The Lower League Thread

Going by the league table alone, it's great to see Huddersfield getting hammered but my thoughts go out to Hogg and hope he makes a speedy recovery.

I do wonder if Huddersfield's rhythm was disrupted last night knowing one of their own players was in such an awful way after such extensive on-pitch treatment. Early reports I've seen look like its not as serious and that Hogg is in a stable condition, which is a good sign, but obviously its still early and full diagnosis is not yet disclosed, so hopefully its not as serious as it looked.

In more conventional sporting matters, I'm aware it opens a door for us to re-establish the gap we were beginning to throw away when we go to Birmingham later. Hopefully we're up for taking it.

Half the team was ill. Hefele and Stankovic were both sent home, Hudson and Schindler were also feeling the effects, and it looked like Smith, Billing, Kachunga and Mooy were also really struggling with something. The sheer number of times we seemed to jump under the ball makes me think depth perception was off. The fact we got out-run at times also suggests to me that there was something physically wrong with the team. Bugs happen. Not an excuse, just an explanation. There's several missing from the U23s today as well.

The Hogg thing just topped it off. Bristol newspapers reporting he's out long-term, which pretty much fucks our promotion bid up, so I hope it's just them misinterpreting Wagner's analysis. I'd take a 4-0 hammering any day of the week if it meant we got Hogg back for the run-in. I'd rather have him than the points.

Apologies for the latest ref rant. He was shocking, but not the reason we lost. I'd rather suffer a horror show ref in a game which is gone than in a tight one. He made basic errors and let them get away with a lot, but we weren't competing. Penalty was yet another joke decision but just put some undeserving gloss on the scoreline. Bristol were better than us, far more aggressive, and took their chances, but 4 is harsh.

I mean, a 0-0 draw at Birmingham to mean its now 3 without a win is not great, dubiously disallowed goal or not. But at the least we're 7 clear of third.

Oh I see. I wasn't aware of the illness running through the squad. But I can certainly imagine it not helping that half the team is either out or feeling physically weaker than normal even before Hogg.

Hogg has been diagnosed with a fractured neck. Its good to know he's been cleared to leave hospital, but that's a shocking injury and one that, as he's a key Huddersfield player, I can imagine will not help.

Football comes second. He's a dad and making sure he's fit and well is very much the priority. Should have known it'd take a broken neck to keep Hogg down, though - he's tough as old boots. Leader of the press, which makes it doubly gutting, as he's the one who sets the tone for the rest of the team. That said, we have Dean Whitehead - he's more than capable of rolling back the years to add the needed bite in midfield, that was so obviously lacking on Friday night.

Drew 0-0 at Millwall yesterday. We're at a stage in the season, where any point might be vital, so I'll happily take that. Not the best of all games though, as Millwall were a bit out of ideas and decided to just hoof it up the pitch and our system more or less set up to defend with little to offer going forward. Joe Murphy once again outstanding, we look so much more settled at the back with him in goal plus Chris Burgess and Taylor Moore in defence. Results elsewhere have fallen quite kindly for us aswell. Looks like the bottom three are more or less doomed, so it might be a battle to avoid 21st place, which is currently held by Port Vale who have games in hand, one of them being at rock-bottom Coventry this tuesday. Giving how this is unfolding I wouldn't say MK Dons and Charlton on 47 points are safe either. Problem for us is, we still have to go to Bolton and play our neighbors in Rochdayul, plus have an away game at Southend to wrap up the season, plus a difficult away trip to Oxford to play. It's going to be tense

1. Kachunga signed on a permanent. £1.1m. In this inflated transfer market, that's a bargain, especially when Villa are spending £12m on Ross McCormack only to farm him out on loan.

2. Season cards £199

3. Brown injured - hence my annoyance at officials not giving him any protection over recent weeks. Knew something like that would happen if people were allowed to kick him up hill and down dale without sanction. No date for Palmer being due back. Payne can fill in, but he's not quite as good as those two yet (good as he could be).

87' - Exeter City 0-3 Yeovil Town

90+3' - Exeter City 3-3 Yeovil Town

If there were a Football Manager version of this, I'd quit and reload.

Yeovil.

How the hell do you fail to win when you're 3-0 up away from home with just a few minutes remaining?

Concede 3 goals by failing to clear your lines on multiple occasions is surely the answer. I saw the highlights and they just collectively panicked.

Stankovic has injured his ACL. Out for 10 months after a pointless international friendly jaunt for Slovenia's U21s - I don't mind competitive internationals and it's one of those things in the game, but can we just do away with friendlies for the sake of having friendlies? So we're basically without any leeway with the squad now. Injuries have decimated us this last few weeks. Hogg, Brown, Palmer and Stankovic all being out robs us of a lot of our options. Though Hogg is back training, he's unlikely to be able to play again this season. Brown has undergone minor knee surgery, and Palmer is just a waiting game now. At least Mooy got himself suspended for Australia and has been back in West Yorkshire since Sunday, so a full week to recover ahead of Burton.

http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/incredible-story-newcastle-trying-sign-12813690

A good read on the Scweinsteiger to Newcastle story.


