FAN’S VIEW 22/23 – No.31 – IPSWICH AT HOME

More than once I’ve commented that the 22/23 version of L1 isn’t as strong as it has been in previous seasons whilst a couple of times noting a very impressive standout side. The first that caught my eye was Plymouth, based on their win over us at Home Park and their performance live on Sky against Exeter. The other was Ipswich who destroyed us at their place on Boxing Day. We’d lost nine league games before this fixture but only one by more than a single goal that being the three the Tractor Boys put past us.

Even the best – or those that appear to be the best – team’s top form comes and goes. Since they beat us we’ve each played three league games. In those games we’ve picked up double the points they have. They’ve drawn all of them: 2-2 at Pompey, 1-1 at Lincoln, who remain unbeaten at home despite only winning twice and the previous week being held 1-1 when Plymouth visited. Probably not the easiest set of fixture around. We of course won last week at Fleetwood and had beaten Charlton and lost to Exeter at the Kassam. Easier opponents?

Although I’m very confident that there will not be such a gap in the score line of this one as there was in the reverse fixture, it goes without saying that this is a very difficult game for us.

Notably most of the “big” L1 clubs that are always being referenced are now at the apex of the table. 1. Plymouth 2. Sheffield Wed 3. IPSWICH 4. Derby 5. Bolton. I can probably add Barnsley too in 6^th. Based on size the notable underachievers are Charlton and Pompey.

Yes, a very difficult league from which to win promotion. Before this one none of the top six have yet visited. It’s about time we started beating them at the Kassam. Given that we’ve only drawn with or been beaten by Morecambe, MK Dons, Fleetwood and Forest Green on our patch I feel the fans are owed something special between now and the end of the campaign to make up for this and give us vfm on the cost of our tickets at last.

OXFORD UNITED 2 IPSWICH TOWN 1

In a long lifetime of following a football team you don’t get to see many games like this one. (See what I did there). It was a frozen pitch that was considered the threat to this match going ahead, not fog.

It was a fairly misty first half but after the break it got much worse with serious and legitimate doubt as to whether proceedings would reach a conclusion being constantly discussed in the stands.

At least the new score board shone bright through the haze and what a message it conveyed when referee Bobby Madden blew to end the contest. The event was surreal as it was but the electronic advertising surrounding the pitch made it even more so. The constant changes meant we had one hue after another obscuring and highlighting to varying degrees what little we could see anyway. It was crazy.

Should the game have been abandoned? From a spectators perspective absolutely yes. We saw little of what we’d paid for. Imagine going to the cinema and with the film just starting a dry ice machine is turned on. “We’ve seen the ball” the visiting fans sang at one stage.

At least our “premium seats” at the back of the SSU are quite close to the half way line so we would have had a much better view than those in the East Stand and ends of the North and South stands. That said there was still a helluva lot going on that we had no clue about. So some of my comments that follow may be based a bit on guess work and more so than usual other reports and highlights packages. Not that others will have been able to see much better than I or that the cameras brought clarity.

However I am not sure that consideration is given to what the crowd can and can’t see. It used to be considered that provided the referee could see both goals form the centre spot, football matches should be played. Whether that is really a thing or not I’ve no idea. Mr Madden did come across and have a word with both managers on two occasions. What was actually said I don’t know but obviously the game was not abandoned. If it had been called off after 75 minutes had been passed the score at the time, 1-1, would have stood. That is a new one to me and I have never heard of that happening anywhere ever.

Let me have a re-think. Should the game have been abandoned? Oxford United 2 Ipswich Town 1. Um! No of course not.

We started with three at the back plus two wing backs. So, is that five at the back? I never know. Probably not when the right wing back is the very much running with the ball type in Djavan Anderson. Our left wing back was Brandon Fleming, on loan from Hull, making his first start for us. He looked good in the first half then faded a bit. In the second half he faded from view completely. Literally.

This defensive formation perhaps wasn’t a surprise but playing with no recognised (centre) forward was. When the options are considered though, possibly not. Matty Taylor now offers little in that role, Gatlin O’Donkor is very inexperienced and not only is Kyle Joseph still getting back after a long time out, playing centrally isn’t his best position. So who did we have up there? Anybody? Yanic Wildschut? Billy Bodin? A false 9 perhaps. I was confused. I hope it confused our opponents.

When the game settled down to a pattern it was very even but gradually Ipswich began to assert themselves, creating chances whilst we looked nowhere like doing so.

Following a corner a Lee Evans drive from just outside the box hit Simon Eastwood in the chest and was then hacked away by Billy Bodin. Not a conventional save but it kept the ball out.

Wes Burns pin-balled himself between Fleming and Ciaron Brown before thrashing a shot from close range onto the bar. I’d give a lot of credit to Easty for his positioning in preventing a goal even if he did not touch the ball.

Conor Chaplin then arrowed a header into our keeper’s body.

