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Tuesday 12th September. Steve Bruce has got to go! Town’s miserable start to the season continued again today with a 2-0 defeat against Wimbledon, and quite honestly the way they are playing I can’t see a quick solution coming. I am sick of hearing his lame excuses about injuries to key players as many of them are now back playing, but I think something is going wrong behind the scenes. Today saw the sacking of two other managers at opposite ends of the football league, and perhaps Steve Bruce will be watching his back now. Chelsea have parted company with Gianluca Vialli after a poor start to their season during which they have only won once, and although they have only played 5 games and lost only one of those the defeat was against Bradford so he probably had it coming. The other casualty today was at the Shay where Mark Lillis has guided Halifax Town to 92nd in the league propping up the rest and he has been given his marching orders. One of the front runners for the vacancy is the man I feel should still be running the show at the McAlpine, Peter Jackson, and I really hope that he gets the job. If he does I might go down to his first game at the Shay to give him my support as he was one of the few managers who seemed as passionate as the fans, a rare breed indeed. Anyway, back to tonight’s gutless show from the other HTFC. When I started writing this little tome I thought (hoped?) I would be commenting on Town’s meteoric rise into the Premiership. However I look at the league table tonight to see that only Grimsby are below us by virtue of scoring less goals. Grimsby parted with their manager recently after a poor start to the season, so think on Brucie. The game itself was memorable for, well, very little indeed. Ah yes, it was memorable for the attendance. Admittedly the country is gripped by a fuel crisis at present as hauliers and farmers blockade oil terminals and refineries making petrol a bit scarce, but only 7,592 people exercised the turnstiles at the McAlpine. Only 116 made the long trip from South East London meaning that around 1,000 season ticket holders are feeling disillusioned and didn’t fancy another frustrating 90 minutes. Town looked a little unsure of themselves as the game got underway and although Martin Smith did create a couple of early openings they were fairly unconvincing in their execution. Chris Beech has failed to show the level of performance this season that he is well capable of and when he did manage a strike at goal he snatched at the effort and sent the ball over the crossbar. Despite their relegation last season, Wimbledon are still a combative side who bossed the game from start to finish and Town never looked like picking up anything from this game as soon as John Hartson game them a 21st minute lead. The ball was played through from Wimbledon’s half of the pitch to Neal Ardley who found himself in acres of space, he raced forward to level with the edge of Town’s penalty area and his powerful low cross was smashed in without hesitation by Hartson. From my position it looked as though he might have been offside but a TV replay seen at half time showed that Dean Gorré who had failed to push up played him onside. Town continued to create little as the half progressed and the Dons defence always seemed to have the ability to dispossess our strikers with frustrating ease. Rob Kozluk looked generally lively but most of his crosses were poor and most passed harmlessly over the heads of our modestly proportioned strikers and I just wish that Steve Bruce would tell Kozluk that we don’t have any 8 foot tall players in our squad. Most of our meagre opportunities fell to Kevin Gallen who fired narrowly over in the 28th minute and then headed towards goal 5 minutes later but the attempt was so poor it didn’t even cross the dead ball line. The former QPR man laid on a shooting chance for Martin Smith on 38 minutes but even when we did manage an effort on target the Wimbledon keeper was up to the task turning the ball around the post for a corner. Wimbledon doubled their lead in the 52nd minute when Ken Monkou reinstated to the starting line up surrendered possession to Marcus Gayle and his chip into the area was despatched past Nico Vaesen by the head of John Hartson. At 2-0 down Town looked devoid of ideas and the introduction of Kevin Kyle 2 minutes after the second goal did little to improve Town’s fortunes as the visitors defence worked efficiently as a unit. Kevin Kyle did manage a rare shot on target a few minutes after his introduction but keeper Davis saved easily and then it was almost 20 minutes before the Davis was called into action again to tip a Martin Smith effort over the bar. The most worrying aspect of the game was Town’s complete lack of creativity and fight in midfield and against a physical side like Wimbledon you either need to show guile or grit, and Town showed neither. The game drifted tamely towards full time and the only surprise was that the lead wasn’t greater for the visitors who could have increased the margin of woe, especially after Rob Kozluk cleared off the line. There was a late scare for Wimbledon when an awful clearance looked as though it had crossed the line but the referee ruled otherwise, and let’s face it the result was academic by this stage anyway. This little feast of football was featured on Sky TV, and I really pity the poor sods who parted with good money to watch a performance such as this one. It’s probably a bit early in the season to be talking about 6 pointers but with Gillingham only a point above us we must stop the rot when we visit the Priestfield Stadium in 4 days time.
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All words and thoughts by Chris except where stated.
A big thank you to Machala for putting up with me doing this and Ian for his support and my Mum for her proof reading.
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