Putting Nailsworth On The Map: EFL 22/23

Up yours Derby. Exeter are *checks notes* second? Keep it up lads

Often the predictable decline takes months or even years, but this season it just took a few weeks for a Greek oligarch to gut my club and then our shit chairman days to apply the coup de grace by not bothering to appoint a new manager after a woefully inadequate pre-season. I spent most of my life watching third tier football - so fuck it all anyway!

Dare I say it, we looked all right yesterday against one of the pre-season favourites. A thoroughly entertaining 3-3 and if we hadn't had two penalties by the time we got to 3 goals we would surely have had at least two more which were far more blatant.

Should have said 'EFL+' in the title, oops

I assumed we weren't having a specific non league thread. ;-)

it's can also encompass teams which are on their way to the football league

But there’s already a Wolves thread

heh!

Shit noddy teams sandwiched between repeats of minder and episodes of the chase or maybe british touring car championships

welp there's the first KDB -> Haaland -> goal

this is the Brodsworth Colliery won't win the combined unibond div IV thread!

make me a mod, I beg you

What a goal from Sarr. How is he still there?

loves a pedestrian underpass

We are coasting along on the momentum and team spirit of the good-enough-for-League-One first 11 that got us promoted last year, only one major player gone (Cam Dawson back to being Wednesday's second keeper, god knows how good their first choice is because Cam was amazing last year) and one arrived (Jamal Blackman, also a keeper, would be interested in Calzino's view of him but he was very good indeed amd very tall indeed when we demolished Vale on Saturday). Lost seven or eight fringe players, meaning a couple of injuries to the wrong people and we are knackered. We'll see.

Bought a season ticket again, partly because I need to be in Devon more for family reasons (not good ones, sadly), but a moderately successful season would be very welcome.

First league managerial casualty of the season, Blyth have sacked Terry Mitchell for losing to Kiddy on the opening day.

Jamal only started once for Town and I think it was a cup game in which he didn't have much to do and I think wasn't at fault for the goal, Nicholls was in such good form at the time he didn't have a chance of breaking into a side on a long unbeaten league run. He was signed because our 2nd choice goalie at the time, the terrible Ryan Schofield - his confidence was shot/was never any good in the first place. Now we've got a terrible rookie manager called Schofield whose confidence is shot/is way out of his depth, which is a shame because I liked him as a player. Soon we'll be a L1 club without any momentum/team spirit. We've signed a striker who is two inches taller than Jamal, in fact at 6"9 the tallest player in England, but haven't seen anything of him since he went to the Dons on loan.

I don't think it was a case of them letting Jamal go because of him not being good enough, more a case of the club wanting to give current 2nd choice Bilokapic his chance because our tightarsed chairman doesn't even like turning the lights on and wants the club to rely more on players from the development squad.

We put out a team with 5 changes away at Cheltenham in the league cup tonight, but they had the decency to put out a team with 8 changes and we won 0-7, can’t say fairer than that. Told you our squad was paper-thin! (It still is though.)

(There were 8 players who’ve come through our youth system on the pitch by the end, although one of them, Liam Sercombe, must be pushing 30 and plays for Cheltenham, having left us years ago)

I reckon a 7-0 win with weakened squad is a strong case for momentum!

it's a shame all the qpr fans left tbh

rip rtc

Jamalwatch update: started off very nicely thank you. And this was fun:

@Big_Blacks @@OfficialECFC 🔥🔥🔥 pic.twitter.com/NW3RdoKtOE

— PapiBobito (@bobbymmk) August 16, 2022

An especially good night for Exeter fans thanks to events at The Valley too

I had a feeling Jamal just needed a regular peg to hang his gloves on and be given a decent run of games after a few nomadic and unsettled career years and he might just shine, bless him!

Yep he looks a cut above our level tbh.

Also yep Charlton did very nicely against the snot, vg. They have a much, much more expensive squad than ours so it’s doubly pleasant to be above them in the league. (We started last night with 7 academy products on the pitch, so there can’t be many cheaper).

we're looking to offload a couple of centre mids on the cheap if you want to bolster that! gwan give Gilbey and Forster-Caskey a caring home

All we want is two brilliant strikers with great physical presence who don’t want to be paid much and don’t mind waiting around on the bench on the off-chance that one of our forwards gets injured. Is that so much to ask?

We've got one of those in Chuks Aneke. The catch is that he is literally always injured himself. Stockley meanwhile turns out to be able to actually play it on the deck in a possession system, surprising even me

He can, the problem with him IMO is he’s so good at dealing well with balls pumped up to him early that lots of players (and managers) find it just too tempting.

Yes, a temptation that Bowyer/Adkins/Jackson couldn't resist. Garner is the real deal though - people were taken aback when he made Stockley captain, thinking he couldn't play the system, but it's working.

Speaking of Jackson, Wimbledon appear unable to hold a two-goal lead atm, which is a grim sign

Pat Jones with the goal #htafc pic.twitter.com/2W4bNMNnK0

— Matt Jaggar (@MattJMedia) August 16, 2022

last night our 19 yr old "Welsh wing wizard" Pat Jones did more in 10 minutes on his senior debut from the bench than Sorba Thomas has done in 4 games. One of them great unexpected moments in a dismal away game when they are down to 10 and losing 2-0 and you are thinking about shopping lists and wondering if they can keep it to a respectable 3-0 at least. He almost set up the equaliser at the death as well, impressive debut.

