Five Conclusions

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80 travelling Yeovil fans were left disappointed after the Glovers saw Aaron Jarvis’ opener cancelled out by two Boston goals. Here are Ollie’s five sad conclusions from Lincolnshire.

It’s that old cliché again… We’ve been saying it a lot lately – and Alex Whittle said it post-match too – but it really was a game of two halves. Yeovil looked relatively in control and composed on the ball in the first 45, and looked dangerous going forward on a few occasions. After the break, it was a different story – with the Glovers unable to build anything of note and having to deal with pretty much one-way traffic from Boston. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what causes the second-half drop off, but whether it’s a lack of fitness, a lack of options from the bench, or an inability to adapt when our opposition turn the screw, it’s incredibly frustrating.

Ryan Jones and Josh Sims formed a good double act. Aside from Aaron Jarvis’ bolt from the blue that put us ahead, most of our dangerous moments in the first-half came from Jones and Sims’ good work down the right. The two were very much on the same wavelength, linking up well on a number of occasions, with Sims in particular causing trouble. Jones has been at the heart of a lot which has been good in recent weeks and it was a shame to see him taken off on the hour mark. Although Sims still showed endeavour, he wasn’t as effective without his mate.

We should have lost by more. Make no mistake about it, although there was only a goal in it, the hosts had more than enough clear cut chances to put the game out of sight – and they probably should have taken them. In-form Tom Cursons had two showdowns with Jed Ward – the first saw him round the keeper only for Kyle Ferguson to slide in heroically on the line, and the second saw our number one manage to get down not once, not twice, but three times to stop Cursons from slotting home. Despite riding our luck at one end, we did little to take advantage at the other – even the introduction of new striker Millar Matthews-Lewis with 15 minutes remaining did little to shake things up.

I’m not going to blame James Daly. The substitute may have given away possession in the lead-up to Boston’s winning goal, but he was surrounded by three yellow shirts with no teammate within 15 yards of him – it wasn’t the first time he had battled away for balls only to have no support to help him out. And of course, when you look back at the replay of the goal, it’s hard to see much determination to win the ball back as Boston break.

We’re putting pressure on ourselves here. We may have ended the day still seven points clear of the drop zone, but the longer we go without getting the points required for survival, the more precarious our position will seem. Results at the weekend went our way and we have a fairly favourable run-in all things considered, including games against three of the current bottom four. What a shame it will be if those games mean something by the time they come around. Anyone see how Tuesday night’s opponents Woking got on today by the way? If you didn’t, maybe try not to look.

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Yeovil fell victim to a professional performance against Scunthorpe United. Here are Tom’s Five Conclusions from Huish Park.

We definitely weren’t bad! This sounds like I’m scrabbling for positives, but genuinely we performed really well in the first half. We looked like a team hunting for a win, not just accepting a 0-0 like we may have in previous years. Sure, things unravelled towards the end of the 90 minutes for us, but I don’t think I could sit there and say we didn’t give it a damn good go, we just need that final finish… speaking of which…

Goodness me, we need a striker. The majority of Yeovil fans can see that Billy Rowley is having to make do with the sum of the parts available to him, but one glaringly obvious gap in the recruitment this season has been the lack of a competent striker.

Aaron Jarvis looked better today, but I don’t think it’s hard to look better than he has in recent performances (looking at you Rochdale…), meanwhile Tahvon Campbell continued to look lackadaisical at best, and lazy at worst. Both players have had opportunities across their last few performances to take the striker spot as their own, but neither have done so. Put it this way, if we had someone like Danny Whitehall in our side today, I think we’d have stood an even better chance…

The lads looked tired. It’s easy to say something like that considering the scoreline and the run of fixtures in recent weeks, but it’s unfortunately true. Right from the off, even in our better periods during the game, we looked somewhat leggy, unable to get that extra yard of space we may have found with rested legs.

The second goal completely sucked the life out of the squad, which was telling for the third goal, so hopefully this week of rest will help us come back against Boston all guns blazing.

