Biggleswade away on Tuesday

Looking for another 3 points after today's win, but they will be after revenge for the Cup tie. I'd take another 1-0 win right now if you offered it to me.

Assuming he's available and selected it will be Nathan Bennett's 400th appearance for Stour.

Leon, by the way, is currently on 492 after today's match.

Biggleswade have won 4 and drawn 2 of their last six in the League. Of course, our Cup win came in the middle of that sequence somewhere.

Hoping i've recovered from the "Gulliver" virus in time for this match.

Aiming to travel down with the usual suspects and hoping for another much needed win.

The silly losses to the mediocre and poorer sides are making the games against the better sides,even away from home,"must win" games and so far we've managed this apart from the Cambridge match but Tuesday's match followed by Weymouth at home and Burnham away must be won in my opinion to even compete for a play off spot,automatic promotion is looking a very distant hope this season now.

Despite some iffy results and five defeats already, we are only one point short of two points per game. If we can keep up the improvement we've been showing the playoffs are well within our grasp. Chesham in particular will take some catching at the top. Maybe Hemel too. Hard to see us winning it from here, but far from iimpossible.

Hoping to get down there. As it stands i am going to be leaving straight from work, that just depends where my schedule takes me this week. I was hoping to be in Luton for work, but thats not looking possible. Another big game, and a Must win.

I Am predicting 3-1 to stour att: more than 1  

Ben 1-0 up.

1-1

1-2....Rowe

2-2......93 minute

Until we start beating these teams below us in the league.... Deja vu.

Frustrating night. Draw was a fair result. They started better but thought we deserved to be ahead at the break. Second half we were poor and their first goal was coming for a while. We tried to get a foothold by changing to 4-5-1 but it didn't work. After they equalised luke went back up front and we started playing again. Thought we'd snatched it with a scramble from a corner that just went over the line, but then we again let one of their players run 20 yards before belting a screamer into the top corner. Don't know if we were naive to have pushed up to give him that much space, or too tired to close him down, but too similar to the Cambridge winner and we are still crying out for a defensive midfielder. No Leon tonight so Ben was alongside Sean, and Sean wasn't able to dictate the play as much as usual.

We need a bigger squad - only three proper subs and two of them full backs. I know it's a long way to go midweek but if we are going to challenge for the play-offs we need more options. The title looks further away every week.

Surprised to see Agbor go off, as most of our threat came down his side. He needs to go down the line sometimes though rather than always coming inside, if for nothing else than to keep the defenders guessing. His crosses with the outside of his right foot were good enough. Could understand if he was knackered as he hasn't started many matches recently, but would have taken off Drew or Ryan before him. Ryan got the goal, but his link up play is nowhere what it was a couple of years ago.

On the positive side, 4 points from 2 tough away games in 4 days. Their keeper made 3 excellent saves so we could claim we were unlucky not to win, but that would have been harsh on them.

I'm not going to "dance around my handbag" about tonight's match.

The game was our's for the taking yet we came up with a baffling 4-5-1 formation that was hopeless after constantly worrying them with our 4-4-2.

I'm not going to single players out for criticism because we are a small club and a family style is very much our way at Stourbridge but what does worry me is that as in most families there are "favourites" and team selection smacks of that in recent times.

It seem's that no matter how badly certain players play they get picked week after week whereas others who warm the bench week after week without complaint ( Agbor for example ),then get a start,look our most potent threat and then get dragged off whilst other's more worthy of being "hooked" get to stay on.

All of us travelling fans thought that Roly should have been switched wings with Washbourne ( who did well ) should then have played on the left.

Wurzel was quite obviously furious when he was dragged off,why wasn't he pushed forward when Francis came on at right back?

Why is it that Wurzel can't get a game on the wing?

Why isn't either of our two specialist right back's getting a start?

Why are we travelling with four subs,one of whom is our 45 year old assistant manager?

Why are no youth team players travelling to at least get experience?

Why is the squad so thin when finances are so healthy?

We need a shake up ,some new,quality faces including at least one central defender to cover Nathan and Will and to allow the option for Will to switch positions should any match require that option.

A central midfielder to boss things and add physicality and a proven goalscorer.

