FAN’S VIEW 22/23 – NO.3: CAMBRIDGE AT HOME

Our opponents

Cambridge spent nine seasons in the Conference, from 2005/06 – 2013/14 and then seven in L2 before returning to tier three for the first time in 20 years last season.

Although they started as one of the favourites to go straight back down they survived fairly comfortably finishing the campaign in 14^th position on 58 points. A bit strange then that the bookies odds showed similar before a ball was kicked this time.

With one league game now played and also, for some reason, their Carabao Cup first round match against Millwall, they’re still to concede a goal and have won both.

I suggest it would be very easy to underestimate them although the odds now quoted show that Morecambe, Fleetwood, Cheltenham, Exeter and Burton in that order are considered more likely for the drop.

Their L1 win was 1-0 against MK Dons at the Abbey Stadium. MK are still quite fancied – although they’ve lost the highly rated Scott Twine – so a very good result for Cambridge and from the few minutes highlights I saw I was quite impressed. They appeared to be quite a big side with some strong runners in the team. Harvey Knibbs was their scorer, running at the defence and finishing well. Watching just a few minutes of a game can be quite deceptive – I was under the impression they were throwing early high balls in although to be fair they did play some good football too. I was surprised though to see possession at 50:50 and Cambridge playing the most passes of the two teams and also being more accurate with those passes. They made 10 fewer crosses than the visitors. I suppose the message here is don’t get fixed ideas of how a team plays. It would be very wrong indeed to think of them as just a hardworking L2 side punching above their weight.

I am expecting an intriguing game of football but my thinking was that surely we should have enough in our squad to get three home points on the board at the first time of asking.

By most measures they’re a smaller club than us. Last season our average home gates were 2,769 higher than theirs. Capacity of the Abbey Stadium is only 8,127 and that includes just 4,376 seats. About 20 years ago the club sold the freehold. Their Landlord since 2010 has been Grosvenor Property UK. When CUFC have been in a bit of difficulty they’ve been helped out with rent reductions and write offs. I can think of certain landlords who have not been quite so helpful.

For years the club tried to relocate without success and in March this year Paul Barry, the majority shareholder of Cambridge United, wrote to supporters, “ … deep down we have always known that the Abbey is where we really wanted to stay, recognising that for all its imperfections and quirkiness it is our home, one full of character and memories. So I am pleased to be able to tell you all that today we have agreement in principle with Grosvenor for the Club to buy back the freehold of the Abbey Stadium. We have agreed a very fair and reasonable price. The funding plan is in place and we hope to conclude the purchase by the summer.”

Their latest annual accounts to 30 June 2021 include this note: “ The company has entered into a memorandum of understanding whereby the landlord has agreed at their discretion, on an annual basis to reduce the annual rental charge to £100,000, so long as both parties continue to work together to promote the redevelopment or relocation of the Abbey Stadium. The annual rental charge for the year under the lease was £100,000. The annual rental charge for the prior year under the lease was £75,000 due to the company receiving three months’ rent relief due to Covid-19.”

Well, we wanted to stay at the Manor except it was 100% not practical if we were to grow as a football club. Just a pity we didn’t jump straight from there to Stratfield Brake under the current owners with the Kassam years never having happened

No chance though with Oxford Parkway not existing then.

I will watch with interest what redevelopment is carried out at the Abbey Stadium, what the capacity ends up, how many seats, cost and how it will be all be funded. With £1m on the balance sheet those accounts show they’re not currently in debt. This is likely down to Barry’s benevolence. Loans to the football club from a company Barry owns have been converted to share capital.  I’ll gloss over our debt. Debt in itself is of course not a bad thing as long as it can be funded.

An out and an in

Going at the end of the month – Academy Manager Dan Harris. Very highly thought of from what I can gather. Came across most impressively when he was guest at the Manor Club. Seems that a very sound structure is in place and it now remains to be seen who fills the void. However it’s not as if there’s been a constant stream of talent flowing through to the first team. That probably leads to frustration be it from those trying to push the youngsters through thinking they’re ready or those waiting to receive them thinking they’re not quite ready yet.

In on loan for a year – 19 year old central midfielder Lewis Bate from Leeds. He played 137 minutes of Premier League football last season. How many L1 minutes will he play for us? Loan signings can make all the difference between success and not quite making it. Let’s hope he’s the right man. He is not very tall but neither is Herbie Kane or Lionel Messi.

Oxford United 1 Cambridge United 0

This being the first home game of the season we undertook our traditional river walk from the city centre along the Thames via Sandford to the Kassam. Starting point was the White House by Tap Social. What’s not to like? They open at 8:30 a.m. and serve beer from 10:00 a.m. Bit early but there you go, each to their own. 11:30 was acceptable. Kind of turns it into an away game and for many they’re more enjoyable experiences than a visit to Minchery Farm. The Tap Social movement is something I think deserves supporting. It “grew out of a passion for good beer and social justice. They are a craft brewery and hospitality social enterprise that provides training and employment opportunities to ex-offenders and welcoming, inclusive spaces for the whole community”. There certainly is a community feel about the place. I’ll likely return.