Let’s not panic. Yes, we’re still eight points above the drop, and yes the team’s behind are picking up points. But, teams are also sinking; look at Sutton and Braintree from just today as an example. We’ve proven we’re capable of picking up points too. Looking at the table with the glass half full, if results go our way next weekend, we’re 12th again. Suddenly, we can look up again, rather than behind.

Today will hurt, but let’s stay calm, back the squad and the staff, and they’ll get us over the line, one way or another.

Billy Rowley
Pic c/o Gary Brown

Roll on the summer. As mentioned above with the striker situation, we need to get some holes filled in this squad in the summer. A heavy reliance on the loan market has had mixed results, and while a lot of the recruitment has been alright, we’ve built a squad for FOUR different managers.

We can see the foundations being laid for the next season, but we’ve just got to get through these last 11 games and look forward to next season; some strikers, some proper wing-backs, and a replenishment of contracted (and preferably good) midfielders, and then we can really begin to judge the Billy Rowley era. Up the Yeo, and all that!

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A great performance from the Glovers saw them coast past Tamworth last night. Here are Ian’s Five Conclusions from Huish Park.

How comfortable was that? From the first ball being kicked, Yeovil felt in total control across the pitch last night. How Tamworth are 10th in the division I have no idea. They kept things condensed centrally, but as soon as we were able to get the ball into wide areas they didn’t really know how to contend with us. We should probably have created more in the first half for our dominance but in a team that’s rebuilding confidence and trying to find a rhythm after a dismal Cup exit, it’s understandable.

Close from Troy Perrett and he knows it.

We were defensively sound. You can only contend with what you’re up against, and Tamworth had nothing other than route one for the majority of the match, but the back three of Jake Wannell, Declan Skura and Joy Mukena dealt with everything they had to with relative ease. They handled the Tamworth big lads well and in the latter stages when the visitors started working crosses into the box, they dealt with that too.

Jake Wannell
Pic c/o Gary Brown

Ryan Jones is coming good. He’s been in and out because of being cup-tied and postponements but after last week’s decent performance, Jones stepped it up again. He was a constant threat on the left hand side and really thrives when he’s carrying the ball. I don’t want to be hyperbolic, and I’m not going to be, but the way he moves with the ball and runs reminds me of Michael McIndoe. Clearly it’s too early to say he’s the second coming, but clearly there’s magic in those boots. His wonderful first touch, his fleet footed dribble through defenders and drilled shot into the bottom corner was superb.

Ryan Jones tackles Kwaku Donkor. Picture courtesy of Debs Curtis.

It was the reaction we needed. After a terrible weekend everyone had to follow up. Did the Sutton win paper over the cracks? What’s going to happen to the teams around us? Well, pleasingly we really built on last Wednesday – albeit against very different opposition – and managed to get ourselves up to 14th and eight points clear of the bottom four. The nervousness of last week has dissipated and we can go into another home match on Saturday with confidence.

Billy Rowley
Pic C/O Gary Brown

We need to build on it again. The lack of consistency has been the story of our season. The elation of Sutton to the despair of Southport and then the uncomfortably comfortable win last night is our season in a microcosm. We’ve got an opportunity to step up against Scunthorpe – who are without a win in six matches – and show that we really are coming good. It’s not going to be perfect, but back to back wins at home gives us enough reason to be positive.

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The Rowley-coaster took another sharp dip as Yeovil Town’s FA Trophy dream died at the hands of lower league Southport. Dave was among the away supporters in Merseyside yesterday and here are his thoughts.

The dream is over and we only have ourselves to blame: Penalties are a lottery, but we picked all the wrong numbers in that second half. We were the better side in the first half but missed too many chances to put ourselves further in front at half-time and with the scoreline at 1-0, and that meant Southport always had a chance. They came out for the second half with that knowledge firmly in their minds and our substitutions assisted, we just got deeper and deeper as the second half progressed and Southport took full advantage. The miss from Chris Sze about 20 minutes before their equaliser should have been a wake up call, but we just did not wake up.

