A sense of Deja Vu (vs Wycombe L2)

Hi all -

After a couple of matches with no blog report (I found the Bury match a bit depressing and didn't go to Torquay), I thought I'd fire up the trusty typewriter and pen a few words about todays home match against Wycombe. Why? Well I usually try to write about the away matches I go to, on the basis that far fewer people will have seen it first hand. Home matches don't seem so bloggable as most people have seen the game anyway. But for me, alarm bells were ringing after the Bury match and I thought today would actually be very interesting in the light of that.

As I set off down to Oxford, the British weather was up to it's normal tricks when there is a test match on - raining cats, dogs and quite possibly horses and elephants as well., but it cleared up as I got to the stadium and despite some very ominous looking clouds the weather held off over the afternoon. The other ominous clouds that had been gathering were to do with our home form and the team selection. Home form? Now before you all click the 'back' button in disgust, I know that we've only played one home league game and we won it. What's to worry about? A one hundred percent record - couldn't be better. But as we all know, the old cliche is that the league is a marathon not a sprint. So if a 50 year old bloke with a limp wearing carpet slippers set off running a marathon at a sprint and was leading after the first fifty yards, I think you could quite justfiably doubt his ability to keep that up for the next 26 miles!

We had beaten Bury, but to my mind it was very unconvincing. I kept having flashbacks to last season when the away form was actualy very good but at home, the word 'average' could have been coined for us - if the coin maker was feeling kind. So on to the second home match of the season, the not-really-a derby-well-I suppose-it-is-geographically game against Wycombe Wanderers, who had so far managed not to set the league alight.

Rigg had pulled a hamstring at Torquay so he was out, and then on Radio Oxford before the game they said that Smalley also had a hamstring twinge so he was out too. Oh and CW had already said that Kitson would be on the bench as he was not yet recovered from his rib/shoulder injury completely.

OK that shouldn't be too much of a problem, we have another left winger in Callum O'Dowda. Swap him in for Rigg - he'd looked good in preseason when I saw him. Beano up front, and find someone to play with or just off him. Maybe Hall, maybe Davies. That in itself is a bit of an indictment of the depth of the squad when two strikers are injured (not uncommon for two to be injured or suspended) and the other one in the squad (Tyrone Marsh) isn't generally considered to be an immediate replacement.

Then the radio announced the team. Normal back four and goalie, then Davies Whing Rose and Hall midfield and Beano up front with Alfie supposedly playing 'just off him'. What?!! Let's pick the bones out of that. Alfie plays best on the right wing, so we put a central midfielder there. And while we are at it we put another central midfielder on the left wing. And the Beano/Alfie partnership up front has never really worked. Alfie floats back to where he is happy, leaving Beano isolated then wanders back infield when he remembers what he is supposed to be doing. We all know how good Beano is as a lone striker... it's just not his game.

Anyway, having got to my seat in what was a fairly busy stadium, and having realised that the ref was Andy D'Urso and one of the linemen was Danny de Vito, we started off by kicking towards the fence end as we prefer. To be fair, the first quarter of an hour was fairly tight, with us perhaps having the territorial advantage. But there were warning signs. As the half wore on, the signs got more obvious. For some reason, a windy day in Grenoble Road has made us think that hoofing the ball in the air was a good idea. 'Keep it on the floor' (and variations thereof) was a common sound in the East stand. As was 'Challenge for it' - mainly aimed at an empty area of the pitch (empty of men in yellow anyway) that is known as the midfield. Danny Rose was doing sterling work, but Whing was as usual the more defensive of the central pair, sitting just in front of the defence. The other central midfielders (who were sort of supposed to be pretend wingers) weren't, if we are being honest, doing very much of anything. Running up the wing and crossing the ball was just not happening, but they were sitting a bit wider then they needed to if the were going to be effective at getting hold of the ball in the middle.

