I am torn between frustration and realism after the last two games. Frustrated because the football we have played for over one and half games has been poor, against sides on paper we should be beating. And this frustration is exacerbated by the fact that we showed in the first 20-30 mins against Rotherham the style of play and front foot football I have been asking for.
So, I know we can do it, so why oh bloody why do we stop. Rotherham were big, powerful and eventually got us to play their game. When McNulty went off the pitch shrank and it became a game of head tennis. We were lucky in the end to get a draw. But the decline started as soon as the penalty was missed and that’s my biggest frustration.
To play for this football club the first thing you need is a mindset that says no matter what in those 90 mins, nothing will deter me from giving it all, go into battle and be carried out on a shield. The only player that looks like he fully epitomises this is O’Nien
Now I’m not suggesting the others don’t have it in their locker but when they let the negatives into their minds, they stop working to 100% of their capabilities.
Off to Bolton we go and it was like a pre-season friendly and we know how bad we are in those… we did not deserve a draw but we did manage to score a penalty and I hope that this will galvanise the team in the way that the miss deflated the team. Time will tell
Realistic. We could have been Bolton, I saw Stewart Donald in the crowd and thought what must he be thinking. This club could have been on minus points and looking down the barrel of an abyss…
But it’s not but it is starting again, building again, so that one day we can compete in the higher echelons of football. But before we can even dream of that we need the right mindset instilled in every one of those that can impact the outcome. We need people who want to be carried out on their shields
To win the battles you need the right tactics and personnel, but you then need the right mindset to deliver.