We lost the penalty lottery: After Brett McGavin had shown the way with the first penalty in the shoot-out, the choice of Aaron Jarvis for the next one was bizarre. In his pre-match comments, Billy Rowley had said Jarvis had travelled separately having been suffering with food poisoning and it showed, he offered nothing for the entire second half and to not even get his penalty on target spoke of someone who was either ill or has given up – or both. Jed Ward’s heroics in shoot-outs has got us this far in the competition, but there’s only so much he can do when two of his team-mates can’t even hit the target.

The sun sets on our dreams of a Wembley final.

Is there any point mentioning the need for a striker?: It feels like we say it in every one of these Conclusions articles, but when you look at the chances we spurned before James Daly pounced on a mistake, it seems so blindingly obvious. I get the difficulties with finding someone at this stage of the season, but when you see other clubs in our division signing strikers, is it really that hard? Really?! Campbell did alright when he was on in the first half, but the fact he can’t complete more than 45 minutes speaks volumes. Less said about Jarvis the better.

Credit to Southport: You have to tip your hat to Southport, they never gave up and the 3,000-odd fans inside Haig Avenue created a fantastic atmosphere. The fans I met before the game had much more of a sense of humour of the ribbing about being Scousers than the more sensitive ones on social media, and they thoroughly deserve their place in the semi-final. I hope they get a Merseyside derby against Marine in the FA Trophy this time around.

James Daly in happier times. Even this was more paper over the cracks.

This has to be a wake-up call: The progress in the FA Trophy has papered over some cracks in our squad, but now they have to be laid bare. There is no point in glossing over it, with the exception of a very select few, this squad is simply not up to it. There are 13 more league games left to play and we have to hope that there’s enough desire and quality in this side to get us over that line. If anyone in a position of control at the club thinks there is going to be the type of success which will bring in the crowds without major investment in the playing squad, they need to think again. If you ever thought this wasn’t a roller-coaster, the thrilling high of late win against Sutton on Wednesday and the devastating drop at Southport tells you differently.

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How’s your heart rate today? Ian’s is still pretty high after another Rowley Rollercoaster. Here are his Five Conclusions from Huish Park…

That was a bonkers finish. When the seven minutes of additional time went up there was a roar of hope rather than expectation but what unfolded in that stoppage time was unlike anything I can remember at Huish Park. Jack Sims in the Sutton United goal had barely been tested in open play all evening and somehow we managed to find the reserves to not only equalise, but go on and win it. No doubt there are early leavers who woke up this morning knowing they could have witnessed a remarkable finish.

Brett McGavin celebrates a late, late winner in front of the Thatcher’s Stand.

James Daly was the fox in the box. It was a bit Dryden Experimental Experience seeing Daly through the middle but when it mattered most he was there. He was the sharpest to react to Sims’ spillage of Luke McCormick’s penalty spill and when Ryan Jones (who I thought worked tremendously hard all night) whipped a teasing cross in, Daly was there to lift the roof off Huish Park. The winger (…striker?) has boundless energy and may not score two more important goals this season.

It wasn’t a vintage performance. Plenty left Huish Park before 90 minutes last night and who could blame them? I thought struggled to create, looked like a team that hadn’t played a lot of football together and – in the second half in particular – were largely second best to Sutton. Passes were loose, Sutton disrupted us when they had to, and when they came down our left hand side it felt like there was something on every time.

But, a win is a win. You cant understate the importance of that result, no matter how it came about. Everything that needed to happen around us did, Braintree lost, Morecambe and Gateshead expended everything to draw 4-4 and we are now sitting pretty eight points clear of the bottom four, but who’s counting? It was not pretty by any stretch of the imagination but in terms of Huish Park moments, Brett McGavin’s penalty is up there. The relief, the joy, the trauma, all of it exploded in that moment and it was an unbelievable feeling. Who’d be a football fan eh?