Wycombe were coming more and more into it, with corners coming frequently, and we weren't looking dangerous, with the only decent shot I can remember in this period being a turn-and-shot from Beano - he almost managed to make something out of nothing. Then the ex-Oxford Dean Morgan (talented but very tempramental) had a header directed to him inside our box and headed it past Clarke, with our defenders looking to Danny de Vito to give an offside. He didn't and we were one down with halftime coming up. It's harsh to say that the goal had been coming (Wycombe weren't exactly peppering the goal with on-target attempts) but in truth they had got hold of the midfield and were running the show. It was almost two as a Wycombe lofted shot found Clarke (whose kicking throughout the game was dismal!) backpeddalling towards his line. It would have gone in under the crossbar so he had to gather it, then found his momentum was still carrying him towards the net, so he threw the ball away and danger was averted. Half time came.

The half time entertainment was Chicken George (probably not allowed to call him that really, but think of it as 'historical') drawing the 50/50 raffle and a bloke asking his girlfriend to marry him. I must admit I think any marriage is off to a rocky start when the groom can't think of a more romantic and intimate setting for a proposal than a football stadium where half the people aren't interested and the other half are chanting 'You don't know what you're doing'! Still, each to his own. I'm starting to regret the passsing of the crossbar challenge if that's what it's come to. Not the Kick the Ball into the Buildbase Box though, that was really pants.

So the second half dawned with Davies going off for Kitson. Not that Davies had played particularly badly, but he was a round peg in a winger shaped hole. Kitson partnered Beano and Potter went to the right wing - where he should have been to start with.

This immediately paid dividends: as Alfie raced past the Chairboys left back, the hapless Wycombe player threw out an arm and caught him in the face. After Torquay and now that, his nose must look like he's done a couple of rounds with Mike Tyson. Was it a sending off? I'm not convinced that it was deliberate really - but the consistently poor Mr D'Urso thought it was, so off he went. The resulting free kick was taken by the hyperactive Duracell Bunny otherwise known as Danny Rose. He put a lovely free kick into the area (something we had avoided doing when given the chance a couple of times in the first half), Oxford players missed it, Wycombe players watched it go past and it bounced rather comically into the net. What was their goalkeeper doing?

Back on par, the formation better and the opposition down to ten men. And 35 minutes to go. Great. So what happens? Straight away, CW makes a substitution. Riiight. We spend the whole of the first half playing people out of position and he does nothing. Then he largely corrects the error for about ten minutes and it works beautifully. So he changes it again. What? He takes Hall off (peg, winger, hole again) and moves Potter to the left - and brings on Ryan Williams on the right. Sigh. Leave Potter on the right, take Hall off, put a left winger on the left. It's not hard.

Kitson had a decent headed chance that should have at least made the goalie work and didn't, but in general we were now suddenly misfiring. Williams is pretty raw, and didn't have the experience to exploit the space, Potter hardly saw the ball again for the rest of the match. The ball, which we had actually started the half by passing on the ground, suddenly went airbourne again. Kitson won his fair share - but come on, we are better than hoof and hope. While we are on the subject, please could Oxford players look where they are passing the ball before they try to do so - I promise it makes it more likely to go to a teammate. Thanks.

Then Morgan dashed into our penalty area, Hunt dangled a leg, Morgan went over it and D'Urso blew for a soft (but probably corrrect) penalty - which Morgan scored. 2-1 down against ten men. Rubbish. Still there was still the best part of half an hour to go, surely we would dominate against the ten men as the game went on by passing it on the floor to our speedy wingers? Nope. Oh, then maybe we'd get hold of the midfield and play some incisinve balls through the triring defence for Beano to run on to? Nope, not that either.

Mullins had a decent shot that the keeper saved (but it looked destined for the post or the side netting anyway from where I was sitting), and Kitson showed a touch of class with a shot destined for the goal that the Wycombe keeper saved excellently. But time was ticking on, and a neutral observer would hardly say that Wycombe were under the cosh. What they obviously were under was orders to waste time. A sniper in the stands kept shoting their players, only for their physio to keep coming on and making sure they weren't actually hors de combat and making them better with a combination of neck massage and magic water.

