A Visit from the 1973 Texaco Cup winners 'The Tractor Boys'

[CrazyHorse]

"Football fans pay good money these days and I've asked the fans to get behind the team and they have done throughout the game. I think that we've got to live with the pressure, I felt that it was a very hard game and we were very dogged today.

"But we let ourselves down conceding after we went ahead and that was our downfall again today. I was disappointed with that after we looked quite strong and determined to win the game.

"I thought that Medo in particular did really well. Medo's passing range was very good today and he isn't renowned for his free-kicks, but after that one he told me that he needs to be taking more."

[Ianmooreslovechild]

Here's uncle lennie giving Ngog his preseason pep talk. You can just make out Beckford swaying along in the foreground alongside the rest of strikers. How can sports science like this continue to fail?
http://youtu.be/QL0k3ISzEjM" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[coffeymagic]

From the snippets of information I've gleaned from FLS, Radio Manchester and irate twitter users that Dougie's master plan was to bring on Daz Pretzl in the 95th minutes.

I would have loved to hear the instructions he gave Darren prior to him coming on. I think it would have been akin to Turnip Taylor telling Nigel Clough to 'run around a bit'.

On the radio Dougie said that as soon as we go one up he'll need to change the tactics. Well one, that assumes we HAVE tactics other than 'fingers crossed' and two doesn't really bode well when a team that simply cannot defend is to try the old 'boring boring Arsenal ploy' of going 1-up and then killing a game.

What happens when we go 2-1 down? What's the plan then Dougie?

It seems it's his ambition to win games 1-0 is more important than Bolton Wanderers winning games.

He's a plank and should be booted from the club. However we can't afford to do that and we're trapped in the equivalent of a loveless marriage.

Booooo!

[LeverEnd]

I terms of image that shambles with Pratley has really done him no favours. I think a lot of people didn't notice it, as they were either watching the ball, switched off or on the way home. Absolutely ridiculous, someone mentioned Danns having cramp but you'd just leave him on at that point.
Craig Davies should've been on well before that. He's a player Dougie has brought in and made worse.I just want him gone now, best case scenario is that we grind out some dull 1 nil wins while playing with 7 defensive players. I won't be watching that for much longer.

[Lord Kangana]

I don't know what Pratley has done wrong this season. He started it off at a flyer, then seemed to get moved around then dropped. He's no world beater, i think we can all agree on that, but he's got form at this level. And that's where we're at. Did he get injured and I missed it?

[boltonboris]

About that Danns cramp......

How does an athlete get cramp when they haven't broken into a sprint for 90 mins.

[Gravedigger]

About that Danns cramp......

How does an athlete get cramp when they haven't broken into a sprint for 90 mins.

Inactivity.

[ChrisC]

About that Danns cramp......

How does an athlete get cramp when they haven't broken into a sprint for 90 mins.

Danns is one of the few players who never stopped running against Ipswich. The guy might lack in overall quality but he never stops running and constantly getting in the way of the opposition.

He did plenty of sprinting against Ipswich aswell because for some reason, players where constantly playing diagonal balls across the field which he kept chasing down and keeping in play.

Can't fault the lad for effort.

[boltonboris]

I must've missed all of that..

I can't for the life of me see any justification in leaving him on out of position and taking Lee off, who was for me, the best player on the pitch

[ChrisC]

I must've missed all of that..

I can't for the life of me see any justification in leaving him on out of position and taking Lee off, who was for me, the best player on the pitch

I agree that Lee was the best player on the pitch and shouldn't have gone off. Best he has been all season for me.

[Athers]

Our problems all go back to Beckford I reckon. He can't help the sort of player he is but it's like playing with ten. In fact playing with ten would be preferred because then we wouldn't try to find Beckford, only for him to either a) Gamble on the defender somehow feinting before he mops up a ball, which he will do fine 499 out of 500 times (That guy at Birmingham was the exception) or b) weakly nudge the defender to no effect as he heads the ball to one of his midfielders. Just after half time there was a moment where Beckford sprinted down the left wing with it and won a throw in or something, I remember being so surprised to see this involvement that I don't think I've seen it before!

With Spearing and Medo in the middle of a 4-4-2 there's no Mark Davies type who can carry the ball forward or link play between the wingers and strikers in that middle channel.

He tries N'gog as a number 10 but he rarely finds the ball at his feet with space to move into, I don't think he comes back far enough if he's going to do that, probably because Ipswich were hard working enough to force our full backs to launch it up the channels and he's our only hope of winning a header.