Blimey

Our winner last night was a bit special, only saw it briefly in a now-deleted tweet

if you find it again please do share.

i'm visiting my dad in somewhere-near-Hereford at the end of the month and thinking of taking my football-mad 7-year-old along to the game against Gloucester City on the 29th.

all of your teams' goals are very impressive, yes yes

but

Sean Clare’s goal from Charlton Athletic’s 5-1 win against Plymouth Argyle yesterday.

WHAT A STRIKE.#cafc #pafc #LeagueOne #goal #EFL pic.twitter.com/n5Rss7Q7B0

— The Garnerama (@TheGarnerama) August 17, 2022

Sorry not to be a the Gloucester game, should be a good day though. They've got off to a flyer, and bought half our team from last year.

xp

look at those headless chickens defending tho!

and managed by a former bantam

well yes in mitigation, plymouth had just had a defender sent off. but still. still!

not trying to take anything away from that Clare goal really, beautiful shot!

ty, and likewise, may your wing wizards keep you away from trouble

Not the angle I saw earlier, but...

We haven't stopped watching this strike from @LukeHaines9 😍#COYW | #CHEvHFC pic.twitter.com/oPYsjdffpm

— HerefordFC (@HerefordFC) August 17, 2022

I knew there would eventually be a good Luke Haines!

I keep making this joke on Twitter but I don't think the Venn diagram of Hereford FC and people-who-know-who-the-other-Luke-Haines-is has much overlap. sadly.

goal is a beauty btw

No I suspect it's just a sliver in the middle

Town have just allegedly spent a whole million on the very impressive Polish international CB Michael Helik. I fell asleep before it was announced and assumed this morning it would be another of their long list of transfer fails or they'd get gazumped by Luton or something. Barnsley turned a down a £5m offer for him last season. I'm also very happy with the Tyrone Simpson signing even though he's won't be available for selection for months. He was originally a RU player and was offered a pro deal at Leicester Tigers 4 years ago and is still a work in progress, but it's always worth taking a gamble on raw talent.

I meant Tyreece not Tyrone, always get those two names mixed up.

Anyone have any idea if anything worrying is going on at AFC Wimbledon? The second half of this season looks to have been a nightmare.

huge lols. huge

more like Sunderland 'Til I Fail

I'm supporting Coventry because I quite like Robins, so apologies - you are probably fucked now.

:)

Excited, will have little to complain about if we lose tomorrow, incredible season

nothing against Coventry and respect for their struggle over the last 20 years, but Luton in the Premiership would be very funny

Haha no offence taken!
Do people have to still go through some guys garden to get to one section of Kenilworth Road?

yes!

They've recently switched the side that the camera gantry is on at k'wth road- in fact you can see the old one still there- something which always faintly annoys me when it happens

omg

after witnessing the soft underbelly of Middlesbrough quite recently, it was never in doubt for me

Have a friend who supports Coventry so would be nice to see them do it but has a side ever gone from non league to the top league in just 10 seasons before?

Wimbledon did, I think, mid 70s - mid 80s.

They did

What a great week for the northeast

lol

looooooool

ref just refusing to blow up until they scored

this is absolutely nuts

Will be 20-19 on penalties at this rate

Wednesday definitely going to lose on pens

Lol no, perfect 5/5

ref did bottle a stonewall red for wednesday

to be fair if I were a posh player I would have been unable to score a penalty out of sheer shame

So excited

gl to Coventry. They didn't want a repeat of last year's reffing fiasco - so they've brought in Michael fucking Oliver today, clowns

a ref who bottles penalty decisions is ideal for a playoff final obv

I remember that wanker giving a straight red to Mounie for an ankle tickle in a 50/50 - an absolute cunt of a ref

gwarn Hamer!

Fuck them plastic pitch edl bastards imo

i have warm wishes for Rob Edwards but yeah basically that

I'm still sore that we almost signed Elijah Adebayo for a modest fee and these fuckers snatched him up while my club were being a tinpot joke operation and haggling over pennies. too good a player for such a shite club. lol that applies to both clubs really!

booo!

thank god for VAR

Glad we've got var to prevent any terrible refereeing errors in huge games like this

the main fault of VAR is that it doesn't execute corrupt referees

Commiserations nxd

After that first half great to see us play like that in the second
Awesome game, and fair fucks Luton

I never felt a fraction of that magnanimity in last year's PO final. Because it was either ref crookedness or incompetence that dominated the outcome. But at least this was a good game.

Looks like the VAR bunch who got Forest up last season are under strict instructions again

yep, the outcome of a playoff final has been decided in advance again. It sounds Barnsley are still going for it though

Windass (120'+3minutes)

oh dear!

Proof of proof be need be that Dale Vince is an attention seeking egotist prick of the highest order.

Oh god.

A fitting way to close out this thread, mind. What's this season's title going to be? Not long left for someone to pounce

"why isn't Colin Murray on my telly when I get back from the pub"

Probably too long and probably should have been last year.

"Duncan Ferguson reads this thread for job advice"?

I think I have it, now they are relegated to our level:

Swann puts the Thorpe in Scunthorpe

Automatically leading the running thus far

We can't have two FGR titles in a row. They've had their little moment!

heh! talking of thread titles or former ones, Ross McCormack has signed for Liversedge

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F2NzAJjWYAA1X8A?format=jpg&name=small

was just looking as to why Ainsworth is trending before the new season has even begun .... he's ready

omg