There wasn't much that Mr D'Urso got right this afternnon in my opinion, but one thing he did do correctly was to add seven minutes injury time to make up for all this Holby City quality acting. In the fifth of those minutes, Kitson flicked the ball on, Constable somehow knocked a Wycombe defender over without D'Urso noticing and Mullins hammered the ball into the net to earn an unlikely draw. There was even the hope than we could snatch a ridiculous win, but time beat us even if Wycombe couldn't.

The final whistle blew and the Oxford team got a rather undeserved ovation. If injury time had been a couple of minutes shorter they would have been jeered off the pitch.

And back into the car and home.

Our home form is absolutely vital to any sustained success. At the moment we are a team good at counter attacking, bad at taking the initiative. Some of the passing is dire and is made too slowly - there were numerous occasions in the second half when Wright in particular had the option to pass the ball quickly to a wide player, but dawdled so long the pass was either never made or the recieving player was closed down. Is there a case for not playing Andy Whing? He is a great 'stopper' in front of the defence but that leaves Danny Rose isolated as the central midfielder higher up the pitch - we were getting overrun there today - did we win a single second ball? Maybe Whing plays away (that's not some sort of accusation!!!) and Davies at home? We've had success this season playing with wingers - keep doing it CW. And when you've just done something clever that is working - don't fiddle with it!

I know some readers will find this report unduly harsh - how can I moan about 10 points from 12, and we are top of the league for God's sake. And of course teams always 'raise their game' when they come to our place. Yeah right. I'd say Portsmouth were the big fish in L2, not us. But I'm only saying this because I care. It's not me it's you etc.  And as for that marathon runner, maybe it would be a kindness to pull him aside and suggest that he used better tactics and used his resources wisely by wearing footgear designed for the job. I think I've just broken that metaphor.

Well let's see what next Saturday's home match to Rochdale brings, hopefully experience is a great teacher - four points from the two home matches wouldn't be a disaster. Any less and I'll be revising my 'possible auto promotion' hopes to 'probable playoffs'.

See you all next time and

= COME ON YOU YELLOWS =

PS Big congratulations to Beano and partner on the birth of their daughter!

Alfie in his Pomp (vs Portsmouth L2)

Hello everyone,

A new season has dawned. I enjoy listening to the cricket, but God it's been a long time since meaningful football. So much so that I'd taken in the Ardley, Brum and Coventry preseason friendlies. Moderately entertaining, but you just don't get that 'matchday' feeling. So it was with excitement unbefitting to my advancing years that I set off for Grenoble Road. No, I haven't gone mad. I decided (what with all the 'parking in Portsmouth' horror stories) that I would potter down to the stadium and get on a coach. Those windows won't lick themselves you know! After catching the coach by the absolute skin of my teeth - held up by a series of drivers who think a 50 mph limit really means you can only drive at 30 - I was ferried down to Fratton Park in comfort.

Fratton Park is a great stadium. A bit rubbed round the edges (but the grafitti covers that up!), it has obviously seen better days. It's not a soulless identikit stadium though, which counts for a lot, there's a reasonable amount of space for away supporters and it does have atmosphere. Walking to the ground, it was fairly obvious that some Pompey supporters are having trouble realising that they are in League 2. "F*cking saddos", a Portsmouth shirt wearing neanderthal abused us as we walked towards the away end. Sad in what way? Because we support our club? Because we are in League 2? Because we had sold out our away allocation? You're in L2 as well you know - hope you don't hurt your knuckles as they drag along the ground.

