come on, sure, but for me there's no way he can be starting ahead of Taylor. I know this is blindingly obvious but he needs the delivery to be able to score. I think we need to just go all out attacking, if we lose we lose, we're 3-0 down at 'half-time' anyway. Not the attitude I wish I had but we've got a mountain to climb and we're not going to reach the summit if we stand at the bottom for an hour and a half. To quote Kate Bush, we need to be running up that hill, and we need to go hell for leather. This is the case for all teams to a certain extent, but I think Blackpool are very much a side that play with great confidence as long as they're ahead. You saw how scrappy the first twenty minutes were before they got their goal. If we score early, then we're in with a chance. Who expected us to beat Crewe, a side that play passing football, six nil?
It's doable. But we have to attack it.