I think it will be this way for the rest of the season. I’m not sure we’re going to see much identity shine through as the season draws to a close. As cliched as it is, each game will be it’s own cup final with varying levels of severity as we muddle through until the May. Until Billy Rowley has exactly what he needs to implement his vision of the team, In my opinion, we’re just seeing a patched up squad to get us through. This has undoubtedly been a baptism of fire for Rowley, and as he admitted last night he’s learnt a lot in his short time at the helm.

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It was a long trek for supporters making the almost 700-mile journey to Cumbria yesterday and the journey home after a 3-0 defeat felt a lot longer. Gloverscast Ben (who had a slightly shorter journey, it has to be said) was on co-commentary duty at Brunton Park and here are his conclusions.

Heads dropped: I will get to the football in a minute, but I do think it’s worth making a point about the body language our football club as a whole is offering up at the moment. The third Carlisle goal on the stroke of half-time was the killer blow for the game itself but, it came in part because heads had already begun to drop and frustrations had kicked in. Even the manager, Billy Rowley, who wears his heart on his sleeve and kicks and heads every ball, was starting to get frustrated, water bottles got kicked and on a couple of occasions, Brett McGavin exchanged ‘pleasantries’ with someone on the Glovers’ bench.

At half-time, our subs had a leisurely walk around kicking a ball, whilst the Carlisle bench had cones, structure and a coach making sure their replacements were ready at the drop of a hat. Players were getting wound up with one another and that’s all giving off the wrong image and setting the wrong tone.

I believe that emotions are high and that I want my players playing on the edge, but let’s remember that achieving our goals comes with….unity. Its written on our kit. Frustration can be a force for good when channeled correctly.

Yeovil Town on the defensive in the first half yesterday.

There was a Jake Wannell shaped hole at the back:

Remember the days of the consistent back line of Michael Smith, Morgan Williams, Jake Wannell and Alex Whittle Oh, what we would give for that kind of consistency right now. Now, that is not to say that Finn Cousin-Dawson, who was my Man of the Match, Declan Skura and Kyle Ferguson don’t have their attributes, they absolutely do. But I am not sure organisation is one of them.

The first goal comes from a second phase of play where players don’t have a grasp on where their player has drifted off to and how to organise with the ball coming back in. That’s where we need someone to set the tone and get the defence set. We missed our skipper.

We need to talk about Ryan Jones: It sounds odd that adding a transfer fee to someone adds pressure straight away, but I think I am not the only one who was hoping for a bit more from him in this part of the season. I do not know if the right wing/wing back/right back is quite where we’ll get the best out of him long term.

I am fully appreciative that any move into a new team requires time to bed in and get used to a new set up, but for a player who we know is very good for this level, I think I would like to see a bit more between now and the end of the season.

Ryan Jones in his days at Aldershot Town

We looked a lot better in the second half: Did Carlisle take their foot off the gas? Maybe a bit, but their substitutes all had a point to prove coming on and certainly did not slow up. (I could make a separate point about squad depth, Regan Linney and Chris Conn-Clarke off the bench? Are you serious? Silly depth).

But, we got chalk on the boots of Jones and Daly and they both looked far more comfortable working with those around them to create plenty of moments that were… nearly… brilliant. I can’t count the number of times we did so much of the nice build up stuff only for the final ball/cross/shot to be naff. Ugh.

I’m not panicking – yet.

Seriously, I am not. There are certain corners of the Internet that have already booked their trains to a range of National League South towns and have started pointing their fingers at any range of people on the pitch, in dug outs, board rooms and wherever else they want to find blame.

That’s not going to help is it? The gap is five points…. to 11th. And I know that is not as click baity as “AFC Yeovil, who’s in?“, but it is true. Let’s try and give the players the belief that one good performance / result and we’re in touching distance of the top half.

That’s bonkers. There are 14 games to go. Every team in the bottom half has to play those around them. Pick the battles, be up for Sutton at home on Wednesday night, but also Tamworth. Things could look different then, but there is so much football to be played.