Some of us are giving up a large slice of our day to travel independently to watch Stour,tonight was a 250 mile round trip and £50 in fuel for me and others plus the cost of getting in.

We love our club and give great support at this level,we are allowed an opinion if things are going "tits up" on the pitch,i for one am not impressed at the conduct of certain members of our bench who resort to telling fan's to "shut the f--- up" when they don't like a comment.

It's happening too often in my opinion.

Ultimately it's probably two points lost rather than a point won but regardless of everything i've said about some baffling decisions i pay tribute to the effort of all involved,effort cannot be questioned.


I'd also like to pay tribute to Biggleswade's keeper ( Ian Brown i think ) what an absolutely top guy and an absolute credit to his club and to himself and a shining example of how to interact with the away support,it's always a pleasure to converse with him during a game,such a nice bloke and funny as well.

Well done Browny,you also pulled off some blinding saves,us behind the goal thought you were tremendous tonight sir!

First the positives, such as they are...

I thought we looked decent in the first half, after a sluggish first ten minutes. Ben took his goal well and we were generally on top, although the only other real chance was Luke's fierce shot near the end of the half which Brown saved well. Occasionally we looked vulnerable to their breaks but on the whole we played the game on our terms.

However...

I don't know whether it was a conscious decision to be more defensive in the second half, maybe because of that exposure to breakaways - I suspect not as we were straight on the attack from the kick off, even if it did only last a minute or so. I think it was more a case of Biggleswade being told to take the game to us more.

When we've got a midfield four of Canavan, Geddes, Billingham and Agbor it doesn't take a genius to work out the problems we're going to have when other teams impose themselves on us, as Biggleswade did. The midfield got deeper and deeper, yet was still pretty ineffective at disrupting their attacks. When we did manage to break things up we were so far detached from the two forwards that we couldn't get attacks going other than playing the ball first time and hoping it would "stick" with Luke or Ryan. The fact that they both had poor games made matters worse. We also get closed down too easily by teams who, it seems to me, are simply fitter and work harder. What some people might call "wanting it more."

I felt going to 4-5-1 was our only option at that point, but that doesn't change the fact that Geddes, Billingham and Canavan still lack enough "bite" between them in the middle. With the personel available last night it was all we had, though.

We would have been far better off taking Rowey off, leaving Luke on his own up front (he has more pace and frankly is playing much better than Ryan right now, even if he does need to stop the bloody sulks!), moving Wurzel onto the right flank and bringing Haynes or Francis on at the back. At least that way we might have had a chance of giving them something to worry about. Instead Luke went out to the right wing where he looks like a fish in treacle.

To be fair, we came close with Sean's free kick and a header from Will, both very well saved by Brown again, but other than that we carried very little serious threat and attacks broke down far too easily through careless passing and poor decision-making.

Biggleswade should have equalised long before they did with all that pressure, and it felt inevitable that they would go on and win from that point.

To our credit we got ourselves back into the game with Ryan diverting a header from Nathan (I think) which just about trickled over the line. Take the lead on 91 minutes and you should be able to hang onto it. We couldn't. Again we had three minutes of scrambling defence culminating in an unchallenged free run and shot from distance. I buy the thought that the players are tired and all that, I really do, and I am loath to criticize, but we should have been flinging bodies in the way of that shot at all costs.

No question we missed Leon and probably Fitz too. I know Fitz doesn't find favour with everybody, but with him, Sean and Leon in the middle and Ben out on the right I don't think the second half would have panned out the way it did. Of course, that would mean playing 4-5-1 and (a) supporters don't like it for some reason, and (b) we'd have to leave out Ryan or Luke, which is a decision the management don't seem to want to make.

I sound like a cracked bloody record on some of this stuff (we all do) but basic deficiencies in the squad and the tactics are not being addressed.

Agree with DA about some on our bench - and will say no more than that.

Also agree about Brownie. DA forgets to mention also that when Luke went down with a head injury Brownie was calling straight away for the ref to stop the game against some of his own team-mate's wishes (and they made it clear what they thought). Great keeper and a class bloke.

Other positives...

Yet another new ground - my 197th with Stour.

A smooth journey home - if the overhead signs were anything to go by it seemed as though every motorway in the country was closed apart from the ones we were using. Made a pleasant change!

