Vale v Swindon

[Indian Dan]

Difficult one to predict this. Vale on the up, Swindon with a to die for away record. I do get the feeling we are beginning to find more consistency, although our win one lose one form over the last 10 or so games would seem to refute that.

I would still expect to win this one as we seem to have found a winning formula away - bore the bastards into submission with pumping high balls. Not entirely fair, that, as a bit more actual FOOTball is creeping into our game.

Glad Vale seem on their way up and hope Chesterfield can galvanise themselves, too. We need proper clubs in the league.

 

[leedsvaliant]

Yes, very difficult to predict. Swindon seem to have stabilised a bit after a poor season last year and appear to have a very good away record. We've won 3 on the bounce, so you would expect that to come to an end at some point. However, the players will be confident and Pope is on fire, so we would hope to get a result.

We know all about Ben Purkiss, who was very promising in his first season with us but quite frankly toss last season. He has no pace, so we need to target him and I expect Montano to come in place of the injured Whitfield (shame as he has been our best player recently) and maybe bring in someone in place of Kay as I don't think we need two defensive midfielders at home.

The consensus is that Swindon have no pace at the back and so we need to test this out. As you say though, we need to keep proper teams in this league.

I reckon a 1-1 draw would be a good result to keep this mini unbeaten run going.

 

[Indian Dan]

You’re right about the lack of pace at the back, but the fact is that away from home we’ve only shipped 5 goals. A lot of that is down to the majority of teams relying on lumping balls up instead of playing it on the ground. We lap the high balls up all day long.

Purkiss does seem like a weak link, but he never actually has a real bad game - he’s a consistent 6 out of 10 player. The thing is, we have loads of pace up front with Anderson and Woolery in particular, so teams seem reluctant to leave themselves short at the back.

Have a feeling if your fans are a bit carried away with 3 wins on the spin they may well over encourage your players to be a bit too gung ho and we’ll do you on the break. 1-1does work for me, too.

 

[valefan16]

Tough game but we are a different animal to a fortnight ago so we have hope but do expect we will come down with a reality check sooner or later that work still needs to be done... That said I expected that at Exeter and we dealt with them comfortably.

Whitfield being out is a massive blow as he has been outstanding but Montano's fitness means he can come in.

What does give me hope regarding Swindon's very good away record is that we set up like an away team at home, one up front, solid at the back as a base with pace on the break in the 2 prongs (usually Whitfield and Harness but will likely be Montano and Harness to feed the holy one up front) it seems to work and we don't really play any different at home compared to away with it.

Playing this has allowed us to keep a solid back four with one holding midfielder so hopefully touch wood will protect us from being broken on.

Hopefully Pope's unreal form of late 6 in 4 will be the key to unlocking Swindon and we can get a win but realistically after last weekend's great and unexpected result a point wouldn't be too bad here.

 

[valefan16]

Side note to Swindon fans... I believe there is an EDL rally in Cobridge/Burslem Saturday around the game time so may need to factor this into travel if local roads are closed.

 

[leedsvaliant]

You’re right about the lack of pace at the back, but the fact is that away from home we’ve only shipped 5 goals. A lot of that is down to the majority of teams relying on lumping balls up instead of playing it on the ground. We lap the high balls up all day long.

Purkiss does seem like a weak link, but he never actually has a real bad game - he’s a consistent 6 out of 10 player. The thing is, we have loads of pace up front with Anderson and Woolery in particular, so teams seem reluctant to leave themselves short at the back.

Have a feeling if your fans are a bit carried away with 3 wins on the spin they may well over encourage your players to be a bit too gung ho and we’ll do you on the break. 1-1does work for me, too.

Sounds like you keep it very tight and catch teams on the break. We do struggle to break teams down at times, especially if we fall behind but hopefully a change in the way we support Pope will give us more opportunities. We are quite direct at times but hopefully we will not just pump balls up to Pope as we did before Aspin came.

Purkiss was solid for us in his first season but gave away so many goals last season he basically cost us our place in League One. He seemed to have hit an all time low confidence wise and his positional sense (particularly off set-pieces) was awful. Perhaps a fresh start will give him new found confidence but hopefully our management team will target his weaknesses.

I don't think anyone is getting carried away as we know how bad we have been, but the shoots of recovery are there.

 

[valefan16]

Liked Purkiss just went downhill second half of last season (as did a few others to be honest).

