Inconsistencies It’s goals, not possession, that matters
WEYMOUTH ..................... 1 COUNTY ............................ 0
COUNTY fell to a surprise 1-0 defeat at lowly Weymouth in National League action on Saturday, as Simon Rusk’s inconsistent start to life in charge of The Hatters continued on the South Coast.
Despite County appearing to be clear favourites on the day, with Rusk’s side looking to apply further pressure to the National League’s top three following last weekend’s 2-0 win over in-form Chesterfield, a strike inside the opening five minutes by Terras forward Andy Dallas proved enough to hand Weymouth the three points – and what, for County, is a humiliating league double over The Hatters.
As has been the case far too often for County, Rusk’s men enjoyed the lion’s share of possession without forcing the breakthrough – and despite a much improved second half, The Hatters again couldn’t find a way through.
The former Brighton U23’s boss has now overseen three wins and three defeats sandwiching five stalemates since he took charge at Edgeley Park following Jim Gannon’s contentious dismissal in late January, with County still sitting fourth in the National League but now seven points off the leading pack.
Rusk named a side showing two changes to the side which earned a 2-0 win over Chesterfield on Saturday, with Will Collar and Elliot Newby replacing Harvey Gilmour and the injured John Rooney.
The hosts got off to a flying start inside the opening five minutes, when a ricochet inside the area fell kindly for in-form loan striker Dallas to clip high past a helpless Ben Hinchliffe and put The Terras in front.
County looked to respond in rapid fashion, with Watford loanee Sam Dalby seeing his looping header nodded off the goalline five minutes later.
Alex Reid tested Ethan Ross with a first-time effort which the home `keeper tipped over following an Elliot Newby knockdown, but goalmouth action was hard to come by for the remainder of a quiet first half.
Chorley loanee Harry Cardwell replaced Dalby for the resumption of proceedings, and The Hatters looked livelier following the Scot’s introduction.
For Dalby, it looks to be an experiment failed following the youngster’s arrival from Watford last month, with the former Leyton Orient man looking likely to return to his parent club at the end of his one moan loan spell this week.
James Jennings saw a close-range effort superbly saved onto the post by Ethan Ross in the Terras goal, before Cardwell came agonisingly close to capping a wellworked County move when he backheeled Reid’s cut-back goalwards only to see his effort
WEYMOUTH have only won six games all season, two of them against us!
I don’t think they particularly raised their game when they played us – to be honest, they’re a pretty bad side, their league position supports that fact.
No, they beat us because we were clueless going forward and toothless in front of goal, again!
If we have any thoughts of automatic promotion (playing like this I don’t think we have, even though we’re only halfway into the season) we have to be beating teams who are sitting in the bottom three of the league table, teams that are losing week in, week out.
Our problems are obvious and many, and seem to be repeated every week, how many times did we have a player receive the ball with their back to goal without a clue what to do other than pass back?
How many times did our midfield lose possession with a wayward pass?
How many times were our forwards muscled off the ball?
How much possession did we have without anything to show for it?
And from the bench, no plan B.
This game could be seen as a defining moment in the season if things don’t massively improve and I mean improve immediately against Solihull Moors on Tuesday because the facts are we’ve gone from promotion contenders to a team looking to be hanging onto a play-off place.
Our first ever visit to the Bob Lucas Stadium would have been one of the first dates looked for from the traveling faithful and I’ve no doubt that we’d have had a positive effect.
But sitting at home watching the live stream (I’m sure my house wasn’t the only one where the language was a little “coarser” than normal) it’s obvious that we’ve regressed over the last nine games.
We’ve only scored in three of them and we can forget the 4-0 win at Woking, that was Jim’s team.
No matter what Simon Rusk says about possession or chances being created, if you can’t score you don’t win and we had chances, more than enough chances.
Alex Reid missed a header from three yards, saw a ball roll along the goalline after a back heel (a bit of power would have seen a goal in both cases) Jennings and Newby had an effort each and there was a bit of penalty box pin ball after a couple of corners but the truth is we weren’t good enough going forward.
It’s a reoccurring problem since the culture of the club has changed!