Interesting ride to Chesterfield by train going through Nottingham and thankfully the lovely old Victorian railway station looked far better than I had expected following the fire at the station on Friday. Arriving at Chesterfield early enough to have a good look around the rather nice town centre and the very interesting Museum giving an appreciation of this rather fascinating once very industrial town. Then a visit to two pubs with an amazing number of handpumps at both the Rutland Arms and the Chesterfield Arms then a hike off to the football ground.
The Chesterfield ground is not the worst one by modern standards and slightly less lego like than that at Shrewsbury but nevertheless lacks a touch of the charm of the old Saltergate but that’s progress I suppose. At least our plans for Power Court look more attractive and nicely situated but we will have to wait a few years I guess to see the final delivery of that scheme. Nathan made two changes to Saturdays starting line up at Newcastle with Danny Hylton absent through injury replaced by Elliot Lee. Glen Rea moved out of the CB role to defensive midfield and Akin Famewo came in for his first start since Hartlepool last season. Possibly not massive changes on paper but if you imagine a line up being announced back in November with the key influential trio of Cuthbert, Sheehan & Hylton being absent at the same time it’s a bit of a blow. In the early stages of the game, we were trying to get some football going with short passes but most of the time we were simply picked off in midfield by the hunting pack of Chesterfield players it seemed that they had almost an extra two or three players on the field than we did. The Spireites were certainly not looking like relegation fodder about to roll over and let the league-leading Hatters stroll to victory; such cheek, where is the respect? To my eye, it seemed from the kick-off that this Chesterfield side were really fired up for the game and sadly a lot more hungry than our players. Maybe as the game progressed we would wake up a touch and start winning the second ball in midfield despite looking to be outnumbered. Chesterfield kept winning the ball and coming forward and a nice cross-field move all along the ground saw the ball reach their unmarked right wing and with our midfield asleep a lovely low cross came into the area and was sweetly tucked away for the opening goal. Total credit to Chesterfield although our marking was poor, it was a quality move and goal we would have been proud to score ourselves. In an attack by the Town, Elliot Lee was fouled by a Chesterfield defender but play waved on by the referee who then judged that Justin had committed a foul in the area and awarded a penalty to the home side. Was it a foul, I was just too far away to make a valid comment but that does not matter, twenty-five minutes gone and we are 2-0 down and not really looking in the game at all. Nathan decided to take off Olly Lee who had been maybe handicapped by an injury picked up a little earlier. Olly who can be an excellent passer when we are in control of midfield was not having one of his better days as the midfield was a real scrap that we were just not winning: Cornick replaced Olly. We did create a couple of chances via Shinnie; one following his own good work but ending with a tame shot and another one clipped over the bar. So we reach halftime down by two goals and the group of us agreeing that on that display there was really not going to be any way back for the Hatters. The wished-for improvement in the second half never materialised and despite a late resurgence of urgency in the last few minutes of the game, we were a well-beaten side and Chesterfield thoroughly deserved their victory. Overall Impression On the day we were well beaten by the better side who showed bags more energy and commitment than our players did. The phrase “bad day at the office” has been used by some but that was also used at Port Vale. To my mind staying with the office analogy, too many parts of the office furniture were missing all at one time! Who can we blame? The pitch as at Port Vale, The Referee, or what about Pelly, he is always a good one to blame, the apparent fielding of about 14 players by Chesterfield? No, we can’t blame any of those. As Nathan said in his post-match interview had at least three leaders missing from the starting line up and maybe that was simply one too many for us to combat a home side really hungry for the victory. To that, I think you can add a good number of our players having a serious off day and the combination of that off day and lack of leaders just killed the fight in our side. We are still in a great position in the league and will no doubt get through this small bad spell and in all probability hit another bad spell before the season ends. To my mind, we just have to put this one behind us and get those leaders as Nathan called them, back onto the pitch. We will be ok, these poor performances happen but let’s move on. A Few Impressions on individual performances Stech: made a couple of decent saves, gambled on the wrong direction with the penalty and his kicking was better than in some recent games. Justine: you can see JJ has real quality but despite some well-timed tackles, he like many others, was not at his best. Mullins: a reasonable game with some well-timed challenges. Famewo: he was up against a more experienced striker but came through well and well worth more L2 exposure. Potts: as much as I rate Dan Potts, if the scouts were watching him today then I will rate him for many more years in a Luton shirt; an off day. Rea: well Rea has been outstanding in the defensive midfield role in recent games but in this game his distribution even for a simple 10-yard pass was abysmal. Olly Lee: I think the midfield was just too competitive for our Olly at Chesterfield. Berry: everybody has an off day and let's hope this otherwise fine player can put his Chesterfield off-day behind him quickly; never able to dictate play, unfortunately. Shinnie: most of our better play revolved around Shinnie but he needed more support. Elliot Lee: some fine close control dribbling earlier but seemed to run out of steam later in the match. Collins: the old-fashioned centre-forward yet sadly starved of the service he thrives on, crosses into the box. The Subs: Cornick: a few tricks as per usual but well marked by the home side. Pelly & Cook: both came on with about 10 minutes to go and neither should shoulder any criticism as they probably looked a lot livelier than others on the pitch.
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Hi there, welcome to my site where I chronicle various things about the Hatters, a team I have followed since the mid 60’sArchives
December 2017
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