Think it was Peterborough when he inexplicably took a throw in hitting Foley on the back leading to their goal for example and just struggled. His replacement should be one of the best right backs in the league in Lawrie Wilson but he has been dreadful, unfit and his attitude hasn't been right... hard to see how he was part of a League One side promoted last season so far... none the less he isn't making the bench and a youth product has come in and done exceptionally well (despite being sent off on his debut!)

The move was right for Purkiss and Vale I think as needed a fresh start and have would hope he will get an ok reception.

 

[IpswichIan]

Yes, very difficult to predict. Swindon seem to have stabilised a bit after a poor season last year and appear to have a very good away record. We've won 3 on the bounce, so you would expect that to come to an end at some point. However, the players will be confident and Pope is on fire, so we would hope to get a result.

We know all about Ben Purkiss, who was very promising in his first season with us but quite frankly toss last season. He has no pace, so we need to target him and I expect Montano to come in place of the injured Whitfield (shame as he has been our best player recently) and maybe bring in someone in place of Kay as I don't think we need two defensive midfielders at home.

The consensus is that Swindon have no pace at the back and so we need to test this out. As you say though, we need to keep proper teams in this league.

I reckon a 1-1 draw would be a good result to keep this mini unbeaten run going.

Vale winning 3-0.

 

[Randolph Haggerty]

As others have said, will take a draw right now ,hoping for a half decent crowd, 5 k home fans would be nice.
What will you lot bring 300-500?
I think the loss of Whitfield is a huge one for us, he has real talent, and a never say die attitude I'm hoping that montano can show us what he's got.
On the standard of football in this league, I don't think it's as bad as made out.
When we played pools in the cup last year they looked like a pub team, I know they went down, but I thought the standard would be worse than it is, I've been pleasantly surprised.
Apart from Notts.
They were toss.

 

[valefan16]

The level is okay this year, miles off league one and no one has been as bad as Hartlepool we’re in the FA Cup when we won 4-0 in first gear during our worst spell of the season in the league.

That said as utterly shit as we were under MB with our lack of organisation, lack of interest and dire tactics no one came and gave us a beating, six of the 9 we lost by the odd goal and the other three 2-0.

Wycombe for thirty minutes did but even then we nearly mugged a draw out of it despite being 3-0 down into the 86th minute.

Chesterfield hit us twice in five minutes against the run of play and we just then lost all direction.

Crewe beat us but despite having ten men we should of easily got a point in that second half... Popey of this month would have punished them.

Notts County were dreadful but smash and grabbed us

Coventry we hit the woodwork twice and had one off the line.

Luton we scored a comical own goal then Hornby let a mis hit cross go right through his hands

Accrington are the best away side in the league, arguably the best we’ve played with some great football but we should of had 3 before they scored their two shots on target

Stevenage we were beyond dire

Grimsby we had enough chances but had a Mad twenty minutes.

Point being in league one playing that badly last year we often got hit for 3 or 4 but no one had really battered us or looked that much better as bad as we’ve been. Most goals have been errors rather than quality.

Other than the Grimsby winger I can’t think of any player that has been outstanding so it’s ok but not great this year, partly showing why just basic improvements have seen us crush two sides and comfortably see off a promotion contender this week.

 

[Indian Dan]

As others have said, will take a draw right now ,hoping for a half decent crowd, 5 k home fans would be nice.
What will you lot bring 300-500?
I think the loss of Whitfield is a huge one for us, he has real talent, and a never say die attitude I'm hoping that montano can show us what he's got.
On the standard of football in this league, I don't think it's as bad as made out.
When we played pools in the cup last year they looked like a pub team, I know they went down, but I thought the standard would be worse than it is, I've been pleasantly surprised.
Apart from Notts.
They were toss.

We’ll bring in excess of 500. The thing about this league you can play exactly the same way 2 games running and win one and lose one. It’s a lottery most of the time. Depends if the footy gods are smiling on you.

 

[Buxton Vale]

I think we can win this, keep our run going and move away from the relegation spots.

2-1 Pope and Worrall

 

[Agombar stool]

I'm going to Dartford in the cup instead of Vale now.

Which means we'll probably win! Although I think Vale will come out flying on Saturday and we'll have to keep them at bay.

I reckon it'll be a decent game. 2-1 home win is my prediction. Pope is bound to score.

