Blankety Blank!

There used to be a show on TV called 'Blankety Blank' where contestants had to supply the missing words to sentences or phrases, it's not that I can't think of any words to describe yesterday's match, I can think of many, but they're all expletives. United manager Spike changed the formation yesterday to something resembling a 4,4,2 but with no natural wide men, we struggled and couldn't get to grips with the game. Worse still, we seem to have no pride,our players seem to think its only a game, there was only one man in our team who had pride in what he was doing,our keeper, Dwayne Nelson. Spike made two changes from his selection of a week ago, one was by choice and the other forced upon him. He omitted Chrissy for new signing Mark McCullough and as joint top scorer, Ally got injured in the warm-up, Vaulsely came in for him at leftback and Ruddy moved to left midfield. When Roy Walker signed Vaulsey in a panic from Coleraine I was sceptical but he sort of grew on me, but yesterday he had a nightmare, but he wasn't the only one.

Another new signing, Shaun Mahon,had looked slow and cumbersome on his debut last week, epitomised with his own-goal last time, but I had decided to reserve judgement on him, but he a had a poor game yesterday. I was on the forum last night and some of the fans seemed to think McCullagh had a good game, but I don't think anyone in our back four had a good game, Mark got pulled out of position when the scum scored the only goal of the game. If he had went and made a tackle I could've excused him, but he didn't and Allen of the scum easily beat Tony Kane who had a horror of a match to score. The goal was a travesty for Gavin Taggart, what possessed him to take a short free-kick near our goal line, instead of leaving it to Dwayne to thump the ball up field, I'll never know. We seem to have no free-kick policy, it's either a short one where we inevitably give the ball away to the opposition or if close to goal, a shot over the bar or straight at the opposing keeper. We were under a bit of pressure, we got a free-kick and Gavin decides to surrender the ball to the opposition, instead of relieving pressure, he put us under more and we finally cracked.

After Gavin gave the ball away, with his short free-kick, Vaulsey and Tomelty came together on the touch-line, I thought that was a foul by Vaulsely but as the scum had possession the ref waved play on. Vaulsely and Tomelty picked themselves up, but Vaulsey didn't track Tomelty and he came on the overlap and Dwayne had to go out and tackle him but he shot and the ball cannoned off Dwayne's leg and over Mahon's head, leaving Allen with the easy task of heading into the empty net, McCullagh meanwhile was nowhere to be seen. It was a goal that shouldn't have been, we had ample time to get the ball away, but were punished for our clanger. United were denied an equaliser soon after when Thommo found Captain Jenks at the far post and his header deceived the scum keeper and Thommo found the unmarked Liggie who drove the ball home. But the joy on the faces of United fans was short-lived, despite awarding the goal, referee Hetherington, later ruled it out for some infringement, some people though that Thommo was offside, but he couldn't have been for Jenks was near the goal-line when he headed it across and Thommo was level with him, but the goal was ruled out anyway. We got to halftime without any further incident, but the scum players, obviously coached by the diving bird, were going down as if pole-axed and the ref was buying it.

2nd half
I thought surely Spike would have to make a change at halftime, as Vaulsely was struggling at leftback, Ruddy was running about like a headless chicken in midfield, trying to cover for his mates and Tony Kane was pathetic to say the least. I felt we needed Duffin to give us some width,replacing Vaulsey. Rodgers to take over from Kane and Lowry in place of either Thommo or Jenks, but Spike like Nero before him, did nothing. In the absence of Ally, Kane was taking all the corners and they were woeful, too close to the keeper or was this the ploy, well if it was it didn't work. Surely we have to have another player who can take corner kicks, it's not rocket science, we had two left-footed players on the pitch who could have taken taken them from the right side, but no we had to stick with Kane and his supply was not good. Finally after about an hour after Liggie and Dolan had demonstrated that they couldn't play with each other, trying fancy flicks instead of the simple ball, Spike acted. He took off Liggie to be replaced by Lowry and I thought this was a backward step, better to keep Liggie on and replace Thommo or Jenks. Lowry made one or two runs into the box but his final ball left a lot to be desired but from one run the ball fell to Jenks but he shot straight at the keeper.

At the other end, Beverland was left unmarked, but could only side-foot the ball past the post, a lucky let-off for United. Gavin found himself in the clear, but he hesitated before trying a long range shot which took a deflection for a corner and a few minutes after Thommo found himself some space but he shot past the post, another chance gone begging. In a last throw of the dice Spike brought on Jimmy Mac for Ruddy and left Rodgers and Duffin scratching their heels on the bench. Jimmy Mac tried to liven things up but he got little encouragement from his team-mates who seemed resigned to the fact of another defeat. Jimmy Mac did create a chance for himself when he ran on to a through ball but his shot was easily saved by the scum keeper. I thought why doesn't Spike take off Kane, bring on Rodgers or Duffin and bring everybody up to try to get something out of this, but he seemed to be happy with a one goal defeat, he was not prepared to go for broke. The only pluses I can see are, we won't have to go to the scum ground anymore this season and we can forget about the top six for another season, it would take a miracle for us to pull it off. Then again, miracles happen everyday, but the impossible takes a little bit longer, and the top six for us, looks impossible!

Dwayne (7), Kane (4), Vaulsey (5), Mahon (5), McCullagh (5), Thommo (5), Jenks (5), Gavin (5), Ruddy (5)(Sub: Jimmy Mac 6,), Liggie (5)(Sub: Lowry 6,), Dolan (5)

Man of the match: Dwayne Nelson