If any player is reading this, turn the Internet off. Mute the #YTFC hashtag and get your motivation from those who gave you everything at Carlisle, those who’ll be at Southport and wherever else this season takes us. Up the Glovers. Achieve by Unity.

Achieve by Unity – it used to be written all over us.

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Well, that was… a bit rubbish, wasn’t it?

Ben dialled up his DAZN stream and took in the Glovers’ 2-1 defeat to Aldershot. Here are his five conclusions.

A result that undid all the good work vs Rochdale.

Actually a performance that undid all the good work vs Rochdale

The harsh truth is that Aldershot wanted it more, the Aldershot players also played with 10 men on Saturday (for longer than we did) but they came with a plan to come out of the boxes quickly, stun us and then just never relented.

The honest thought is that, instead of fighting fire with fire, we went into damage limitation mode and couldnt get a foot into the game at all. And if I had a quid for every time we gave the ball away, by yearly DAZN subscription would have been covered twice over.

That’s about Aldershot deciding to live and die by their positive actions and they well and truly deserved every bit of it.

Finn Cousin-Dawson celebrates his goal
Pic c/o Gary Brown

For the love of Phil Jevons will someone find a striker.

Twice in the game, we had set pieces in attacking areas which Jake Wannell won in the air, twice the ball fell into the six yard box and twice, not a soul in green and white was to be seen.

Wannell’s arms went up in exasperation twice. Where is the striker who snaffles five or six a season by sticking their foot through one from 4 yards, who wants to be in the mix, where push comes to shove, where youve got to get a kick, where you’ve got to do anything and everything to get that ball over the line? Aldershot had someone like that. He won them the game.

Tahvon Campbell
Pic c/o Gary Brown

Ward and Works worth their weight.

We’ve said it a million times, here’s 1,000,001. Without Jed Ward we’d be well and truly stuffed wouldn’t we?

By his standards, he actually had a below par game, some sloppy distribution and a couple of little fumbles. But we were in the game because of him, he’s saved us so many points this season.

And a word for Works, who is diminutive in stature, but when he flashes into gear, my word there’s a player there. The sort of player we’ll see doing great things in the future and we’ll say “remember that belter he scored vs Aldershot that time?”.

Terrell Works shoots….and scores. Nice one, son.

Worried without Wannell

Jake Wannell’s tenth yellow of the season means he’ll miss the next two (vs Carlisle and Sutton)

Our defence has chopped and changed a fair bit this season, but we’re going to have FCD and two relative newbies against Carlisle and that’s got me a little nervous.

But, it does offer a chance for FCD, or perhaps Kyle Ferguson to hear the call for leadership from the gaffer and really step up. Just like they did vs Rochdale.

Jake Wannell strides forwards | Photo by Gary Brown

We’re still paying the price for early season chaos.

Its mid February and we’re having to manage the minutes of players who have come in after time out of other sides and we’re still asking a lot of a young side, packed full of exciting, but raw talent.

Four managers, four ideas, four plans, four plan As, four plan Bs and its clear we didnt start the season fit enough – I’d love to compare Aldershot’s heat maps and distance covered – and with games coming thick and fast it isn’t getting any easier. But the Rowley era has, overall, been a positive one, we’re still on a road to Wembley, we’re still closer to 11th (4pts) than we are to 21st (5pts).

It’s a massive summer ahead, get there unscathed in the league (and maybe a Trophy in the back pocket) and this defeat will be long forgotten.

Billy Rowley
Pic c/o Gary Brown

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It was a return to Huish Park after 35 days of postponements and away days and the Glovers showed they’re no slouches against promotion-chasers Rochdale. Here are Ian’s Five Conclusions…

We held our own against promotion hopefuls. Even the most optimistic of supporters must have gone into yesterday with massive apprehension going up against the – at the time – league leaders. Rochdale were in unbelievable form and had not dropped a single point from a winning position all season…until they came to Huish Park. We showed all the buzzwords yesterday: character, determination, spirit, camaraderie and played some good football before we were frustratingly reduced to 10 men.