I'm a Freedman apologist but it wasn't good on Saturday - Ipswich were typical McCarthy and we were never going to see a result like 3-1 or 4-2. I do think we probably matched them for long periods but given the onus as the home team to try to create we came up very short. I counted one clear cut chance created in the 90 minutes, which Lonergan saved. Dour stuff all round really.

[LeverEnd]

About that Danns cramp......

How does an athlete get cramp when they haven't broken into a sprint for 90 mins.

Danns is one of the few players who never stopped running against Ipswich. The guy might lack in overall quality but he never stops running and constantly getting in the way of the opposition.

He did plenty of sprinting against Ipswich aswell because for some reason, players where constantly playing diagonal balls across the field which he kept chasing down and keeping in play.

Can't fault the lad for effort.

Agreed, he and Ream were the only players to come out with any credit. Danns did little 1st half but 2nd half worked very hard and was involved a lot. He's limited, but the fact that he was our best attacking influence 2nd half is to his credit and the shame of the other attackers.

[Andy Waller]

About that Danns cramp......

How does an athlete get cramp when they haven't broken into a sprint for 90 mins.

Danns is one of the few players who never stopped running against Ipswich. The guy might lack in overall quality but he never stops running and constantly getting in the way of the opposition.

He did plenty of sprinting against Ipswich aswell because for some reason, players where constantly playing diagonal balls across the field which he kept chasing down and keeping in play.

Can't fault the lad for effort.

Is a good review of him a "Laud Of The Danns"?

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

we're trapped in the equivalent of a loveless marriage.

Weird, have just made that comparison on a different thread (but about forum posters rather than BWFC & DF)

I don't know what Pratley has done wrong this season. He started it off at a flyer, then seemed to get moved around then dropped. He's no world beater, i think we can all agree on that, but he's got form at this level. And that's where we're at. Did he get injured and I missed it?

Scored a couple in the first week of the season, but was still the same limited player on the ball. Don't think he really regained his position, on the pitch or in the manager's thoughts, after that daft second yellow at Forest. Since then DF's attempts to rebuild the team from the back have involved at least two more defensive midfielders than Prats. One of the manager's big downfalls is that Spearing/Medo are too similar and uncreative to give us the necessary spark in midfield, but although Prats did play deeper for Swansea, I'm not sure he would bring enough creativity to make up for the qualities Medo/Spearing bring...

[Wandering Willy]

Pratley will play again.

Law of averages says it's only a matter of time before his number is picked from DF's bag of marbles.

It's a lottery what position he will play though.

[Bruno3]

Can't understand why there haven't been any negative comments about Spearing - worst performance in a white shirt for a long time - unable to pass to anyone other than the opposition - no creative ability whatsoever. He does run around a lot but so no doubt he'll get praised for effort but he might as well have run around in the car park for all the use he was.

[ChrisC]

Can't understand why there haven't been any negative comments about Spearing - worst performance in a white shirt for a long time - unable to pass to anyone other than the opposition - no creative ability whatsoever. He does run around a lot but so no doubt he'll get praised for effort but he might as well have run around in the car park for all the use he was.

I agree, very poor and quick to blame others for his mistakes.

[William the White]

we're trapped in the equivalent of a loveless marriage.

Weird, have just made that comparison on a different thread (but about forum posters rather than BWFC & DF)

I don't know what Pratley has done wrong this season. He started it off at a flyer, then seemed to get moved around then dropped. He's no world beater, i think we can all agree on that, but he's got form at this level. And that's where we're at. Did he get injured and I missed it?

Scored a couple in the first week of the season, but was still the same limited player on the ball. Don't think he really regained his position, on the pitch or in the manager's thoughts, after that daft second yellow at Forest. Since then DF's attempts to rebuild the team from the back have involved at least two more defensive midfielders than Prats. One of the manager's big downfalls is that Spearing/Medo are too similar and uncreative to give us the necessary spark in midfield, but although Prats did play deeper for Swansea, I'm not sure he would bring enough creativity to make up for the qualities Medo/Spearing bring...

Tim Ream should be in the holding position. IMHO.

[boltonboris]

But then at the moment, that leaves us short at the back, which I think is a more pressing concern than an already swelled midfield roster

[boltonboris]

Personally Id like to see Medo/Spearing holding with Danns and Moritz in front, if we're to persist with a 5 man midfield.

At least there's more chance of us getting the ball to Beckford in more dangerous ares, rather than lobbing them into the channels