Hard One To Take

Is there anything useful to be said after a 1-4 home defeat? If we were around the top of the table you might dismiss the game as one of those things that happen - better side for most of the first half, even second half, scores still tied with 20 minutes left, near misses either side of their second goal etc. But we’re not. We are second-bottom of a league which we view as a failure to be in with one win in 10, 17 goals conceded, now three defeats and two draws in the last five since the addition of new players. So before any thoughts on the game the question right now for us all, including TS, is Adkins out now, yes or no?

I’ve been in the ‘give it a little more time’ camp and just about still am, but with provisos. The three factors which for me count in his favour are: first, that the players are still trying their hardest, no sign on the pitch that he has lost the dressing room; second, a major problem is clearly the fitness levels of too many players, pinpointing and addressing that issue (and perhaps it is just game time) doesn’t necessarily involve changing the manager; and third, it is still a new combination of players, a factor that can’t last for much longer but is still material. Now if in the morning after it looks as if the players are turning against him the balance shifts in favour of Adkins going now – and I suspect that through the day all Addicks will be glancing at the club site to see if there is news to that effect, nobody will be surprised if there is.

As for the game, it reminded me a lot of the Gillingham match. Bolton actually had one or two moments in the first 10 minutes when they might have scored, but for some last-ditch interventions. Instead our pressing paid a dividend in that we forced a mistake, fed Leko on the right, and his cross was converted. And for the rest of the first 30 minutes we were clearly in the ascendency, playing decent football, covering well and preventing any Bolton threat, looking capable of adding to the lead. At Gillingham the game changed at the break with their substitutions; last night we just seemed to lose momentum heading towards half-time and Bolton, who perhaps had been biding their time, aware that our good spells don’t tend to last, came more into it. And they equalised, with echoes of Wycombe’s first, a guy allowed to cut inside from the left and shoot low into the far corner.

We all wanted to see us come out for the second half and reassert the previous dominance. That didn’t happen, perhaps as the danger men down the flanks started to run out of steam, perhaps as Bolton raised their game. As Curbs was to stress later, whoever scored next would probably go on and win. It was almost them as their guy’s flicked header went just wide, almost us curtesy of Davison’s curler which shaved the post, proved to be them with a deflected shot, then we came within a whisker of levelling things with Washington getting in behind and chipping the keeper, probably should have scored but went just wide.

The awful third Bolton goal, in by then pretty dire conditions, finished the game with 10 minutes of normal time left, by which time we were looking a spent force physically, then after our panic substitutions bad defeat became a rout with a farcical fourth as some of our defence held back and others charged forward to try to play offside.

So for sure 1-4 was hard on us, if the game is taken in isolation. In a remarkably fair match report in The Bolton Times it was noted that this was the eighth time in 10 games that Bolton had gone behind, so perhaps it was no surprise that they took being behind in their stride. The report acknowledged both that Bolton “must have been fairly pleased to have jogged back down the tunnel on level terms” and that “the game entered into the last quarter finely poised and a winner nearly impossible to predict”. What is missing from the assessment is that through the first quarter of the season we have not been responding well to challenging situations and too many times have coughed up crucial goals in tight contests.

So what might we change for the better, aside from the manager? I thought the selections in defence were good, as was playing two wide men and balancing this with a couple of combative midfielders in the central positions. All of this worked well enough in the first half, but we proved incapable of keeping it going. Both Leko and Blackett-Taylor ran out of steam (only the former was replaced), while both Clare and Watson departed early. If we had had another winger on the bench (DJ or Kirk) we might have kept the shape better, and I was surprised that it wasn’t Arter who came on in midfield as Clare tired, again to keep the shape.

So there are still plenty of options, even if after last night the major question regarding the team seems less about what combinations and partnerships we might work on and more which players are capable of lasting a full game. If Adkins keeps his job for Saturday it will surely be with the knowledge that another defeat then, in whatever circumstances/conditions, would be the end of the road. After all, much as we enjoy the matchday TV show, listening to Deano, Curbs and Scottie Minto discussing how many points we are from a play-off spot seems a little divorced from reality.