Still can't get my head around what they we're trying to do. Seriously Llambias and Wise flogging a key player to sign punts for almost the same amount of money. Thank God for JFK - might actually one of the most important figures in modern Newcastle....

Right, long rant coming. Preface it with the fact we didn't break them down or do enough to win.

Why was Ben Turner playing? He got a 5-match ban yesterday, so why the fuck is he allowed special dispensation to play against us? He's not been on a wrong end of a dodgy card, he's been found guilty of racist abuse by a panel who decided on a balance of probabilities that he had used racist language against an opponent. Cold, considered verdict, not a heat of the moment decision. He's been banned. He shouldn't have been playing. That he's been allowed to play has been a significant disadvantage to us, and it now means whoever plays them 5th in this suspension gets a significant unfair advantage we didn't get. Don't know who it is, could be anyone.

Why was Dean Whitehead sent off? He got such a soft first booking because Burton's players crowded that weak-willed spineless little cretin in black, but so far as I could see for the second there was less than nothing in it. Hefele went for an aerial ball with a bit too much gusto, free-kick. Next thing I know three players have grabbed Whitehead and are trying to persuade the ref to card him again. From what I'd seen, he'd been behind Hefele, but that was all. Seemed like (and I'm not claiming to have seen everything) Whitehead hadn't done anything whatsoever. That racist Turner had gone down clutching his face like he'd been shot

Why didn't we get a penalty? Tommy Smith tripped in box. Penalty. No debate. So why wasn't it given? It was as clear as day, I saw contact from 100 yards away and the lad take both of Smith's legs, so why the ref and linesman didn't see it I just don't know. Game-changing decision. No excuses. Cost us too many times with simple, easy decisions that any simpleton could give the right way.

Why were Burton allowed to referee the game? What happened to the dissent ruling at the start of the season? Löwe got booked for haranguing the linesman late in the second half after the Burton lad had physically grabbed him round the throat and wrestled him off the ball about a foot away from the linesman. Löwe was right to be angry because fuck only knows what that stupid prick had been watching to not give a foul, but you can't harangue an official. So a booking's fair enough (though it did come from spectacular incompetence on behalf of a stupid man whose lights were on but nobody was home). So what about their lad charging 50 yards to harangue the fourth official in the first half? What about the dozen or so occasions when three and four Burton players physically surrounded the referee to stop him moving anywhere? What about the lad who refused to go to the ref to be booked? None of those resulted in a card. And worst of all, both of Whitehead's bookings came about because they surrounded the referee.

OK, the first is a foul. But it's soft. He's gone to charge down a clearance and run into him a split second late. But their lad has gone down like he's been shot, rolled about six times. Five of their players were straight around the referee. He wasn't going to book Whitehead until he was bullied into it. Second one so far as I could see wasn't him. Turner, however, needs a very long ban - 6 months or so. His cheating was an absolute disgrace. Clutching his face like that, then up the moment Whitehead is pulled to one side to remonstrate with the officials. Leaves such a sour taste in the mouth, especially as he demonstrably shouldn't be playing after being banned!

You couldn't make it up.

Actually, you could make it up.

Decisions for this season:

Mooy yellow card v Leeds (a).

Decisions against this season:

Newcastle penalty at St James's Park;
No red card v Wolves;
Yellow card for Bridcutt v Leeds (a) (see Mooy incident);
Rajiv Van La Parra red at Reading;
Gunter yellow at Reading;
Sheffield Wednesday penalty (H);
No penalty v Birmingham;
Birmingham free-kick for their equaliser;
Two penalties not given v Wigan (H);
Fielding not sent off v Bristol City (H);
No foul for the opener v Wednesday (a);
Payne sent off v Wednesday (a);
Leeds' equaliser at home not chalked off for offside;
Brown not being allowed to score v Barnsley (a);
Barnsley's keeper not being sent off (a);
Newcastle's penalty at home;
Newcastle's second goal at home;
Bristol's penalty (a);
Today.

So that's one key incorrect decision our way - with TWENTY the other way. Costing us a total of 10 points directly. 12 goal swing. More than half of our games have been adversely affected by key demonstrably incorrect easy decisions that anyone should get right going against us when they shouldn't be.

Open your eyes everyone, there is clearly a campaign against Huddersfield.

So... 10 points clear of third with 7 to play after yesterday. Its going to be a tough & ludicriously busy month first, but the path to getting auto (for me, the minimum goal, although the title would be nice) is becoming much much clearer. Good day.

