Burton Albion 3-1 BWFC

Tuesday night at the Pirelli Stadium and it will be all hands to the pumps as we take on Burton Albion in the hope of closing the gap on the teams above us and putting a bit more pressure on the Portsmouth side that are on our heels with a game in hand.

Burton sit just 5 points and 3 places behind us and have struggled against teams above them, yet put away the teams below them no problem - apart from Cambridge today which ended 2 all  - so it's no surprise they're mid table.

Since signing up Gassam Adahme from Norwich, they've tweaked their system to a slightly more adventurous 4312 (from 4321) to facilitate the young Moroccan striker who is pacy, skilful but delivering not too much end product as yet.

They have decent players throughout the team and are tidy defensively but again I think this is all about us - if we play to our ability and Evatt doesn't tweak the team too much, we should have enough to take the points.

We need this and I think we'll scrape it 1 - 2.

COYWM!

Update:

Just been looking at the Pirelli pitch and it's a bog with rough patches all over the place - not really condusive to free flowing football. Add to that the fact that Burton have been fielding 6 out-and-out defenders in recent games, and we can expect a war of attrition on Tuesday night. Hopefully Evatt will pick a team better suited for trench warfare

As with all our remaining games it's another must win. We can't get out of 10th but will close the gap. Obviously, we will have a slip up somewhere. I expect a couple of team changes, hopefully we should have enough to get the job done.

terenceanne wrote:As with all our remaining games it's another must win. We can't get out of 10th but will close the gap. Obviously, we will have a slip up somewhere. I expect a couple of team changes, hopefully we should have enough to get the job done.

We should win this but the pitch is a bit of a leveller. Potential banana skin.

wanderlust wrote:
We should win this but the pitch is a bit of a leveller. Potential banana skin.

Conditions so bad that I fear Trench Foot  could be a future problem.

Cajunboy wrote:
Conditions so bad that I fear Trench Foot  could be a future problem.

Weather forecast in Burton is for biblical rain in the morning which should stop before the game - should be the perfect "calm before the storm" which is likely to arrive in Bolton just in time for our game against Wimbledon on Saturday

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] fans the [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] is the away fans only pub. It has hot & cold food, parking, Sky Sports, large capacity and is a 6min walk to ground

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Postcode to get here DE13 0AR

Parking available by the ground

Station is 30min walk to ground

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We need to tighten up after the last game but no reason why we can't continue this great run, i'm going 2-1 to the Super Whites.

Norpig wrote:We need to tighten up after the last game but no reason why we can't continue this great run, i'm going 2-1 to the Super Whites.

I'm just hoping we don't make it difficult for ourselves by conceding first.

Could be off this one tonight given the weather forecast and the state of their pitch but I hope not because we need to keep the momentum going. Big test for the lads tonight but since they seem more on defending it could be a good night for us with our new scoring boots on. They rely on set pieces so I think we need both Bod and Baka back for them tonight so Charles may be rested. I’d also consider Sadlier for Marlon given conditions but that would be a big call for IE. Either way I’m going 0-2 to the Whites.

Whitesince63 wrote:Could be off this one tonight given the weather forecast and the state of their pitch but I hope not because we need to keep the momentum going. Big test for the lads tonight but since they seem more on defending it could be a good night for us with our new scoring boots on. They rely on set pieces so I think we need both Bod and Baka back for them tonight so Charles may be rested. I’d also consider Sadlier for Marlon given conditions but that would be a big call for IE. Either way I’m going 0-2 to the Whites.

Just looked at the updated weather forecast in Burton and the weather front is running a bit late so there's a chance it will rain during the game but not so much before so it could be just about playable.

That said, I read this on a fans forum:

"Having not seen a home game for 2 years until the Sheff Wed game 10 days ago, I was shocked by the state of the pitch. It may not yet quite rival the old Baseball Ground, but it is no surface to play on. I used to be surprised how well the pitch used to stand up to the rigours of the season. Even at this time of the year there would be a good covering of grass and drainage didn't seem to be a problem. What has gone wrong I don't know, but something clearly has. Is it just down to additional games being played on it, or has the high standard of maintenance that lead to the pitch regularly winning awards slipped in recent seasons?

One thing is clear, a sodden pudding of largely grassless sandy mud is no encouragement to decent football, nor will it assist in building much needed new support. Still as they always say, it's the same for both teams. Let's hope Albion, being used to it, adapt better tonight. We'll see!"

I suppose we have to write this one off........ our inability to clear the ball from our penalty area cost us tonight......otherwise they were never in the game ---- that's the banana skin stepped on.
One thing of note going forward is our goal difference..... it's the worst of any top ten and shipping three more tonight didn't help.  Plymouth 6th and Oxford 7th are separated by one goal for example. 
Needless to say, we can't afford anymore slipups. Onwards !!!

Terrible start to the game and it was effectively over after 17 minutes. They won every battle and second ball and we couldn't cope with their physicality. 

We played better second half but the likes of Dempsey, Sadlier and Bodvarrson didn't take their chance after getting a start. Back to Morley. Dapo and Celine for Saturday hopefully.

Norpig wrote:Terrible start to the game and it was effectively over after 17 minutes. They won every battle and second ball and we couldn't cope with their physicality. 

We played better second half but the likes of Dempsey, Sadlier and Bodvarrson didn't take their chance after getting a start. Back to Morley. Dapo and Celine for Saturday hopefully.

The Wombles will be rubbing their hands watching that.

Norpig wrote:Terrible start to the game and it was effectively over after 17 minutes. They won every battle and second ball and we couldn't cope with their physicality. 

We played better second half but the likes of Dempsey, Sadlier and Bodvarrson didn't take their chance after getting a start. Back to Morley. Dapo and Celine for Saturday hopefully.

Thought Dempsey, Sadlier and Bodvarsson were the best of a bad bunch TBH and Dapo was dire when he came on.
The problem was defending the throws and corners - so if anyone needs replacing it's the defence - including Santos.

I guess if we're not able to press them back at the top of the pitch when playing in poor conditions, them inevitably there'll be more pressure on the defence - and Burton didn't have to worry about a bobbly wet pitch because they just launched it into the box - the ball hardly touched the ground.

The problem was, we missed Jones.
Aimson does ok as backup but we don't distribute as well without Jones.

Secondly, our delivery on crosses from corners, free kicks and open play is poor. Why can't Pro footballers get the ball above chest height when crossing?