Norwegian Oyster

The scoreline suggests we were hammered. And we were in terms of result, but at least four of their goals can be explained by defensive errors - and one was a real shame as it followed some really neat, short, crisp passing and moving on the deck by the Oystermen culminating in one loose ball from debutant Ben Smith, who otherwise had a pretty good game, which was intercepted, leaving Tanner flat on the floor and a Met player successfully one-on-one against Fewell. Maybe there is an argument that the Oystermen should not have been playing one-touch football so close to their own penalty area, but at least they were trying to express themselves.

The Police's first two goals involved crosses to the far post and two pretty simple finishes. Positionally, they can both be explained by failures to mark properly. The first should have been picked up either by Powell or Denly, the second by Smith or Tanner. The two closest players in each case was the full back. Both full backs had poor games: Powell was beaten for pace every time, and Greg Smith displayed positional naivety and poor decision-making: one outside foot clearance gifted the Met another goal. Both players were better going forwards: so Smith was pretty unhurried on the ball (which is a good thing) and seemed quite prepared to cut inside briefly on occasion; Powell too picked his passes relatively well. But their lack of pace meant that they probably should have stayed further back, especially away from home. Cornhill replaced Powell in the second half (after Powell picked up an injury), and Cornhill acquitted himself pretty well at left back. Given that he is also our best set-piece taker, he really should be in the starting eleven, somewhere. He first made the team as a right back and although he has done very well at right midfield too, he is not going to displace Axon, Grant, Dolton or, for that matter Gess (who was yesterday playing in the reserves apparently). As has been suggested elsewhere, when GS is fit, the best full backs we have are the two Garys (Gary Sayer and Gareth Cornhill). Powell definitely has some potential (but it's very interesting to note that on the Ramsgate website he is described as a defensive left-sided midfielder!).

Any manager is going to show loyalty towards players he has brought to the club, but Greg Smith's 13 games for the club have hardly been an unqualified success so far. Managers also have more information about the players than us lowly fans, but how long does a player need to regain his confidence - something Smith is currently lacking? I can understand Gess being sent to the reserves because he has not been playing as well this season as last season. He also needs to start scoring goals again. He remains Town's top scorer at the moment. I'm sure he will bounce back - he has already shown a willingness to temper his 'red mist' - and perhaps, like Lloydy, he will come back stronger from the experience. The only problem with this analysis is that even Lloydy was dropped to the bench for this game despite being our best defender over the last two games. So, as has been pointed out elsewhere, what are players to think if their good form is not rewarded by the shirt? Of course, it's difficult to make space for everyone especially when one of your centre backs is the club captain - but Gooding sometimes dons the armband, and he does not play every game. Incidentally, it looks like Clint Gooding is slowly finding his form again. His performance was ok yesterday, but he still has some way to go.

 

Gooding's weighted pass with the outside of his boot almost takes out the ref

On the theme of inexplicably dropping players (Cornhill being the most obvious example, closely followed - on recent performances - by Lloyd) what's the story with Hitchings? With the exception of one game he has played, he has been one of our most consistent (even if not outstanding) performers. Even if his last game was his weakest, what's the logic behind dropping someone on one bad performance, especially if others are dropped after good performances and yet others keep their berth despite having barely one good performance over 10 games??? Maybe there is some logic behind this, but I cannot fathom it. 

Back to the game: we were one down after 10 minutes and two down after 19 minutes. Fewell made a great save on 26 minutes to prevent the Met going three ahead. On the half hour mark, new signing and debutant Axon lost his man and put in a good driven low cross which was almost met by a well-placed Vahid, but this was shortly followed by a Met counter-attack that almost resulted in another goal at the far post.  

 

Paul Axon

In the last ten minutes of the first half, Whitstable were by far the best team playing some attractive attacking football. Another debutant, Ben Smith, from the reserves, showed not only a willingness to get stuck in, but he also had composure on the ball. One driven shot from the distance proved testing but resulted in a corner. Axon put one testing corner in from one side and Grant from the other although he skied a free kick in a good position right at the death of the first half.

Whitstable came out in the second half looking determined and by no means dead and buried. Cornhill's introduction led to a degree of composure being instilled into the Oystermen's game and Vahid started chasing down much more than he has done of late. He even put in the odd tackle. I was impressed by his work rate for once. Unfortunately, on 62 minutes, despite Whitstable having the best of the half, Met were gifted a goal after a good Whitstable move was intercepted following one loose pass from Ben Smith. And five minutes later, Whitstable made another mistake as Greg Smith tried to clear a high ball with the outside of his foot, inevitably miscuing the clearance straight to the Met left winger who took his goal well.