Anyway, into the stadium. Looking around it's not surprising that they were considering moving when times were better for them. Fratton Park doesn't look big enough to contain the egos of Prem footballers, although I bet that the club are now glad they haven't ended up with a huge white elephant to play in. We were in a stand behind one goal. The stand to our left was a little odd, having been dug to under the level of the pitch. That meant that the eye level of the first couple of rows of punters was at pitch level. Must give an odd view. The far stand was sponsored by Jobsite (presumably might come in useful for the players if they manage to add to Portsmouth's impressive recent collection of relegations), with the one to the right sponsored by a Mercedes-Benz car dealership, which seemed a contrast! The far stand had the usual 'images picked out in different coloured seats' malarkey. They always look a bit odd. The one to the right of the stand was the Pompey crest. The one to the left was, I think, a face. But since 'seat art' is comparable in resolution to early eighties computer games pixel graphics it was absolutely impossible to make out who it was supposed to be. I apologise for my ignorance.

I don't always bother to sit in my allotted seat, but having found the one I'd actually bought I decided to sit in it as it gave a decent view - halfway back to the left of the goal. Which was fine until another chap turned up and asked if I was sitting in his seat. He showed me his ticket. Oops yes, he had this seat. I dug my ticket out of my pocket. Hold on, I had this seat too. Both tickets were identical! Same block, same row, same seat number. How on earth had that happened? Presumably the tickets had been supplied by Portmouth preprinted - sort it out Pompey! Happily enough the other chap wasn't that bothered - I'd have moved elsewhere if he was - and he found another seat.

The atmosphere built as kickoff approached. The yellows end was packed and the rest of the ground filled rapidly. As well as being packed, the yellow end was noisy. The far stand had a card display saying  '-OURS-', we had a giant flag. There seemed to be a certain cockiness about the Portsmouth fans. Surely they were 'too big for this league'? Surely all the other clubs in the FL basment division were just going to roll over, so they could start their march back up the leagues to their 'rightful place'? There are loads of clubs and their supporters who fall victim to this blinkered arrogance. Some not so far from home maybe - and we all know what happens when you start thinking like that! Perhaps someone would like to give them Luton Town Supporters Club's phone number!

The teams rans out to an amazing din from all four sides of the ground. I have to say that this season's kit is a hit with me. I like the more orange, less acid yellow and the darker shorts look very smart. Never mind the nylon, who was inside it? Well I think we all picked most of the team beforehand. Clarke, Newey, Wright, Mullins and Hunt at the back, with Whing in front of them as the midfield stopper. Potter and Rigg as the wide men with Rose in the more attacking central midfield role. Kitson and Smalley up front. I would have preferred Constable instead of Smalley, (don't worry there is a helping of humble pie coming up later!) but those who had seen CWs preseason teams wouldn't have been surprised.

If I'm honest, it started much as I thought it would. Portsmouth playing at a million miles an hour, us second best much of the time. Were some of our players a bit overawed by the atmosphere? Was it a cunning plan to sit tight for the first half? We showed little real ambition going forwards and were a yard slower in midfield. As a result, Portsmouth had a lot of the ball. But the longer it went on, the more it became apparent that they were actually doing precious little with it. Lots of passing backwards and forwards, with little penetration. They had a header over and Mullins flashed one past their post, but in truth there was a lot of huff and puff from Pompey and little end result.

That all changed after about 25 minutes when a lovely cross from a Portsmouth wide player was deftly headed into our goal past a helpless Clarke. The complacency levels in the home stands rose. This was what was supposed to happen, right? The Yellow Army responded maginficently, roaring the players on despite the setback. Suddenly the players raised their game. Whing went forward and shot toward the right side of their goal. It looked for all the world as if an equaliser was there, but the keeper suddenly appeared from behind a knot of players and made the save. Damn. But our central and wide midfield was now having to push further up the pitch, and was looking all the better for  it.

Alfie Potter suddenly did what I'd like to see him do more of. He went past his man, and put in a lovely cross. Smalley got himself into a great position and slotted it home. Three quarters of the stadium deflated like a punctured pre-kickoff beachball. The yellow quarter went bananas. Back to parity and about ten minutes left to half time.

