Shrewsbury Town 0-1 Bolton

I watched it and they had chances but to be fair they were only half chances apart from Bowman's miss. It's the gamble Evatt is taking playing a back 3 with 2 WBs pushing on - if they don't get back quickly we're susceptible to the break but when they're all back we can - and did - hold out for long periods which is a massive change from trying to dominate possession and going nowhere.
Geth didn't have a great game but him and Fossey do represent a decent wide threat so I can see what he's trying and I like it - but the lads simply have to play better.

Hair raising stuff from Trafford at the start of both games. Both could have easily been goals and he would have been lambasted on here. But because we have two fortuitous clean sheets people are touting him as more accomplished and more confident than Dixon.
I feel the jury is still very much out on that.

Aside from that, I still feel that his long passing is far less impressive than Dixon's and he also tends to waste a lot of time by holding the ball for ages or not releasing it to start a fast attack. Dixon was a master at this.

I think Dixon's couple of very in your face errors have swayed a vocal minority (or even majority) to turn against him rather than accurately assess his merits.

terenceanne wrote:
Not sure why we were toothless today - probably too much backwards and sideways again. 

Respectfully disagree with this, T.

I think finding our stride against Ipswich WAS precisely down to returning to our early season roots of passing and retaining the ball, even sideways and backwards. 

I think today's toothlessness was down to us reverting to a kick and rush long ball mentality. Indeed right from kick off our second touch was to hoof it forwards to no avail. Again we pumped free kicks in our own half long. We repeated it over and over, generally losing possession each time. Personally, even with the win, I bemoaned our lack of passing and thought that cwe weren't really worth all 3 points.

The goal with Jack Dearden commentary 

Biggie wrote:Hair raising stuff from Trafford at the start of both games. Both could have easily been goals and he would have been lambasted on here. But because we have two fortuitous clean sheets people are touting him as more accomplished and more confident than Dixon.
I feel the jury is still very much out on that.

Aside from that, I still feel that his long passing is far less impressive than Dixon's and he also tends to waste a lot of time by holding the ball for ages or not releasing it to start a fast attack. Dixon was a master at this.

I think Dixon's couple of very in your face errors have swayed a vocal minority (or even majority) to turn against him rather than accurately assess his merits.

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Biggie wrote:

Respectfully disagree with this, T.

I think finding our stride against Ipswich WAS precisely down to returning to our early season roots of passing and retaining the ball, even sideways and backwards. 

I think today's toothlessness was down to us reverting to a kick and rush long ball mentality. Indeed right from kick off our second touch was to hoof it forwards to no avail. Again we pumped free kicks in our own half long. We repeated it over and over, generally losing possession each time. Personally, even with the win, I bemoaned our lack of passing and thought that cwe weren't really worth all 3 points.

Yes, but there are still too many occasions where MJ for example will get possession back, then instead of turning and playing the ball forward or clipping it into a channel whatever - he passes back to the goalie who proceeds to hoof it up the park. Which tends to turn over the possession again. In my mind the player on the halfway line should be a little bit more accurate even with a hoof.
Watch Man City - they do it quite often in a game.

It's Monday. Any chance of news about our targets?