I wouldn't have blamed him. Thought he looked our most industrious player up to that point, always looking to be involved and always making himself available.Sparky wrote: Sat Sep 13, 2025 6:51 pm Curious game that one. Like Tony said, for long stretches there was this massive gap in midfield. We seemed a little obsessed with putting pressure on their centre backs with long balls. And down the channels. Worked sometimes, I suppose, but seemed to lead to those large gaps in the middle. Not a fan of giving up the centre of midfield like that, often means that the opposition make use of it and boss it.
Anyway, thought Sam Deadfield had a good game today. Not always been a fan, probably because of memories of the Gwynnet year, when he and Shane Dunne would sit back and watch the game go by, though that probably had something to do with Mel's style. Thought he dragged us through today's win very well. Was it me, or did Harry look very annoyed at being substituted?
AFC Croydon Athletic (H)
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Lord Elpus
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HamptonLifer5
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Harry's head looked to have been on Mars all afternoon! Pushing and shoving almost all of their team. Good win, good comeback. Onto the next round!
Agreed Harry Gardner was on a short fuse all afternoon. I thought Paul Field also seemed off his game today and I think we badly missed Nathan Paul-Lavaly. However, very effective substitutions at 58 mins got the job done for us. The poorest performance of the season at the Bev so far but all good if we can still win on those days.HamptonLifer5 wrote: Sat Sep 13, 2025 8:34 pm Harry's head looked to have been on Mars all afternoon! Pushing and shoving almost all of their team.
I spotted that too. He was sailing a bit close to the wind in the first half getting into tussles with the Croydon players and could have picked up a card. Maybe a bit frustrated that things weren’t going our way.
I get that a longer ball into the channels is the right option if you are struggling to play through the press but it needs midfield to get up in support of the forwards more quickly. At times our build up was too slow almost as if we feel we have to play across the back a few times before launching forward.
I get that a longer ball into the channels is the right option if you are struggling to play through the press but it needs midfield to get up in support of the forwards more quickly. At times our build up was too slow almost as if we feel we have to play across the back a few times before launching forward.
Very brief highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVH9Ohk7ims
A very high quality video from Croydon, featuring our own Chris Hurst! https://youtu.be/ZraoaMfWdiQ?si=QxraDaBA1oR7DBoS