 

[valefan16]

I'm going to Dartford in the cup instead of Vale now.

Which means we'll probably win! Although I think Vale will come out flying on Saturday and we'll have to keep them at bay.

I reckon it'll be a decent game. 2-1 home win is my prediction. Pope is bound to score.

Dartford's alright, we played there in 2010 I think it was in the cup. Decent little set up, all eco like FGR in that the ground is eco friendly. Gave us a tough game with us equalising late on before we panned them in the replay at VP.

Lot of West Ham there though!

 

[northstandexile]

We played at Dartford in the conference in out promotion year and lost 2-0 in front of tv cameras on a Friday night.

Board went up for one minute of injury time at end of first half with us level at 0-0 and between then and the half time whistle blowing we were two down.

 

[Agombar stool]

The impressive thing for me is the location from the train station and the Town Centre which sounds like it has decent bars.

Back to tomorrow, is this EDL nonsense likely to cause issues?

 

[valefan16]

The impressive thing for me is the location from the train station and the Town Centre which sounds like it has decent bars.

Back to tomorrow, is this EDL nonsense likely to cause issues?

Don't think they are as big as they used to be but they are going through Cobridge which i believe is a mainly ethnic minority area but that's a mile or so away from Vale Park.

 

[Agombar stool]

Don't think they are as big as they used to be but they are going through Cobridge which i believe is a mainly ethnic minority area but that's a mile or so away from Vale Park.

Hopefully it passes off without major incident!

 

[valefan16]

Hopefully it passes off without major incident!

It hasn't really had much coverage, it only got noticed by Vale fans on the unofficial forum. Think the main part of it is 4pm so the football fans will at least be in the ground and out of the way.

 

[Randolph Haggerty]

First I've heard of it is on here, I'm a born and bred cobridge lad, it is indeed ethnically diverse.
There was never any racial tension years ago, in fact we used to have Asians v whites footy on the fields on a Sunday morning, then a few joints after, it was always good natured, only bother came from clashing personalities nowt do with skin colour.
The edl can fuck off.
I've always wondered why lower league clubs like ourselves who are desperate for support don't tap into this market, I think I've only ever seen 5 or 6 Asian lads at the vale.

 

[valefan16]

Britain First rather than EDL it appears:

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/www.st...-news/police-alert-far-right-group-688744.amp

 

[valefan16]

Very poor and sounds like the reality check has hit. Didn’t really help ourselves with the keeper error and fair play to Swindon for a clinical performance.

Need to bounce back and not let confidence take a hit which will be tough with Oxford next.

 

[kieran_vale]

Well done Swindon, seems a little bit of a reality check that for Vale.

 

[Indian Dan]

Another solid, unspectacular performance. Just wish we would keep it on the deck a bit more - we look so much better. Fantastic free kick from Matty Taylor, dreadful keeper error for our second.

Onwards and upwards

 

[Agombar stool]

Well done Swindon, seems a little bit of a reality check that for Vale.

Thanks guys. All the best for the rest of the season. Happy Town fan tonight !

 

[Agombar stool]

Very poor and sounds like the reality check has hit. Didn’t really help ourselves with the keeper error and fair play to Swindon for a clinical performance.

Need to bounce back and not let confidence take a hit which will be tough with Oxford next.

3 decent goals from our perspective but bad from yours. It that a new keeper? Looked an awful blunder for the second and what an assist by Smith for our third.

Hope you pull away from the bottom and towards safety. All the best.

 

[valefan16]

3 decent goals from our perspective but bad from yours. It that a new keeper? Looked an awful blunder for the second and what an assist by Smith for our third.

Hope you pull away from the bottom and towards safety. All the best.

He was announced at 2pm today emergency loan as our two keepers are injured and our current loanee got injured yesterday too! Meant to be decent but had a mare.

 

[Randolph Haggerty]

Best side I've seen at vale this year, organised and clinical without being spectacular.

 

[valefan16]

Good to see Aspo rip into them as a relegation performance rather than hide behind the three wins though like Brown would have (well he wouldn’t get three wins).

Says it like it is and have full faith we will survive with him at the helm.

Worry is though did we miss Whitfield that much that we could be screwed until his injury is cleared up in a month or so?

 

[markpvfc]

I'd start Stobbs and Turner next week instead of Harness and Montano. To call their performances today pathetic would be being generous.