Yeovil Town huddle | Pic c/o Gary Brown

Aaron Jarvis owes his teammates a Thatchers. When Jarvis replaced Campbell (who had one of his better games) the match was nicely poised, we’d enjoyed some decent chances and were holding our own but the first time we tossed the ball up for Jarvis to compete the worst happened. I thought it was sheer idiocy. We know how Jarvis competes and looks for contact but the way he led with his forearm, arm not looking at the ball gave the referee very little choice. I know he plays looking for contact and roughing up his opposing defenders, but I thought it was really poor and he let everyone down.

Referee Niall Smith gives Aaron Jarvis his marching orders

Finn Cousin Dawson stepped up. It’s often been a case of always the bridesmaid never the bride for FCD. He’s not one of the first choice centre backs and he’s been shoe-horned into the floating wingback role, so it was nice to see him get his flowers yesterday. His header to bring us back level was pinpoint perfection and he had a solid game in at right centre back. For me, he’s more dependable than Ferguson.

Finn Cousin-Dawson wheels away | Pic by Gary Brown

Mafico made another mark. What a find Dakarai Mafico is. (Hat tip to Declan Skura too) The Cardiff youngster was in centre midfield yesterday – or number 6 as the cool kids say – and he was fantastic. Brave on the ball, forward-thinking, confident to play through the lines. He did his defensive work and got us attacking too. We may only get to enjoy him this season, (although with Cardiff chasing promotion to the Championship they might let us have him back next season, right?) but the way he knits everything together between defence and attack is well beyond his years.

Dakarai Mafico | Pic c/o Gary Brown

It was a great game of football. Billy Rowley described it as ‘cat and mouse’ whilst admitting modern football can be a bit boring (hear, hear) but I thought it was an entertaining game. We played some nice football and after 35 days since we were last at Huish Park, I could see an improvement and the style beginning to come through. In the moments when we played out from the back it looked more instinctive than it has done. We did the dogged stuff for the last 20 minutes and the players deserved their standing ovation from the supporters at full time.

 

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We were up, we were down, we were level, we had it taken away at the end – life is a Rowley-coaster! Heartbreak and frustration, pride and disappointment, just a regular Wednesday night in the life of a Yeovil Town fan.

Ed Turnbull was in the away end with 124 other hardy Glovers, here are his Five Conclusions from the defeat to Boreham Wood.

The first hour showed we’ve got a long way to go

I know we went in at the break level, but that was a complete steal. I really enjoyed the way we used the ball at Telford and Altrincham, but in the first half against a stronger opposition we didn’t have any of the ball to use. And when we did get it our quality on the ball wasn’t good enough as we were suffocated by the Boreham Wood press. Right from the first whistle it felt like we were in for a long evening of bus-parking under the cosh, a still all-too-familiar feeling from 2025.

But the last half hour showed how far we’ve come

A goal and a man down away at a top 6 team in a game we’ve been on the back foot thus far, I think even the optimists amongst the hardy travelling contingent were struggling to see a way back into the game. But Billy Rowley did, it seemed. He decided attack was the best form of defence, and so it very nearly proved to be. This was epitomised by James Daly, who scored an excellent goal and very nearly topped it with a goal that would’ve induced comparisons to Gareth Bale’s against Barcelona in the Copa del Rey, albeit from the other side of the pitch (someone out there knows what I’m on about, right?!). It was very refreshing (and long overdue) to see a Yeovil side come out of their shells when up against it, rather than curling up into a ball of damage limitation with minimal success as we’ve become all too accustomed to.

We shot ourselves in the foot

The first 2 goals felt preventable, as did the red card (although I’m not sure I should complain about that, because it seemed to make us better!) – frustrating mistakes, made all the more annoying by the fact they ultimately undid all the aforementioned positives. I’ve generally been a fan of Kyle Ferguson, and still am, but I make that 3 key mistakes he’s made this season which have directly led to goals conceded (after Scunthorpe and Brackley away). Unfortunately for him, they’ve all come in games where we’ve lost by 1 goal.

