Bolton 2-1 Burton

Should hammer Burton really but we all know how unpredictable we are from one game to the next!

I'm going for a comfortable 2-0 win. We are looking a bit short on centre backs though, hopefully Toal is fit to play?

Have we gone back to the 3-5-2-1 system again?

Had to answer the door to the postman and missed the mad 3 minutes or so and missed the goals.

Typical! Next time I'm not going to answer it!

Stephen Crainey admitted Wanderers were not at their best in beating Burton Albion – but he remains pleased that they could continue their upward trajectory in the table.

The assistant boss spoke to local media after a 2-1 win, which came courtesy of second-half goals from Aaron Collins and Randell Williams.

The Whites climbed to 11th in the table with what proved a patchy performance but Crainey felt the result was all-important on the day.

“I’m delighted to win the game, obviously, but we can play better,” he said. “We demand better as well and I think we will play better, moving forward, but it is nice to win games of football and we did that today.

“I thought the first 10-15 minutes we started well, good high-intensity to our play, had a couple of chances within that but you have to take those in games of football, otherwise you let teams back into it. We need to sustain that pressure for 90 minutes, not just 20. It’s something we aspire to do.

“That’s us won four out of five now, which is good, we’ve got Birmingham and Peterborough this week. St Andrews on Tuesday will be tough, we know that, but we have got a good squad here and we’ll give a good account of ourselves.”

Serving the first of his three-match ban, Ian Evatt watched the game from the TV gantry and communicated with his staff on the bench via a radio.

Asked if the Bolton boss had given him “ear-ache” during some of the more dramatic spells of the match, Crainey laughed: “Not at all. He was quite calm and controlled.

“It isn’t ideal the manager not being at the side but sometimes it happens in football, you have to adjust and adapt and that is what we did today. I was just delighted to win the game.

“He can speak before the game, at half time and then after the game. I was on the radio to him, so was Pete, so we got clear communication there and made it work.”

Wanderers go to league leaders Birmingham on Tuesday night with Crainey and Atherton in charge on the touchline.

“Naturally the manager leads from the front but me and Pete needed to do it today,” Crainey said. “The manager misses the next two and then he’ll be back at the side leading the team but for the next two me and Pete will have to do it. The manager will have his say, we’ll have communication with him, whatever he says goes.”

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I see people moaning again in various comments - I thought we were the far better team and should have been three up at half time. Of course, we couldn't hold our wads for 90 minutes but there was some good football played in parts.  Dempsey MOM for me.
Will we get hammered on Tuesday - With the current defense, probably. But we often play to the level of our opponents.......so you never know.
COYWM

The goals.

Clever thinking for our first one (can't be offside from a throw-in) and a defensive nightmare for their goal!

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Sluffy wrote:Have we gone back to the 3-5-2-1 system again?

To answer my own question - Yes we did!

Seems very few others (if any?) picked up on this - being the new system we started the season with that flopped so badly for us.

I guess Evatt most have wanted to give it another try and presumably fancied it would work against struggling in the league Burton?

It doesn't seem to me to be a massive success this time either - our first goal was quick thinking at a throw in (so not part of the 3-5-2-1 system design) and the defending for their goals was like watching the Keystone Cops!

Burton Abion boss Mark Robinson believes there was plenty to admire in his side’s performance at Wanderers, despite a defeat which leaves them anchored to the foot of League One.

The Brewers are the only team in the division yet to win a game but Robinson feels a change of luck is on the cards if they can tighten up on the errors which helped Bolton go 2-0 up in the second half.

Mason Bennett missed a gilt-edged opportunity before the break which could have given Burton a foothold, and Danilo Orsi did bring them quickly back into the game at 2-1 with 24 minutes left to go.

“It was probably the least control we have had in a game, but we dug in, especially the first 10-15 minutes and showed that resilience,” Robinson said.

“We weathered that spell and had some moments. It was a very tight game after that.

“A lot of their better moments came from us turning the ball over too cheaply.

“But just one moment cost us (first goal) and it is difficult because you don’t work on that on the training ground.

“You have got to stay switched on against good players and we didn’t stay switched on. To concede the second one straight away made it harder.

“But I admired how the boys came straight back in it."

Wanderers had dominated in the first half an hour but Mason Bennett missed a chance from point blank range to give his side a lead.

“You have to stay positive and make your own luck. It affected ‘Mase’ for a little while,” Robinson said. “He arrived there but couldn’t sort his feet out and the ball ends up going away from goal instead of in it.”

Burton have games against fellow strugglers Cambridge and Crawley on the horizon and Robinson believes the team, which brought in 24 new players over the summer and are now playing a completely different style to the one they did last season, will turn a corner.

“We have to find a way,” he said. “We have to mix the resilience we had today, not make the errors. We are not getting carved open because of the style of play. In every game it is moments and we have to work hard to put those moments in our favour.”

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Burton have sacked their manager...

Robinson sacked as Burton head coach

League One bottom side Burton Albion have sacked head coach Mark Robinson following a run of seven successive defeats in all competitions.

Robinson, 58, left his previous job as Chelsea's development squad boss to become Burton head coach in June.

But he won only one of his 14 games in charge - in the EFL Trophy - and the club's Scandinavian owners decided change was necessary following Tuesday's 3-2 home loss to Wycombe Wanderers.

The Brewers are bottom of the League One table with four points from 11 games, already 11 points from safety.

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