TALKING POINTS

Luke Hunter

@gullsgullsluke

Luke discusses a return to winning ways

ONE SWALLOW DOESN’T MAKE A SUMMER

Yesterday was a better day at Plainmoor and I’ll come to that shortly, I promise, but I felt obliged to look back across a few of our other recent Talking Points before penning this one. Seven days is a long time in football, and after the disaster-class away at Hampton and Richmond Borough, guest contributor, John Cadigan, squarely pointed the finger at our current custodians…

“And the answers Edwards gave inspire no confidence as to either the ownership’s willingness to listen, understand and change, or their true motives for the future”

Six years is an even longer time in football – and with a magnifying glass on the last two seasons in particular – isolated wins cannot be allowed to gloss over such a pathetically poor period for our Club, defined by a set of circumstances that as of yet, nobody has been willing to recognise, let alone take responsibility for. George Edwards was there yesterday – I noticed him rushing past the Bristow’s turnstiles at full time, airpods in ear, eyes firmly fixed on anything but the supporters passing him. Nevertheless I was glad to see him – the Plainmoor atmosphere was faultless yesterday, I expected and understood toxicity but the fans were with the team from the first minute to the last and the result was a just reward. After the last few weeks, I think George Edwards needed to see that, and I hope he spent a few minutes considering just how loyal this fanbase is, what this club can be, and how lucky he is to have it – I won’t hold my breathe but the entire entity deserves more respect. So no, one swallow doesn’t make a summer and one win doesn’t magically reverse two years of regression, but maybe, just maybe, some of the frustration finally exploding at Hampton and Richmond leached into the Club, and those that are fortunate enough to be paid for their involvement have started setting their standards a little bit higher.

THANK COD

Even the most ardent supporters of Gary Johnson have found our loan activity – or lack of – absolutely confounding this season. Long standing relations with City, Argyle and QPR have dried up – whilst more fleeting acquisitions from the likes of Bournemouth and Southampton have also been surprisingly elusive; I was appalled by our pre-season calendar but could at least see sense from a ‘relationship building’ perspective – alas, nothing.

It is therefore a massive relief that ‘Our Lee’ and his Cod Army have delivered what seems to be, two proper footballers – Callum Dolan was fantastic yesterday and a creative spark through the middle that has been lacking for a significant amount of time. Theo Williams will provide the pace we have been lacking – whether that will equal goals, I’m not sure – but it is a different dimension and he had a touch of class about him. Frustratingly, Aaron Jarvis was restricted to crutches pitch side yesterday and it feels optimistic to think that he really will be firing on all cylinders before Christmas.

ASH DIEBACK

If you haven’t heard, Ash trees in the UK are having a hard time at the moment with a degenerative condition called Ash Dieback – you can spot the unhappy ones from a mile away – unfortunately, you can also see that unhappiness in their namesake Bradley Ash. First and foremost, he is clearly not a lone striker – he is very much in the Elliot Benyon mould of poacher – and desperately needs either a big man to play off, or balls to run onto – he’s getting neither at the moment.

The out-of-form striker or out-of-form-assisters is a quintessential chicken and egg scenario, dare I say it is probably a bit of both with us at the moment? And poor Brad, his confidence looks shot as well – he needs to dig deep and find a way onto the scoresheet, the injury crisis isn’t helping him develop a partnership with anybody but hopefully he can start to find the form that made him an attractive proposition in the first place. Yesterday was an especially difficult day against an especially bulging defence – if not Yeovil, he might have more of a chance to make a mark next weekend – a goal to get him going again could be all the difference.

HARD WORK MAKES THE DREAM WORK

There was a lot of good things about that win – Bath are one of the better teams at this level, a lovely goal from Donnellan, the Plainmoor pitch untroubled by biblical rain – but most of all, it was a proper, dig deep, kind of win. I think you learn more about a squad in those circumstances than you do trouncing bottom of the league 4-0 – I’m absolutely not getting carried away here but I finally felt like there was the embers of cohesion, especially with the transition from back line to midfield – for the most part, I think every player could look themselves in the mirror and say they gave 110%; as I’ve said before, that is the fundamental starting point for me and I think 99% of the yellow army will back anybody who ticks that box. We need that level of effort every single week now – that is what it takes to be successful in a league like this, especially when you’re a so-called big scalp that every body wants a slice from.

THE SCRUFF OF THE NECK

In our best periods yesterday, we were confident and ambitious and played the game on our terms – I want to see more of that, let’s play up to the big fish in the small pond tagline a little bit and start taking some of these matches by the scruff of the neck, too often this season we have been dictated by the opposition and ended up paying very mediocre teams far too much respect; this is a tough league, make no mistake, but as I seamlessly loop back to Talking Point One – we’re a full-time team consisting of experienced professional footballers who need to be hitting a standard fitting of that – this match was a good benchmark.