Kyle Ferguson | Photo by Gary Brown

Credit to Boreham Wood though

Yeovil made mistakes, but Boreham Wood were clinical enough to punish them. And then I have to (through gritted teeth) accept Aaron Henry’s free-kick was worthy of winning the game, especially one where Boreham Wood deserved to win on the balance of chances, territory, possession and probably just about every other metric. How Abdul Abdulmalik isn’t playing in a higher league I am now even more perplexed than I was after the reverse fixture back in October. Mind you, I’m equally perplexed by how the atmosphere at a club pushing for promotion to the EFL can be so non-existent!

We can hold our heads high after that

Maybe it says something about the home support too (sorry, I’ll stop with the needless digs now), but the fact the team that had just conceded a stoppage time winner was the team whose fans clapped them for longer after the full time whistle was a telling reflection of the pride I and many Yeovil fans felt after witnessing that display once we went down to ten. That said, football’s about picking up points not being proud of how you lose. It’s not going to get easier when we welcome table-topping Rochdale 65-and-a-bit hours after the end of this match, and I worry how our smallish squad will cope with the upcoming onslaught of fixtures, but at least I feel we’ve got a team that can give us plenty of excitement (and more importantly enough points to steer clear of danger) along the Rowleycoaster that the next 3 months will be.

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Gloverscast Ben was on co-ommentary duty for BBC Somerset this weekend. He was at the J Davidson Stadium to witness the last minute winner for the Glovers. Here are his five conclusions.

Jed Ward saves Penalties.

When they document this season in a Hollywood movie or a Netflix documentary, there will be plenty of storyline that flow throughout, but one of them will undoubtedly be that Jed Ward has picked some brilliant moments to save spot kicks.

The context of the game, the fact that we’ve recovered 0 points from losing positions this season and that it was a decently hit penalty all add to that being a massive, massive moment. Breathe it in, the smell of freshly cleaned sheets

A win for intent?

It wasn’t a great game, the greasy surface, the wet weather, the two mid table sides who have been through some stuff this season kind of set that up, but I think Yeovil won the game, because we wanted to win it. Altrincham wanted to slow the game down, Yeovil wanted the ball to move forward.

It isnt that simple, it never is, but I felt like Rowley’s attacking additions have one mindset that is to get the ball to the opposition penalty area, the substitutions – again, possibly because thats all we had – were replacing energy with energy in the attacking third.

The Cardiff lads are a bit good.

Dakarai Mafico won the Gloverscast Player of the Month for January and deservedly so, im really looking forward to seeing what Perrett can bring to this side.

I loved everything he did in the final third. He’s young and raw and not everything came off, but his brain is certainly there for a high level of football.

He’s only ever thinking forward. He ran with the ball, stuck to him like glue, he’s got a nice touch in tight spots to keep the possession. My MOTM. We’ve got a couple of good ones.

We are still missing that number 9.

Tahvon Campbell got booted about before being taken off, and did a lot of real battling and would have felt every single minute of it, but without having Jarvis to call upon from the bench, we did feel light.

We’ve got a very simple tactic when the ball goes direct; the ball goes into the feet of TC, or for him to nod on and then there’s runners beyond the front man to create chances. That’s a physical job, often a thankless one, but one that looks increasingly pivotal in a Billy Rowley set up. A summer priority to make sure we have the best back to goal striker in non league at our disposal… (no, not that one Dave)

Momentum feels good.

I know there’s been a slightly broken up schedule with postponements and the focus switching between league and cup, but the numbers, right now, don’t lie. Four wins from the last five (well, three and a penalties victory), three clean sheets and the early signs of what a Billy Rowley Yeovil might look like over the next few months and seasons.

Those 201 fans int he away end headed home with a last gasp winner in their back pockets, and dare I say, are heading to promotion chasing Boreham Wood, (who have lost four of their last five) in a great mood and hoping we can cause an upset.