Of course I have gone into rapture over some of the football we’ve produced under Karl and the number of goals we score. Last season it was 82. No team other than champions Wigan could match that, but I’ve made it clear to the point of frustration that I’m not happy with that alone. Defensively it has been a different story. In 21/22 eleven sides let in fewer than we did. Some fans don’t seem to care about this and chatting to them I get the impression they might be happier losing a 4-3 thriller than getting a scrappy 1-0 win. I’d quite like to see a bit of a mix and would be pleased to see us sacrifice some of our attacking intent if it means significantly tightening up. Not asking much am I?

But where’s that balance? That’s for the manager to figure out and it will change depending on who the opposition are.

At Derby if it had not been for one error which was compounded by too many players running towards the ball we would not have conceded. In this I thought we looked as solid at the back as we have done for a very long time. There’s already a strong central partnership between Elliott Moore and Stuart Findlay. It seemed to me we weren’t playing 4-3-3 but more 4-2-3-1 and the two Cameron Brannagan and Marcus McGuane obviously provide protection. (I must confess I’m hopeless at picking up team formations and that applies to us and/or our opponents)

Playing like this we were creating very little with the whole affair being quite mundane. So I’m now thinking have we gone too far the other way? No pleasing me is there?

Billy Bodin, Josh Murphy and Marcus Browne weren’t in the game much and Matty Taylor was again an isolated figure. I’d be interested to know how many touches our number 9 got during this game. I’m starting to think Lukaku at Chelsea last season.

There were individual errors too and it was things like Sam Long taking his eye off the ball and letting it go out of play to concede possession to the visitors that were building up in my memory bank. An analysis of that data could easily lead to the conclusion that this wasn’t going to be our day.

Come the second half when it was more of the same and we weren’t able to play any football that was hurting Cambridge, those high balls forward which we were never going to win had me once more yearning for a big physical centre-forward.

For all this MT sticks to his thankless task and in the first half did win a very good header which sent Browne through on goal with it looking like we were about to trouble the scoreboard for the first time in 22/23. Penalty or not? I’d say a lot more yes than no but it wasn’t given by referee Tom Reeves in only his second season on the league list.

Cambridge were a well organised team who didn’t seem to be struggling to stop us play. They probably looked the more likely scorers but didn’t manage one shot on target all afternoon. That though doesn’t mean none of their nine shots didn’t go close or that a forward wasn’t far from getting on the end of something.

Karl made four substitutions in the final quarter and two of these changed the game and the mood out of all recognition.

It only took a few moments to see that Lewis Bate was something special. For the first time all afternoon I felt excited and that I might leap from my seat at any moment. He had that extra quality, looked composed on the ball and immediately got us attacking more.

Size wise our average height wasn’t increasing but we now looked really dangerous from corners. First Moore then Taylor were only denied by very good saves from Cambridge stopper Dimitar Mitov.

Although our improvement had been marked nothing more than a point appeared to be coming our way.

Tyler Goodrham, a day shy of his 19^th birthday, was only introduced in the 86^th minute. Another very small player. That’s not a criticism of anyone under six foot just a statement of fact and wondering what the average height of the eleven we had on the pitch at that time was and if it was an all-time low.

What a few minutes he had out there.

We’re not usually good at doing much positive when we get a throw-in. Bate was alert and moved to get space. Steve Seddon the thrower wasn’t hanging around either. First time passing wasn’t something we’d been doing much. First time passes can increase the tempo of a game and if done accurately with decent touch or control exhibited by the receiver can get the opposition on the back foot and in a bit of a tangle pretty quickly. Bate did play it first time to Goodrham. No way did it look like a goal would result from the situation. Our teenager was midway between penalty area and touch line and seemed to be well marshalled. He turned, went, cut inside using the outside of his right foot and bulldozed past his marker. Another defender stepped towards him frightened of conceding a spot-kick. Again Goodrham used his body and strength, then from a yard or so outside the angle of the six yard box fired home.

What a joy. It’s always so sweet to win a game right at the death and this was in the final minute of the added four – and from a young lad from the Academy making his League debut.

The ball heading for the top corner from Tyler’s right boot. Photo Steve Daniels

From a pragmatic standpoint the clean sheet was as pleasing. Perhaps a little bit meaningless this early on but two games into this new campaign we’re now one of 17 teams in L1 that have a 50% success rate at keeping opponents out. None have managed it in both matches they’ve played.

This demonstrates how tight the league is going to be again as does the fact that Peterborough are already the only team to have maximum points.

Looking at Cambridge fans’ opinions online there are many that think they were worth at least a point. I’ve also heard some of our own say we were lucky. I think we did deserve the win. After those substitutions we were the most threatening side.

The stats back this up. We had 56% possession. We made 409 passes to Cambridge’s 326 and this was without our football really getting going for most of the game. Our passing accuracy in both halves of the pitch was better than theirs. We had 15 shots, six of which were on target.

7462 Oxford fans will have left the ground buzzing, 595 from Cambridge thinking football is a cruel game. I was expecting slightly more supporters from each club to turn out. I have to say though that the Amber Army stood together as a unit and made a decent amount of noise to get behind their team. Another bloody drum. No thanks.

I’m going to end with a bit of humour lifted from Cambridge fans on social media. A few did recognise what a good goal our very late winner was. One posted, “”Fantastic strike from their lad, tbf.”  Another had picked up when his birthday is. “It’s his 19th birthday tomorrow, bet he’ll wake up happy tomorrow”. And a third added, “Will probably wake up the other six Dwarves as well.” I don’t think the fact that we lack inches is escaping away fans.