Accrington Stanley v Blackpool Official Matchday Thread 19.12.20

Accy are well trained in the dark arts, Coleman is a past master at bending the officials ears. Remind me of Wycombe last year but they should have beat us ,particularly in the last 10 mins . Still UTMP
 
20togo said:
Started slowly but ended up the better team for last 20 mins of first half. Second half we were never in it so in the end a good point.
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Fair summary 👍
Another game unbeaten on a horrible afternoon weather-wise and against a niggly team with lots of nous.
 
We don't make and take enough chances with the attacking options we have. This is our weakness. Some good delivery from Garbutt today but we made little of it. Defence played really well. Dougall needs a break, we haven't had the same control in midfield the last couple of games.
 
I expected Accy to be a better footballing side. It was hoofball from them bypassing the midfield to their guys up front. It almost caught us out a few times. They were playing like an away team trying to hit us on the break.

They dropped to the ground wounded at the slightest touch and were constantly nagging the ref trying to get our players booked. Gillingham tactics! Was disappointed about that.
 
Scaramanga said:
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a team constantly pissing and moaning at the referee even when they were winning free kicks. Horrible horrible team, hope they get nothing this season.
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Why were they moaning every time they were awarded a free kick? did they want one of ours sent off! horrible team as you say.
We were lucky in the end to draw. Couldn't seem to put two passes together and some panic kicking out of defence but good point so let's move on to the next match still unbeaten since Donny
 
Well that was disappointing but not helped by the ref and his assistants. As the commentator said "he let everything go in the first half but blew for everything in the second" and they killed the game between them.
Happy with a point on that showing. Midfield never had a grip on the game. Dougall looked poor again, Virtue looked sluggish. Hamilton should do better in those conditions. I think part of his problem is he doesn't show himself as much as he should. What happened to his heroic defensive game today? Good job Turton had a blinder. I think Ward should've started ahead of Virtue or Dougal today. This game was tailored for Robson too.

Maxwell 6 Turton 8 Ballard 6 Ekpiteta 6 Garbutt 6 Hamilton 5 Dougall 4 Virtue 5 Anderson 6 Madine 6 Yates 5
 
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I think the full backs Turton and Garbutt were our best two players...then it was Ballard and Marv...going forward we were poor and I dont think we did much to try and win it last 15 mins. Virtue and Dougall didnt work for me and Dougall will benefit from the break. Ward has been very very unlucky not to be playing.

A good point earned and we would have lost that 1-0 earlier in the season. Battling points like this all add up at the end and the unbeaten run continues. Another clean sheet and we are becoming hard to beat.
 
Impossible to play good football in those conditions, very happy with a solid no frills performance. Definitely steel has been added to the quality we already had. As said in the commentary Ethan Robson would walk into any team in the division and he wasn't even on the bench.
 
Scruffy game ,scruffy point but of course we`ll take it and hope for better next time..

My ifollow constantly buffering,only just finished 15 mins after the actual finish.Pathetic ifollow.
 
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I thought the defence were excellent again today, midfield really struggled with their passing which hindered us up top. Overall I’m happy with a point. We will play miles better than that and get beaten this season. A mention also for Maxi, thought his handling in awful conditions was exceptional
 
Another 10 minutes and we would have lost that so have to be happy with the point. Virtue looked rusty and Ballard wasn't as solid as usual but the conditions were terrible so fair enough. Turton was excellent. Final 20 minutes were just a succession of free kicks as soon as we got in their final third. What was that about where Hamilton and Turton had the ball on the right and the free kick was taken from the penalty spot?
Move on to next week. Not a game to remember.
 
I don’t particularly like Accy but I’m impressed with how they defend, close down and scrap for everything. They did the same last year at our place, not an easy team to play and horrid conditions so a good point in the end. We’ll never win every game so it’s important we pick up points. Strange ref as well, went from letting everything go to blowing up for nowt.
 
Scaramanga said:
I thought the defence were excellent again today, midfield really struggled with their passing which hindered us up top. Overall I’m happy with a point. We will play miles better than that and get beaten this season. A mention also for Maxi, thought his handling in awful conditions was exceptional
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Yep. Maxwell played well today. Kicking was a bit off, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt that it was the conditions making it close to impossible to be accurate.
 
kuriousoranj said:
Well that was disappointing but not helped by the ref and his assistants. As the commentator said "he let everything go in the first half but blew for everything in the second" and they killed the game between them.
Happy with a point on that showing. Midfield never had a grip on the game. Dougal looked poor again, Virtue looked sluggish. Hamilton should do better in those conditions. I think part of his problem is he doesn't show himself as much as he should. What happened to his heroic defensive game today. Good job Turton had a blinder. I think Ward should've started ahead of Virtue or Dougal today. This game was tailored for Robson too.

