After the disappointment of the Poole Christmas Bank Holiday game, waking up on New Years Day that feeling that some may describe as stupidity came over me once again and I decided to make the trip down the M5 in the hope we might start the year in a better fashion than we ended 2021. First of all Happy New Year all, after making my debut on the TSOF blog for Merthyr away, once SV knew I was making the trip he asked me to have another go, so here is my thoughts on our latest away day.
Whilst there were few positives to take on the field from the Poole Town game, something made me feel like Yate might be one of those games where things click/fall our way and we get a result, so with it also being my closest away game, and thankfully waking up without a hangover it seemed like a good idea. The first positive of the day was that despite the sale of cans of Stella from a giant tent behind one goal, the home support seemed to be able to handle their drink a bit better than the visitors on Boxing Day, so a repeat of the Jake Paul style windmilling in the crowd seemed unlikely.
Arriving an hour or so before KO, the first challenge of the afternoon would be navigating the walk from the car to the ground across what was essentially a giant lake, it seems shit car parks may be a theme of the games I get chosen for the blog. Heading into the bar to meet the General et al, talk quickly moved to the lineup, the lack of Alfie Stanley (and Roberts) and therefore no recognised striker led to questions about the lineup and formation, but appeared to be a 4-3-3 with Bayston up top and Oakley and Charlie Gunson either side.
After a fairly heated debate between my dad and Luke about the optimum number of recognised first team players at the club, it was time to head outside for the game, the most notable thing as the two sides lined up was the size of Yate defender Matthew Bower, looking at the General we were instantly expecting a repeat of Truro away where we decided to pump long balls straight at their biggest defenders for the first 75 minutes of the game, however, the opening exchanges of the game were thankfully fairly positive for the Magpies as we played some nice football and moved it around quickly and efficiently.
The ground with some huge conifers down one side, some of which seemed pretty close to hanging over the pitch, saw a surface, perhaps fairly expected at this time of year, that was fairly uneven and bobbly, but that wasn’t appearing to cut up much further despite the recent rain. Having only seen a handful of games this season, mainly defeats, it is well talked about on the group that we are playing a lot better style of football this year and the first half against Yate seemed to be evidence of that. Whilst it was far from a one sided affair, I think it would be fair to say there was little between the two teams with us playing the better football at times, but Yate looking more threatening in the final third when they did get there.
A few long range efforts had flashed wide of the Yate goal when midway through the half we won a freekick on the edge of the Yate box, after a clever bit of work from Bayston to win the foul. The free kick itself, seemed relatively routine for the Yate goalkeeper but with the bounce just before him, he spilled the effort, before some Laurel and Hardy style defending from Yate left Bayston with a fairly simple finish to open our account for 2022. In the minutes that followed a good block at the other end from Madden to deny Yate was quickly followed by a great chance for Oakley to increase our lead, but he was denied by the Yate keeper, before Billy Lowes tried to recreate his effort from a week previous, but he was denied by the upright, both moments probably proved fairly pivotal later on.
One observation was how it was good to see a decent travelling contingent for the game. Not getting to many Saturday games these days, it is literally often the same old few people (see what I did there) I see at games these days. But there was a good number of people behind the goal in both halves, hopefully some good results might see this continue in games to come.
With the half time lead, and some pretty decent football played, things seemed pretty positive “New Year, New Us” and all that, arrangements for the end of season bus tour were being initiated. In stark similarity to the Merthyr game the following period of play couldn’t have been much further from the positive opening half we had watched. Whether we decided to purposefully sit back, whether the enforced change with Madden being replaced by Davidson led to it, or Yate just came out with a different mentality, I am not really sure, but it appeared as if we were in for 45 minutes of defending, in the hope we would see the game out for a 1-0 victory.
Yate, who appeared to have a 12th player in a black kit in the second half, seemed a different side, and perhaps why they are where they are in the league as they pushed and pushed for the equaliser that just seemed inevitable to the travelling support behind the away goal. Mr Enever no doubt delighted with the assist by awarding a penalty as the clock ticked towards 80 minutes, which the home side duly convert. The goal did seem to spark Dorch back into action, but unfortunately as we pushed to regain the lead, we were left exposed to a quick counter that led to the home side’s second, offside appeals waved away as the linesman picked himself back up from the floor.
The last ten minutes, and the majority of the six minutes of injury time were spent with Yate either on the floor, of taking their time to take throw ins, kicking the ball away, or pretty much anything else to prevent the game actually being played on the pitch, it might sound quite bitter, but my issue isn’t with the home side, everyone would want their team to do it if they could, but how the referee let them do it time after time, with no effort to speed things up, or just to purely uphold the rules of the game he’s there for was very frustrating. In a day and age where we are short of referees in the non league game, and speaking from experience I know it is a difficult job, I wouldn’t normally comment on this, but his display was particularly poor, especially after giving out a yellow card to one of our players in the first half for the softest push you’ll see, largely because of the rehearsed appeal in unison of the home dugout, but his subsequent failure to then book any players in the second half for a number of very late tackles.
Enough on the man in the middle, on reflection afterwards few of us just standing in the bar after the game fairly speechless after what was a huge improvement on the Poole game, but ultimately another frustrating game where we walk away with 0 points after a one goal reverse. Whilst it could be argued we might have had the better of the first half, it was very clear that Yate dominated the second, and maybe therefore deserved the 3 points, but I don’t think a draw would have been too unkind on the home side. Things are definitely in a much better place at the club these days, both on and off the pitch, however, the next step is to really convert some of these games into 1 and 3 points that we are just missing out on. Hopefully we will pick up the required points to avoid having to look down, but such is our position we are currently only a couple of defeats away from that position currently, so we can hopefully get some “Good times on the pitch”. DW
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