We’ve been in the third tier for a while now and so when I say that the first half on Saturday was one of the worst, if not the worst, I’ve seen in recent times you’ll understand just how bad it was!
Appleton is to blame for our failure to win this game. Cambridge ought to have been ahead at half time as they failed to take advantage of some glorious opportunities.
A couple of those came courtesy of defensive cock-ups one from AMB and one from playing it out poorly from the back ( I can’t recall who was to blame for that).
It was evident so early on that we’d been set up badly. No Louie Watson again whilst retaining Fraser in another physical game. In addition, the manager saw fit to give young Rylah his league debut.
The gaffer decided to play May on his own up front and so it was no wonder he got no change from the U’s defence.
I’m tempted to say that the manager’s learning on the job but clearly he’s not. He obviously learned nothing from the mad team selection against Cray Valley at home.
He ought to have changed things after at least 30 minutes but he delayed until half time when he made his one good sub decision of the day in bringing on Kanu.
The young striker showed an appetite missing from most in the first half. It was his persistence that set up the chance for May to score.
Minutes later and CBT decided either to earn his corn or remembered that a scout might be watching and produced some trickery and a lovely cross for Campbell C to head home.
We were fortunate to go 2-0 up but most of the Valley faithful knew that we needed a third to make it safe. I felt that if it stayed at 2-0 and the U’s scored at any time it would be a problem for us (I don’t say that with the benefit of hindsight btw).
Having got the first sub right, all the other subs Appleton made were utter madness. He brought on Mbick after Cambridge got their first. It was a change in the pipeline but not one he had to make after watching them score. There was time to pull out of that.
However, he simply didn’t have the courage, common sense or humility to alter the move.
When he brought on Deji to add another defender you knew instantly what it was going to lead to. We’ve seen it all to often. It was simply inviting them on to us.
If they weren’t before then alarm bells ought to be ringing regarding the manager.
When we drew at Carlisle he said that if we beat Cheltenham it would be looked upon as a good point. Do me a favour!
Post match on Saturday and he was bemoaning the lack of older and experienced players. Utter tosh! Our failure to win was down to his management of the game.
We ought to be concerned that he seems to fall out with players. We can add Tedic (nothing said on why he wasn’t in the squad) to Watson L being ostracised.
On top of all this (and I know we have several injuries) but we’re a million miles away from a settled side. Instead, we have one that constantly changes from game to game.
Allied to that, attacking wise, we’re so one dimensional and when CBT can’t be bothered as appears to be the case several times of late, we offer virtually nothing.
We look set to struggle through the remainder of this month. Beyond that who knows?
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