Match Thread: Lincoln City v Shrewsbury Town | Page 14 | Vital Football

Match Thread: Lincoln City v Shrewsbury Town

Shrewsbury came to spoil 5-3-2, take an age doing anything, kicking the ball away. It seems to be teams that sit back we struggle against particularly at home and that was a problem the Cowleys had aswell.
We couldn’t get our key men into the game and in truth it was a drab affair from both sides, it’s a point where maybe a few weeks ago we may have conceded late on.

Too many misfiring tonight, the likes of Toff and Bruno below their usual standards and that set the tone for the rest of the side, sporadic clever touches but rarely achieved the tempo needed to be a real threat.

Felt a real off-day from the off, with the preparation time that's a worry but lets hope for a response on Tuesday.
 
Go back less than two weeks and it was one of the greatest days in our history. Funny old game.
Reactions on here tend to be extemes, a win and a good performance v Sunderland and we're promotion contenders, draw tonight in a poor game and mid-table if we're lucky and possibly in a relegation fight.

Its always been the way on here, immediate match responses tend to lack a wider perspective.

We're holding our own in this division, which is a strange one - last season, 12 teams at risk of relegation on the final day? This season, the loss of Bury and Bolton's deduction means relegation should not be so open, Southend and Wimbledon look to be weak.

Funny old game indeed.
 
Unfortunately it was a case of Shrewsbury successfully dragging us down to their level by parking the bus.

Sadly we didn't arrive with our A game and were frustrated to hell.

A very soft red card, thanks to am-dram acting from their No. 11. The ref looked at the linesman for assistance and it seemed that old lino was duped.

The golden rule of football is that if you can't win....don't lose.
 
Our attacking play is sooo slow! Unnecessary sideways and backward passes giving them all the time in the world to get 11 men back behind the ball and we can't break them down. We never looked like scoring v 11 on Saturday and it was the same tonight.
I think.that's a little harsh. Shrewsbury permanently had 7 men behind the ball whenever we got possession making it very difficult for us to get any forward momentum. They only showed any remote attacking intent when we went down to ten, although in classic Arsene Wenger style I cant comment as I didn't see it.

We played pretty well against a good side on Saturday, but we certainly played quite poorly against a pretty average side tonight.
 
Did see the sending off and it was an outstretched arm from Bolger around the chest area, just a block not a swinging arm, hope we appeal.
 
Managed to keep a clean sheet against 11 men.
Had the ball in the back of the net twice and created a fair few chances in the first half, just poor finishing.
We certainly weren't at the races today but we were still the better side and looked the most likely to win.
Onwards and upwards.

Edited to add-

Against a seasoned League 1 side when we are still finding our feet.
 
Thought Toff had desire tonight and played well. I get frustrated with the sideways passing that achieves little. Eardley making too many errors this season. Grant was anonymous in 2nd half and forgot he was on until he was substituted. Andrade had the ball too much with his back to defenders and too tight to touchline. O Connor had a decent game in my opinion
 
Did see the sending off and it was an outstretched arm from Bolger around the chest area, just a block not a swinging arm, hope we appeal.
That is how I saw it. A free kick and yellow card 'for the team' as they say. If their bloke had been six inches taller it probably wouldn't have been any card at all.
 
The sending off was right in front of me in upper 4.Bolger looked at the guy as he started to run run down the line and then brought his arm/elbow back and crazily put it into Whaley’s face. For me it was always going to be a red, it was a mad thing to do, ironically I thought Bolger and Shackell were having a good game at the time.

Whaley absolutely milked it, but sadly can we say Andrade wouldn’t have done the same thing. For me the virtually no contact sport we watch, encourages simulation and mass exaggeration.
 
You'd not be happy if you're a Shrews fan who travelled over here on a Friday night and your manager goes 5-4-1 in damage limitation mode for most of the game (even if he'll pass it off as 3-5-2 come 3-5-1-1) as though they were playing Man City. Not that it was too much of a surprise, Ricketts had the same 'do not lose' mindset at Wrexham as he did tonight. It'd bore me to tears being as negative as that. Not a wonder they hardly score.

Too many not quite at it tonight for us. Shrewsbury defended well and were organised but didn't commit bodies forward anyway until after the sending off and tried to steal the win so in that respect it was difficult to get though them.

Grant and Payne didn't look after the ball well enough and kept giving it away, the full backs didn't have many options when it went out to them and Walker was being marked by 3 albeit we got though them a handful of times.

Subs made no impact either.

Perhaps slightly slow on the ball and too many sideways passes but what can you do when the opposition set up like that? I'm reluctant to use the word predictable because you could see patterns of play that have been worked on that didn't quite work - and that's just a learning curve for us at the minute with new management.

Going to contradict myself and say that I called the Bolger red as it happened but only because of how it will have looked to the ref/linesman rather than what it actually was. He's put his arm across him but given that their guy was about 2 foot shorter than Bolger, his elbow did go into his face but it wasn't a swing it looked more of a natural 'easing' him out that you see 5 or 6 times a game when a ball is played into the channel.

Nothing to be overly concerned about. I'd be amazed if we came across a side any lesser interested in winning, or even scoring, this season than tonight.