FAN’S VIEW 22/23 – No.41 – DERBY AT HOME

Where are those straws?

Prior to this game logic told me we are going down so I set myself the task of finding a straw to clutch on to but that was like, well, looking for one particular piece of straw in a very large haystack.

New manager? I’ve always been of the mind that the one to keep us up and the one to take us forward next season are two very different people. Even if we had brought in a grizzly old schooler with the expectation that he could boringly bring us just enough points by fair means or foul to ensure we’ll be seeing L1 football next season, I doubt the players at his disposal would have been capable of delivering it. Such is the crock of shite Robbo has left behind.

I therefore can’t help but feel sorry for Liam Manning, who certainly isn’t a coach with a pragmatic let’s just get the job done outlook. Going forward possibly he might well be the man. Last season as head coach of MK Dons he took the club within one point and three goals of automatic promotion to the Championship. In the summer they lost players such as leading scorer Scott Twine that weren’t really replaced and like us, they have had a horrific season. On 11 December last year with the Dons 23rd in the table on 15 points from 20 matches and having only won one of the previous 11 league games, he was given the boot.

I’m neither over the moon nor distraught about his appointment. As always let’s wait and see and give the guy a chance. He did both good and bad at the Dons – as KR did with us.

Time for a bit of compare and contrast to make me feel better.

Managerial records

Karl Robinson

Liam Manning

Just taking these stats at face value with no proper thought of what’s behind them, Manning wins. I’ll take that.

At 42 years old Robinson is still a relatively young manager/head coach. Manning is five years his junior. Neither has experience of playing in the Football League. Seems these are the types we are going for.

Manning’s favoured style is high pressing and lots of possession. I don’t think the high press is something we’ve ever done consistently or that effectively and I’d question whether all of our players are fit enough for such a workload. Lots of possession I like provided it’s not all sideways and backwards and there is an end product in the form of goals. We’ve seen the good and bad of that over the years with it latterly being mostly uninspiring going nowhere clueless football. Under Manning when we played the Dons they tried to play out from the back more than any other team I can recall with the keeper just about being an eleventh outfield player. Way too risky. We made them pay with our pressing and that says something. If we do similar under our new man you’ll be hearing “GET RID OF THE BLOODY THING” from the back row of the SSU.

Oxford United 2 Derby County 3

I went along with no expectation that we would get anything from this game. Even when we went 1-0 up after 14 minutes I still didn’t feel confident.

Sure enough nine minutes later we no longer had the lead and just over a quarter of an hour further on we were behind. That we only ended up losing by a single goal is neither here nor there. We lost, that’s it. Also our second was clearly too little too late. Call it a consolation if you must. It didn’t console me.

Derby weren’t very good but I’d say they were good at not being very good whilst knowing full well that was all that was required to beat us.

At the end of the day it was the usual story of not keeping a clean sheet. Defensively we’ve got worse. Earlier in the season we were letting in just the one so the thinking was if we could somehow get a goal we’d get a point. We’ve let in THREE in each of our last three home fixtures. That’s a damning statistic. Individually at times each of our back line look reasonable but as a unit it’s all very questionable. How often does a forward get between the two centre-halves? There’s plenty of individual mistakes there too. Not that many, but it doesn’t take many for the damage to be done and as a whole team we don’t seem to be able to put anything resembling a defensive barrier in front of the back line. Midfielders and forwards will at times chase back well and get tackles in but there’s so much more to it than that if the team is to become hard to beat. Currently we’re 100% the opposite.

The game was bookended by our two goals.

The first came from a perfectly weighted and accurate free-kick from James Henry. My brother, who had put a quid on Sam Long to score at any time at 14/1, said “this is going on Long’s head”. It indeed was, with our right-back making a run from beyond the far post.

Henry, who was our best player last week, looked to me to be so again. A few months back he had been playing like a man who looked to be finished, but having returned after his injury/few weeks rest to recharge, his experience and – dare I say it – at times bit of class, is just what we need at present. So it was a real pisser when he went off injured a few minutes from the end of the first half in obvious pain. It did not look good.

Kyle Joseph put away that late chance that was created for him by Marcus McGuane really well. He had the look of a proper finisher. If only he could do that a bit more often -or any of the others come to that. But they don’t. Is it that they can’t or that we rarely make chances like this?

