EXETER

Chiefs

There was a full page spread in the Sunday Times on 7th September. It informed that London Welsh “have a model professional leading their cause against Exeter today”. They’ve basically dispensed with last year’s team and brought in a new one of bigger names such as Piri Weepu. Tom May, the captain who has two England caps, said LW “don’t just go out looking for good players who play the way they want. They spend ages looking at people of character.”

The article also refers to the crusade to make the Welsh an attraction and a commercial proposition in Oxfordshire. If it was the Manor we were talking about here I’d feel much more justified in crying “get orf my land”.

I don’t want them for many reasons. One, it wrecks the pitch, particularly given the penny pinching way in which the Kassam has been poorly maintained. Two, it’s got an element of the MK Dons about it and anyone who knows me will know how strongly I feel about the way Grid City was allowed to circumvent the rules of fair competition by winning promotion after promotion to climb the ladder. Okay, this is rather different in that there is only one London Welsh but that’s London and Wales, not Oxford and England. Three, with their rent going in to FK’s pocket there is less incentive for him to sell up and if he does this is bound to impact on the asking price.

I’ve got a feeling though that I’m going to have to “get over it” because there’s a fair possibility that they will be tied up in plans of a potentially complicated and convoluted nature, to move OUFC forward in some sort of “stakeholder” or “enabler” role.

Oh, and the result – London Welsh 0 Exeter Chiefs 52. I find that quite satisfying.

Grecians

I often look back on the pre-match beers with much greater fondness than the match itself and Saturday was such an occasion, particularly as I discovered two new (to me) drinking holes that I will definitely visit again when back in Exeter.

The First Great Western is a rarity in that, unlike most hotels its size, it has retained the bar area as it was decades ago, totally unspoilt by any corporate modernisation. With plenty of hand pumps to choose from the beer could not be faulted. There were a few Chiefs fans in there having a drink or two before jumping on the train at St David’s for the short trip to their match with Leicester Tigers. I congratulated them on the magnificent win they had the previous week.

Early days yes, but without doubt “The Fat Pig”, is a contender for away pub of the season. It’s the only brewpub in the City. The owner’s business model is to take formerly run down, closed, back street boozers of ill repute and create a much needed rest from the generic pub chains that dominate many city centres today. Good man. What’s not to like?

Nothing about the pub, but much about the football that followed.

I was fully confident that we would win this one. So much so that I put a couple of quid on us. After all Exeter were bottom, they’re rubbish at home and are financially strapped to such an extent that they’ve recently experienced a transfer embargo. They’d never be able to sign the strikers we’ve brought to OUFC in the last few weeks. In this instance, given the opposition and (misguided) belief that it will all come right eventually, I thought our poor defensive set up wouldn’t factor enough to deny us that elusive League win.

I left St James Park more concerned than ever. Does the current regime have a clue what League Two is all about and can someone please tell them the way teams are set up requires a balance between defending PROPERLY and attacking?

Defensively we’re getting worse. We don’t mark. Time and again I noticed when Jake Wright challenged for a high ball he wasn’t just focussing on the forward he was challenging but had to have half an eye on other unmarked red shirts in the close vicinity. The same could be said of Tom Newey too as Exeter banged long ball after long ball in his direction. He got very little help.

With Joe Riley pushed forward and David Hunt returning at right back we were much more solid down that flank. But overall we really have lost the art of marking. This is a basic requirement even in village football. We didn’t look good at defending corners and our failure to pick players up from throw-ins is a source of immense frustration to me. In the first half Exeter took a throw that should have represented no danger. However, no one bothered to get anywhere near the recipient and out of nothing with zero creative effort or skill required they’d got a shot away that wasn’t that far off target.

And I’m going to have to say what’s the point of the two (Michael Collins and Josh Ruffels in this instance) in front of the back four? Holding midfielders? They didn’t hold anything much nor provide a protective wall to help the back four out. Neither did they, in disruptive Andy Whing style, get stuck in or close much down.

I wonder whether Michael Appleton and his staff think they’re working with Barcelona from about five years ago or, if not, think they have the coaching ability to turn our players into Messi, Iniesta and Xavi – players who can receive the ball in the tightest of situations marked by half the opposition and still retain possession.

I’m no fan of hoofball but this is League Two, a league where the most sensible option is often to just whack the bloody thing away and clear your lines. At least that way possession is lost deep in the opposition half not just outside our own penalty area. George Long has obviously been told to throw the ball short which is a good thing unless the receiver is tightly marked or about to be quickly closed down (yes that again – the thing our opponents do in abundance and we don’t) and very likely to lose possession. Then it is a very bad thing. We did lots of very bad things throughout the game.

From the start we dicked about in dangerous areas. With not four minutes on the clock Johnny Mullins passes to Jake Wright. Our captain takes a poor touch, the ball runs loose and after a pretty pathetic attempt to win it by Ruffels the Grecians have possession. A deft up and over pass and they have a penalty. Possibly offside but that’s not the point. We’ve not currently got the belief or skill to play like this. Winning the right to play like that requires first to win the battle and demoralise the opposition. With that the belief would come.

On the day we let in no further goals but I suspect that if we’d been playing one of the better League Two sides it would have been a different story. Defending used to be our forte but now only five teams have let in more than us.

This of course should not really matter in our brave new attacking world. The sad state of affairs at the other end of the pitch though is that just three teams have netted fewer times than us. Yes, we were unlucky with the Will Hoskins injury and Tyrone Barnett is obviously rusty not having played more than ten minutes here and there for a while now, but it wasn’t as if we created chances by the bucketful on Saturday.

Put some positives in says my mate Mark. Trouble is I can knock each positive down almost immediately, but here goes.

1. We are unbeaten in three League games.

(Yes but we have not won since 12 April. We have dropped 18 of the 21 points available this season.)

2. We are no longer in the bottom two.

(Yes but there is already a four point gap between us and Accy in 21st position

3. Our goal.

(Yes, that must be mentioned. The ball won by Barnett, Collins to Riley who then behaved like a good old fashioned winger bombing down the touch line and whipping in the perfect cross. Callum O’Dowda couldn’t have done better with his finish. Well done lad. There’s always a but with me isn’t there and here it is that if we were any good we would have gone on to win against such mediocre opposition and that I didn’t think CoD did much else in the game.)

4. The referee was good.

(Well, yes he was and credit where it is due but that just means we can’t blame him for anything and has nothing to do with the plight of OUFC. It wasn’t his fault the linesman didn’t flag for offside. I liked the way he tried to keep the game flowing and used a commonsense approach in not even booking Long.)

Gary Waddock set the bar pretty low but so far Mapp is struggling to get over even that. This has to change on Tuesday doesn’t it? But without a fundamental change of approach to defending I can’t see us getting anywhere near the top of this League. There may be the odd 3-3, or even 4-3 along the way but I’d settle for 1-0, 0-0, 1-0, 0-0 right now to pick up some bloody points.