It appeared that a goal could well have been on the way. It was – but surprisingly for us. The commentator observed that Eastwood was “not sure what to do with it”. He went long. Almost always this results in us losing possession, but not this time. Yanic Wildschut did really well to bring the ball under control and turn away from Luke Woolfenden. The ball behaved kindly and our man was able to force his way into the box suddenly only facing Cameron Burgess and keeper Christian Walton. He took the ball past Burgess and poked it home past Walton’s outstretched leg.

YW’s post-match interview on Radio Oxford was rather more informative than much of the blandness we have to suffer when watching national TV.

But we don’t keep clean sheets. A statement I’ve probably written about twenty times already this season.

Four minutes later it’s 1-1. The equaliser was really well worked but the space allowed to Janoi Donacien in the build-up was scandalous. Give a player that much room and you deserve to pay for it. Walton was involved in playing out from the back. When the ball got to Donacien he was able to move with it almost half way inside his own half to just outside our penalty area with no obstacle put in his way. He passed to Burns whose ball into the box, which Cameron Brannagan just failed to cut out with a desperate slide, found its target, Marcus Harness. A delicate chip to the far post was met by Leif Davis’s head with the ball put back across Eastwood and into the goal.

The crowd had sensed the danger. Karl could see it. Recriminations followed. Our captain and Brannagan exchanged words. CB was then called across to his boss who also spoke to our number 8. All this suggests that the area that our highest paid player should have been patrolling was left open. It wasn’t just that though we were all over the place. The commentator had it right: “far too easy”.

This didn’t bode well but even though we very much rode our luck we were never undone in quite such a fashion again. It was still though the Tractor Boys who looked the likelier to get the next goal if there was to be one.

Easty again used his body to block a Burns shot and George Hirst fired just wide when he probably should have done better. On another day it would have gone in.

Again though when a goal came it was for the team that had looked less like getting it, us. Again it came from going long, this time from a free-kick hit through the pea soup towards the corner flag on our right flank. O’Donkor got a head on it as he and Joseph outnumbered Davis with the ball falling loose. Another defender attempted to clear but Tyler Goodrham blocked it and then got it back from O’Donkor who held an opponent off really well. Goodrham then beat his man beautifully and played a quality ball into the six yard box. Yet another defender slashed the ball up but not properly away and then Sam Morsy’s head got it a little bit further from the goal he and his team mates were defending. Not far enough away by any stretch of the imagination though. One bounce and it was right on the edge of the D. One first time shot by Brannagan and it was beyond the keeper and into the goal. From what I could see it looked to have been very well executed and kept low.

There was still seven minutes to go and a further seven were added. So nearly a quarter of an hour of nail biting. Except if you can’t see how do you know when to bite? There were some shapes moving around against a very thick grey background. It was anyone’s guess as to who was doing what and where the ball was.

It was only after reading Chris Williams’s report on the official OUFC site that I learned Ipswich had hit the frame of the goal for a second time.

A result to savour, a team performance of grit and hard work but definitely not one to get too carried away with even though it rightfully should fill up the tank marked confidence close to the brim. There’s no doubt we’ve got talented players but in this one or two didn’t perform and none really stood out. Perhaps that shows what solidarity we’ve built as the season has progressed.

I’ve raved about Lewis Bate in recent weeks but he didn’t have a good game. I’ve also given plaudits to Joseph but I didn’t detect much influence from him in the half hour he had.

Yet we came away with maximum points, scoring two goals, without a strike force as such. Disappointingly it doesn’t seem that we will be bringing a striker in and the silence surrounding Sam Baldock is deafening.

Ipswich boss Kieran McKenna was quite gracious in defeat saying we did a job on them and Karl Robinson out thought him with our formation(s). We did of course revert to four at the back immediately after we’d retaken the lead.

I’m not so sure. If Ipswich had taken their chances it would have been a different story. They had 17 shots, six of which were on target. Five of our 13 were on target. Of those on target I can only recall the two that went in. That’ll do for me.

What I do remember is quite a few free-kicks and long throws which Brown tried to hurl into the penalty area with Elliott Moore having sent up being of poor quality and mostly not getting past the first defender. Do we need a dead ball coach? Where’s Mous when you need him?

Shame because we had loads of free-kicks. They conceded 22 to our nine. I thought Madden should have been shown yellow long before he did and the ref should have waved it at more than just the one Ipswich player. For me they were a bit dirty but having read the views of some of their fans on social media we were the rough house boys and being allowed to do what their team was being penalised for. True we’re no longer a pushover and we’re a much more competitive team for it.

Hardly any time to rest is there? Wycombe next and we know what they’re all about. Gareth Ainsworth saw as much of our game on Saturday as we did. He was sat just in front of us and stayed almost to the end.

Before we face the Chairboys there is something very important happening in the afternoon at two o’clock. Fingers crossed we get over the first hurdle.

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