As for Ben Turner, its not hard to imagine an elongated appeal process also meaning he can play for the Brewers at Newcastle on Wednesday. I recall when the Magpies were deliberating on appealing Jonjo Shelvey's 5 game ban for racist comments earlier in the season, it meant he would've played for the 2 games after his suspension was due to, and actually did, start. Worth noting the 5th game the ban would be if it kicks in before Burton's game at Newcastle is a match with Leeds.

Meanwhile, Rotherham are down... must underline that Neil Warnock knows the 2nd tier very well if he kept that rag-tag mob up last season then without him they sunk big time.

Yeah the plan, if Wise and Llambias actually had one & weren't just fucking about, does sound slightly demented.

Did we have an official DoF between making Wise go away in 2009 and the interlude where JFK had the gig in 2013/14?

Can't believe Whitehead got a second booking for clattering someone off the ball.

The League One table is shaping up a little something like this:



This has banana skin written all over it. Not only because we had a shocking result at Oxford but also due to other teams getting the odd result here and there (legit thought Swindon had fekked it but they are right back into it after winning twice in a row). Our cause would be greatly helped with results for our beloved neighbours at Rochdale vs. Vale and Millwall at Shrews. Going to be a bit scrappy.

27 goals in 41 games for Oldham

Says a lot for how shit Gillingham's defence is to have scored twice as many goals and be below Oldham on goal difference.

Haha, true.

3-1 defeat at Reading tonight. Didn't expect to get anything but to get it back to 2-1 but then concede again a minute later is dire. Thankfully Bristol City (who we've still to play at home) and Forest (who we've got to play away yet) also lost, so we keep hanging on in there....

He misses the ball by less than a foot. Time between the header and contact is less than 1/10th of a second. No raised arm. Contact between Turner's head and Whitehead's back, with Whitehead looking to avoid that contact after he'd realised he wasn't getting there. Not reckless. Not a booking by any stretch. It's a slightly late challenge made to look worse than it was by awful play-acting and seven Burton players reacting to get at Whitehead. Seen the incident a good 15 times now, including slowing it down to see if there's a raised arm or any intent, and I've seen nothing. It's a 50/50 with a player a split second late, as will happen 15 times a game. We got shafted by a play-acting racist and a referee too clueless to realise.

So... what the fuck happened in the Newcastle-Burton game with Ritchie's penalty?

I can only judge from Twitter but it sounds like some absurd interpretation of the rules. And 3 minutes added time given the referee took 6 to disallow the goal is the shitty cherry on top.

Congratulations, you've met Keith Stroud. The man is an absolute idiot. Arrogant and stupid. You're better off having a house brick referee.

That's mostly irrelevant - it's obvious the Burton player is favourite for the ball and Whitehead has jumped into him anyway. - He looks like he's caught him with his shoulder and looks like he has tried to generate power in doing so. - And Turner reacts as if he's just been smashed in the face by a quite heavy man.

Whitehead hasn't used an elbow - probably because he thinks he'll get away with it if he keeps his arm down.

Anyway I see referees have been misapplying the rules again - I'm not sure how what Keith Stroud did was against Huddersfield - but I'm sure it was.

For some reason I thought he was PL accredited. Apparently not since 2010. But either way, its bad enough the PGMOL released a statement of apology for fucking up, which is probably the first time a ref has done that in years - I recall a ref doing that when Alan Shearer was denied a certain penalty at Old Trafford in 2004, but few come to mind in English football since. Maybe someone can provide it...

Still, least Ritchie got a goal and the Mags got 3 points closer to the top flight. Lord knows what the fuck would've happened if Stroud had inadvertently gifted Burton a point.

Can't really take positives from that tbh. Still 10 clear of Huddersfield at least though.

So, so, so close to promotion now. Could be sealed on Friday if results go our way...

At least promotion can be secured on Friday if Huddersfield lose and ourselves beat Leeds at home, can't we?

That's the case for Brighton if they beat Wolves and Huddersfield lose. For us, I think it would have been the case if we'd drawn yesterday, let alone won, that promotion would be secured on Friday through those mechanics. But I think if we beat both Leeds and Ipswich and Huddersfield lose one of those Easter games, that's promotion booked.

Pray for Bury FC my old friends, because yesterday we played every bit like a side going doon. No midfield, no bite, no fight, just woeful. We have our neighbours from Dale visiting us on Thursday, this will either be a right laugh or a right punch in the cunt.

Been away for a few days since the Forest game. Got lucky to only lose by 2. Forest were very organised, played well, we just didn't match them. We've been very inconsistent without Brown and Palmer - we need them back, and soon, to make sure of the play-offs.

That said, it's worth pointing out how well we played against Norwich. Should have been a cricket score, much like the way they demolished Reading at the weekend.