A few weeks ago we were riding along on a very slight, but decidedly noticeable positive wave. We had finally beaten bloody Leamington. We had overhauled Spurs again as top all time FA Cup goal scorers. We had just registered back to back home crowds of over a 1000.
But, at twenty minutes past four on Saturday 16th October it all started to go wrong. Poppies-style wrong.
We were 2-0 up against bolshy Buxton and had spent the first fifteen minutes of the second half camped inside their penalty area. A combination of poor finishing, poor luck and a couple of great saves kept us from getting 3, 4 or more against the Derbyshire upstarts.
Then everything turned to sh*te.
A few minutes later we'd gifted Buxton a way back into the game, then shipped a 94th minute penalty. The Buxton gob-shite manager, in one of his last actions at the club, turned out to have called the tie annoyingly perfectly. He said they'd draw at Latimer Park and spank us on their own heavenly pitch. Which they did, And did.
We followed up the spanking at Buxton with a dose of covid, allied with the upset of having the manager possibly leaving. Then an abject surrender to Darlington where we seemed to want to prove all of our naysayers right by kicking every ball long and every opponent longer.
Finally we manage to succumb to Scum-lite. Sure, it's in a cup tie no-one was really interested in, but it's still a loss to the pointless ones from down the road.
So, the rot has set in. Tomorrow we play at home to Blyth Spartans who have lost their last eight games to leave them second bottom of the League but perversely only three points behind us. Nothing less than a win, and a convincing one will put us back on some sort of track. Dropped points, or even, heaven help us, a defeat and it could shape the rest of the season. Goodbye challenging for the Play-Offs. Goodbye four figure crowds. Hello rapid turn-around of players. Hello season of struggle.
Until the next lockdown of course.....
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Worringly, this may be how our strikers view the Spartan defence tomorrow.... |