Maxwell 6 Turton 8 Ballard 6 Ekpiteta 6 Garbutt 6 Hamilton 5 Dougal 4 Virtue 5 Anderson 6 Madine 6 Yates 5
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Agree with all that apart from the CJ comment...he created our best two chances and was never fed the ball. Virtue and Dougall didnt work on this occasion. Neither were at their best.
 
Scaramanga said:
I thought the defence were excellent again today, midfield really struggled with their passing which hindered us up top. Overall I’m happy with a point. We will play miles better than that and get beaten this season. A mention also for Maxi, thought his handling in awful conditions was exceptional
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Yep, good point. Maxwells handling was excellent. Said it pre match that Virtues battling hi energy got him the start today. I'm not sure Ward could have added anything today, only taken away.
 
Still sitting nicely in 12th spot, think the majority of us would’ve happily settled for that a few weeks back. Well deserved rest for the lads now, reckon they’ll be well fit & revved up for Boxing Day game against Rochdale. Up the Mighty!
 
TangerinePeel said:
The fact they didn't score from the sheer amount of corners with the height in their squad. Testament to our defence I think.
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Mainly the wind, we were caught out on the deck and if anyone deserved to win they did. They looked very lively up front particularly the last 30.
 
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I would go

Maxwell 7 not much to do but solid enough...distribution not as good as usual
Turton 8 good game and my man of the match
Marv 7 good solid game..the odd time out of position
Ballard 7 won some good headers second half
Garbutt 7.5 offers a lot more going forward and was solid in defence
Dougall 5.5 looked a bit jaded...break will do him good
Virtue 5 off the pace but will come on for the run out
CJ 6 delivered our best two chances but was never really utilised and is a victim of poor service
Keshi 6 again not given the requisite service...looked capable on the break...worked hard
Yates..5.5 again no service nearly scored when hit post
Madine 5.5 again only scraps to feed on some good touches some very poor...didnt pass as well as he can
 
I thought Turton had a very good game as did Maxwell . Horrible team to play against continually trying to influence the ref. Not the effective midfield we have come to know but the weather conditions were awful. A very good point to pick up
 
Levi501 said:
Still sitting nicely in 12th spot, think the majority of us would’ve happily settled for that a few weeks back. Well deserved rest for the lads now, reckon they’ll be well fit & revved up for Boxing Day game against Rochdale. Up the Mighty!
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Ekpiteta edged it for me, he was immense, probably our most consistent player.
 
Defended well and it’s very much a point gained against a difficult team. The way they niggle and moan and resort to the dark arts make them akin to a Mourinho lite team. As others have said, we would have lost that game earlier in the season. So progress is being made
 
Hazi said:
They fall over ref blows.
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Ref very poor today. Stanley players in his ear all match and getting a free kick every time they fell over. Only thing he did in our favour was when Yates clipped their player on the edge of their box and he waved play on leading to us nearly scoring.

Blew up numerous times for free kicks to us when we were going forward and had a bit of space.
 
That was an excellent point imo. It's the sign of a good team when you pick up points when playing badly, and that was one of our worst performance of the season. Passing was dreadful, we had no quality in the final third and I think that was partly down to conditions, but I think we have to give credit to Accy - it's easy to see why they're doing well. Their forwards take up excellent positions consistently and play the defenders very well.

That's where my praise of them end. They also play the ref very well, and I totally agree with someone else that they reminded me a lot of Wycombe last season. Always in the refs ear, collapsing to the ground easily. Game management from the first whistle. Some would call it the style of a side that felt they were inferior technically to the opposition and so need to spoil the game. It's effective but can only take you so far, as Wycombe are finding out.

For us, I thought we showed yet again that we can really battle for points, it's good to see we can do that. Some of our defending was last ditch, but we did that brilliantly and our defending from set pieces was much better. There's not much else to say, except we can now see that there are games where Yates and Madine (that everyone was wanting), won't work. They didn't have much service, but also there was no link up between them either. I agree with starting them together depending on the opposition, but let's be honest we're going to need something else to solve our goalscoring problem. Our best performance of the season actually occurred when they didn't play together.

Shocking conditions, poor pitch, in form opposition, one of our best points of the season.
 
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