Personally I was fairly happy with that. We had been second best for the first 25 minutes, so going in level at the break would be OK. But Mr Potter had other ideas. This time Sean Rigg was the provider, cutting the ball across the penalty area. Alfie made good ground and... well we've all seen this kind of chance skied over the bar. But not this time. He kept it down beautifully and we were in the lead. If we were jubilant after the equaliser, we were now delirious. 2-1 up! Excellent. Looking at the blue shirted Portsmouth players, shoulders were down. In the stands, blue shirted supporters had their heads in their hands. The realisation was dawning that it wasn't going to be quite as easy as they had assumed. The songs in the away end were getting louder and even prouder.

Halftime came with us well on top. The Pompey players looked as if they had just been told their dog had died. It was a pity there wasn't another five minutes - we would have scored again. I can't remember if there was much half time entertainment. Jim Smith came onto the pitch and was applauded by both sets of fans, the 50/50 raffle was a measly three hundred quid or so for an 18,000 crowd. Times are hard in Portsmouth, obviously. I hadn't bought a ticket, putting my change into a Dave Langan bucket instead.

The second half started and any idea that we might have lost the momentum we had built up in the first half were soon put to bed. There was only one team going to score next. And that was made even more likely when the Portsmouth skipper, obviously not happy that his big day out was going wrong, decided that an elbow to Danny Rose's head was a sensible thing to do. About three yards from the ref. Very bright. Almost as bright as the red card he was deservedly shown. Rose stayed down for some time, but eventually recovered and came back onto the pitch. So now we were one up, in the ascendancy and against ten men.

Very shortly we were two up. Alfie (that man again) went down the right wing, cut back inside and as the Portsmouth defenders failed to do anything much (tackling, closing down, anything) took aim and in front of the yellow faithful put the ball past the keeper inside the near post. More mayhem in the yellow end. Amazingly enough, with over 20 minutes to go Portsmouth supporters were now starting to make for the exits. What? Stay and support your team! When they are losing they need your support MORE than when they are winning.

Just five minutes later and that trickle of support out of the ground turned into a flood. Deane Smalley picked up a cross from the man Potter again, as as the Portsmouth defence a) fell over and b) arrived far too late, he scored his second of the afternoon. I have to admit that I was now actually laughing. 'Is there a fire drill?' we sang as we waved the opposition support out of the ground. What had started out looking as if it might be a difficult afternoon was now very comfortable indeed. There was still 20 minutes to go, enough time for Mullins to smack a header against the outside of the post, a Portsmouth player to make a nasty challenge on Kitson (who also got himself booked somehow), us to make three substitutions and Craddock to come on for his new club and cock up several (half) chances. By the time the ref put Portsmouth out of their misery the home stands were at least a quarter empty, the away stand was singing and cheering fit to bust.

A bit of a queue to get out of the ground, back to Oxford on the coach and then a drive back home.

Reading that back, there is quite a lot I haven't mentioned. Kitson made a huge difference. Laying the ball off, tackling, chasing down defenders, bringing other players into the game. More of a provider than scorer perhaps (although I think that will change) - he was excellent.  Our defence was very solid, with Portsmouth actually having very few chances.

We certainly looked better when being more aggressive and forward thinking rather than trying to contain.

Man of the match was Potter. By a mile. If he can keep that up, or anything near it, he will be a shining star in our season.

And finally, I've put some humble pie in the oven to warm up. I thought it was a mistake to offer Deane Smalley another year. But actions speak louder than words and his form and application so far have been excellent. Keep it up Deane - if it means more success for you and Oxford I am very happy indeed to be wrong. Is it OK if I have custard on it?

Next match - Charlton in the League Cup. I can't get to South London on a weekday evening in time for that one. Good luck to those who go (it will be a much changed team according to CW), and I'll see you next Saturday at our first home game of the season.

Come On You Yellows.