Once more there was evidence of our lack of clinicality (I’m using this as a word even if it isn’t really) in this game. Gatlin O’Donkor put in the work rate and took a bit of a battering but had a couple of chances that one would expect a goal scoring centre-forward to do better with. There was also a first half breakaway when his touch let him down. I feel incredible sympathy for all the youngsters that are being thrown in to this holy mess of a season. Hopefully they’ll come out the other side better and stronger men for the experience and the football club will reap the rewards further down the line.

There were a few bits to like of what we saw of Oisin Smyth, making his league debut, but he too had a chance that he probably should have done better with. He’s been with us a year now and has hardly played any football in this country. In less than two months’ time he will be 23 so not really a youngster.

The stats from this game told quite a familiar tale but did somewhat surprise me. We had 65% possession and made 444 passes to the Rams 241 and were much more accurate than them with this: 72% to just 51%. However as we know there are passes and there are passes.

I’d not recalled us having so many shots – 13 with eight being on target. The visitors only had eight and four respectively. Joe Wildsmith in the Derby goal made a couple of decent saves but I didn’t think he was ever under real pressure.

A lot of our attacking was again players running with the ball as much in hope that they would be able to fashion something than part of a tactical game plan. That said, Marcus Browne was rather good at this and it was he who was chopped down more than once, including winning the free-kick from which we scored.

Djavan Anderson was not so good but just when it appeared that he was getting going, off he went and on came Tyler Goodrham on 66 minutes.

I love TG to bits, he excites more than any other and gives the impression that he is about to make something happen most of the time but he too occasionally frustrates when what, from high up in the stand, looks to be a simple and sensible pass is overlooked and possession is lost.

Many things frustrate at present and it would not make sense if that was not so given our plight. Another is that we don’t move the ball quickly enough. Three touches to get the ball from A to B when it could easily have been achieved in one.

Manning’s appointment had been announced on the club website in the morning. I got into the ground way earlier than I normally do but didn’t hear any announcement over the tannoy covering this. There was nothing – which I found strange. We all need a lift. Perhaps this was intentionally held back until he has actually started work at the football club.

He starts the job proper on Monday – and what a job.

Many fans now, whilst not quite resigned to it, are talking about the highly likely scenario of relegation. Next Saturday’s game at Morecambe is humungous.  The Shrimps are in 21^st position but are only three points behind us having played the same number of games. On Tuesday they host Charlton so could be level by the time we turn up. Their form is pretty crap. Over the last 10 games they’ve won just nine points. That’s relegation form. OUFC of course in their last 10 have got one miserable solitary point.

This is probably the worst ever run in the history of the football club. I can’t be arsed to check.

For all this, the talk is of us fans still being there if/when we end up in L2 next season. Of course we will be. I know I will be. We went down to the Conference with our team and stuck by them and would do the same again should they drop to that level.

With this though comes immense anger. That we have once before plummeted to those depths was down to Firoz Kassam’s parsimony. Like many owners he had no idea how to run a successful football club. This time my anger is as high as it was then because the money has been there but has been spaffed like never before. Lots of blame for this lies with Robbo but not solely. The owners and club officials, if any were in the loop, allowed it to happen. I wonder who KR reported to and how the monthly/quarterly (or whatever) progress meetings went. To have allowed him to remain in control during the January transfer window was nothing short of allowing the big hole the club had got into to get even larger.  Tyler Smith, Ateef Konate and Brandon Fleming were as much the answer to solving our many problems as the lead singer from Aerosmith, any old con artist and Brandon Flowers would have been.

Forgive me for not being upbeat now that we have changed head coach but that’s how I feel. I didn’t detect a whole lot of positivity around the ground from my fellow supporters either.

Next week could be pivotal. Win and there will be genuine belief that we’re capable of ensuring we play in tier three again in 2023/24. Lose and going down will feel almost inevitable.

Manning has not got long to work with not a lot, but here’s praying that he’s got it in him to squeeze out of them what’s been missing all these months in terms of points.

Bargain from the club shop at just six quid a pair

(NB: I’m struggling for pictures from home games now that Simon Jaggs has been told he can’t take his camera in to the ground)