TRM wrote:I sound like a cracked bloody record on some of this stuff (we all do) but basic deficiencies in the squad and the tactics are not being addressed.

So why is this? Gary knows far more than me about managing a football team and has proved he knows what he is doing, but we can't all be wrong can we? I guess we're either trying to sign players and they don't want to come, or we're not trying to sign players and Gary is happy with the squad - not sure which would be more worrying!!

Agre with most of the comments on here already.

Slow start but a good move for the goal and from there i thought we would have taken the game to them and increased our lead. Only other chance we had in that half was from Luke.

Second half we led a charmed life by not closing them down quick enough. Its been like that for two or three seasons so why haven't we tried to do something about it. They got they equaliser from poor defending and would have hought they would go on to win. However it seem to wake us up and from then we had a few chances. We get the goal and you would think we would defend for our lives.
We didnt and we let the same mistake happen which happened at Cambridge. Surely the management noticed what we saw that night no tackle of any kind.

Agree Agbor looked our best attack but what i can't understand is the player has no left foot at all so why play him on the left. The crosses with the outside of the foot carry no pace. We should pla him on the right let he beat the defender and then get the cross in. Drew could have played left as he has done before.

Agree midfield aint strong enough another area we have known for sometime.

Neither Ryan or Luke had a good game. They dont want to seem to want to play as a partnership which is a pity as i think they could be as good as any in our league. I couldnt care less who the leading goalscorer is all i want is a victory.

Not sure who i woud have took off. Certainly getting fed up with Luke's attitude and he gets every bit of encourage from the fans its not we are have a go at him we just dont want him to give up so easily.

The position of right back could be any of the three. For me i would go with Francis.

We could try Drake out wide but nothing against Aaron but i think he has just lost that yard of pace to play there. I wouldnt mind if he proved me wrong though.

Defensively we look shaky and team seem to be going through us to easily.

Agree new players are needed and soo if we want any play off hopes this season.

In the end was it two points lost or a point gain but on Saturday morning we would have taken four points.

For me the sadest thing was the comment from the management to the fans behind the goal. Hopefully somebody in the management team is big enough to say it was wrong.

The fans appreciate what everyone puts into the club.

Its just so frustrating when you know te players can do better.

To clarify one thing - although I agreed with DA's point about our bench, I was thinking more in general terms on occasions. I wasn't aware of any specific comments last night until I read it on here.

Definitely not something that should be happening though. As supporters we are all fully aware that the players have had to endure a series of lengthy trips in recent weeks, many of them in midweek, and I'm sure that also contributes to the odd absence (for example Jamie last Tuesday, Leon and Fitz last night maybe?) which does not help the management. It was remarked on by DA on another thread after the Cambridge match and we all appreciate the players' efforts especially in the last few weeks. I don't think anybody here has accused the team of not giving it their full commitment.

We all know it because many of us are doing the same trips. StourSi has been to all those recent games, DA and I have driven to most (Bideford is the only one I've missed and I'll be at Burnham and Stevenage). If we didn't care, if it didn't mean something, we wouldn't bother - but we do, it does and we do!

We all get frustrated at matches - that's human nature. I try not to let that frustration come out as I don't believe it helps the players to be told when they know full well they've just done something daft. But believe me I am cursing and swearing at them under my breath. Others are not so able to keep their feelings in check at times, and I would not dream of criticising them for that. If supporters are occasionally hard on the team or the management (sometimes justified, sometimes maybe not) it is only because we despeartely want the team to do well.

Equally, I hope that any reaction from the bench is also born out of similar frustration and nothing more.

I will drive any distance and because I work for myself loose money by doing that.

Karen my partner has to take time off work for some matches that's how much we want to see Stourbridge Fc to achieve want we all surely want that is promotion.

Except the players and management have other jobs but surely we are better than our performances at Cambridge and Biggleswade.

Lets also remember even though they have left work early to play they are still being paid to player for Stourbridge Fc the supporters are not.

Highlights...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AnOXd2sd_I&feature=youtu.be

MotM was Jamie Oliver with 7 votes, Nathan received 4, Sean 2, Will & Ben 1 each.

The wine was won by Barry Cuff.