For anyone wondering why this site is rarely updated, I am now editor of Vital Exeter City (http://www.exeter.vitalfootball.co.uk/) and blog on The Times Online and FourFourTwo’s Talentspotter.
Please check out these blogs, comments and feedback are always much appreciated!
On their way in?
Having not paid a significant sum for a player for many a year and manager Paul Tisdale’s fondness for a settled squad I think we can rule out a plethora of star arrivals and a few tweaks here and there sounds far more likely.
Our six forwards have played musical chairs this season with the majority of them being given a chance with Adam Stansfield being handed the staring role as the central striker on most occasions. His statistics of six goals in 22 appearances masks the worryingly high number of guilt-edged chances and one-on-ones he has missed and his ability to harry and harass defenders has helped him keep his place in the side despite his woeful form in front of goal. With five strikers already on the books, signing a sixth might be pushing it but with Richard Logan mysteriously out of favour and Stansfield woefully out of form I would ideally like to see a proven goal scorer join the ranks.
We have been linked with Hereford striker Steve Guinan which, after seeing a lot of Hereford matches last year, would be an awful signing for the club. Tisdale is far more likely to go for a player on a free transfer or from the lower leagues. He could do much worse than enquire about FC United’s Kyle Wilson, the club have said they would let him move to a league club and with 22 goals in 24 appearances this season he could be just the clinical forward we are looking for.
We may also see some defensive cover pursued in the window. This could be the offer of a longer deal to Fred Murray, who is currently at the club on a short-term basis and has impressed when called into action, or another mystery signing. One of the main themes of Tisdale’s signings is that, with the exception of one or two (Rob Edwards, Marcus Stewart etc) they are plucked from obscurity and definitely not household names.
Just look at Neil Saunders, Matt Taylor, Ryan Harley and Ben Watson. So we shouldn’t be expecting any big names to be gracing St James Park in January, but being an Exeter City fan is full of surprises at the moment so you just never know.
The Exit Door
Creative midfielders are not two-a-penny in League Two, a sad fact that means the vultures are circling overhead waiting to pounce on Exeter’s playmaker Ryan Harley. Signed from Western Super Mare in Spring 2008, he made an instant impact and forced his way into the team , played a vital role in the club’s promotion. Two footed and with fantastic vision, Harley has his admirers but here’s hoping his recent injury and slight dip in form has shaken potential suitors off his case!
Another player under close scrutiny from visiting scouts is 21-year-old Exeter youth product Dan Seaborne. The defender broke into the side at the start of last season and made the centre back position his own as he captained the Grecians to the Play Off Final win over Cambridge. Seaborne has been linked with a variety of clubs in recent months, most notably Crystal Palace and Portsmouth. In fact many fans suggested he was on the brink of deadline day move to the South Coast but the deal could not be completed in time. Contracted past the end of this season, any suitors will be asked to pay a hefty for Seaborne. Let’s hope it puts them off.
Dean Moxey is another home-grown talent who is receiving admiring glances. Arguably the club’s most consistent performers in recent weeks, Moxey stepped into the left-back slot vacated by Wolves-bound George Friend, and made it his own. Notable mentions also go to Matt Gill and Matt Taylor who are two of our most consistent performers and could easily come under the spotlight in January.
Five years ago Wales were the self-proclaimed ‘best supported side in Europe’ with over 70,000 passionate Welshman rocking the Millennium Stadium on five occasions as the side battled for a place in Euro 2004. In a country of rugby lovers, the public found their enthusiasm for their football and at £5 a ticket demand rocketed. The team responded with a historic victory over Italy but eventually fell short. It hasn’t been the same since.
Five years on and their attendances at this fantastic arena would make half the Championship blush. The visits of Germany and Ireland in recent years have just hit the 25,000 mark while 10,000 of the committed Welsh public dragged themselves to see the visits of Azerbaijan and Liechtenstein. Watching these matches is an uncomfortable and thoroughly unenjoyable experience.
Put 10,000 people in a small ground and they could make one hell of a din. In a 74, 500 seater stadium it feels ridiculous and very amateur. You can almost hear the players in-game conversations in a ghost-town atmosphere that must surely effect the players. The infuriating over-use of air-horns make these vital qualifiers feel more like a celebrity soccer tournament.
The bitter disappointment amongst supporters after missing out on Euro 2004 was compounded when the Welsh FA binned their bargain ticket prices. After over 55,000 watched Wales struggle against Northern Ireland and Poland crowds plummeted. With the exception of the visit of the old enemy in 2005, home games have never threatened to be anything but a washout.
A severe lack of promotion means it’s never really obvious if the country has a football team let alone one in a group with Germany and Russia. Arsenal’s recent Carling Cup tie with Sheffield United saw £10 tickets introduced and adverts on the back of the Metro. If the marketing team of Arsenal can manage such simple PR tricks you have to ask why a national football association isn’t doing the same?
A student in the capital can watch Cardiff City for £10 but is then expected to pay a credit-crunch inducing £20 to watch the mighty Liechtenstein. I know where I’d rather and it seems that thousands agree.
While Northern Ireland and Scotland put up a real fight for Euro 2008 in front of intimidating home crowds, the Welsh were being embarrassed 5-1 by Slovakia in front of a half empty ground. The atmosphere at Welsh matches is light years away from the vocal and visible fans that drove their celtic neighbours to historic victories and it could harm their chances.
This Welsh side has bags of potential, but it is a shame they may only get the chance to prove it at such a morale-sapping venue. Joe Ledley and Wayne Hennessey join a squad with eleven Premiership players in its ranks. They face a crucial Millennium Stadium double header with Finland and Germany in the spring where victory in both would keep their hopes of qualification alive. But will anyone be there to watch it?
It’s Christmas time again. The time of year all football fans love, giving you the chance to see your team on Boxing Day without the hassles of work and long distances to travel. It’s also the time of year when sports journalists are as lazy as you or me and we can’t escape a cheesy Christmas pun in your club’s match reports.
Every goal conceded becomes a gift, every win will provide Christmas cheer. Not forgetting of course that customary shot of a Father Christmas look-a-like on Match Of The Day. (or Ken Bates!)
Here’s a festive checklist of puns, metaphors and cringe-worthy chrismassy headlines to keep an eye out for in your team’s Boxing Day match report:
Peter Evans
We all love to see our side playing quality football. As Brian Clough said: “If God wanted us to play football in the air, then he would have built a pitch in the clouds” and this season Exeter City have won praise from all quarters for being a side full of creative and free flowing football who have passed our way through teams and won with style without needing to ‘play football in the air’.
But sometimes to be successful you need a Plan B. On many occasions this season our players and fans have said that at times in recent weeks we have lacked one.
After Saturday’s match I think we have found one and it got us out of jail.
An experimental line-up saw our two most creative midfielders playing behind Watson and Stansfield; two short and pacey strikers with the obvious intention of running at a huge Lincoln backline that included own goal specialist Frank Sinclair.
74 minutes in it and it was obvious that this plan was dying on its feet. We were one nil down and struggling to create any real chances. Neil Saunders, an out-and-out winger, had started on the right hand flank and our other creative winger Dean Moxey was restricted at wing-back, but wingers can only be so useful with two 5ftsomething strikers ahead of them.
You could argue that too often this season Tisdale’s substitutions have been like-for-like when the side is struggling. He may take off a speed merchant for another pacey player or take off a creative but slow striker (Stewart) for another (Basham) and the side get stuck in the same rut. But this time the change in tactics was spot on.
Enter Craig McAllister. The target man and lower league journeyman has not started a league game this season so plenty of eyebrows were raised when Tisdale whipped out his Big Mac but the Scotsman’s impact was immediate, our side not only gained a focal point of the attack but the afternoon swung in City’s favour.
Tisdale sent on a left back and pushed our previous left-back (converted winger Moxey) upfront alongside the double substitutes of Basham and McAllister. It had an instant impact. Two minutes after McAllister’s arrival he rose to meet a Rory Delap-esque long throw with a superb header for his first Football League goal: 1-1.
15 minutes of explosive football followed with both sides throwing the kitchen sink at the match with McAllister and Moxey performing impeccably upfront. Without a win in 4 games, City needed a goal.
A string of chances followed and just as it looked like we would have to make do with a draw, we grabbed an unforgettable 92nd minute winner. Basham and McAllister superbly flicked on a ball into the path of the third forward Dean Moxey who fire homed in front of an ecstatic Big Bank and the product of the Exeter youth team loved every minute of the chaos that followed.
How about that for use of substitutions? In a similar vein to last season’s Play Off win at Torquay, where all three of Tisdale’s subs scored, this proved his reading of the game is second to none. I must admit that a forward line of the barely used target man McAllister, Basham and our left-back at the start of play didn’t look like the combination to break down a resolute back line and score two goals in fifteen minutes but it was proved wrong.
Long may it continue. I think that McAllister should undoubtedly get a few extended run outs in the side, either as an impact sub or from the start. With my favoured striker of the ‘famous five’ (Basham, Logan, Watson, Stewart, Stansfield and McAllister) Richard Logan mysteriously out of favour and when he is selected chosen to play an almost midfield role in a 4-3-3 it could well be a chance for City to play with a bigger presence through the middle instead of opting for the smaller striker in the middle of two others, a tactic that was beginning to be found out.
We are still in the Play Off mix with almost half of the season gone and face some vital matches in the next month or so which could define where are season is heading.
Before our relegation to the Conference our fans sat through years of tedious mediocrity as we spent many a season spent ambling between 12th and 16th position in the Old Division Three with little chance of relegation or promotion. So with a Play Off challenge, a 6-1 defeat, an FA Cup upset and two last-gasp goals in our last few matches being an Exeter fan is seemingly anything but dull and long may it continue.
