If Witton had been five or six nil up, the visitors could have had no complaints, but instead we lose concentration, concede a goal, overplay it, give away a second and suddenly a team that had been utterly outplayed sense a way back in. I hope our players can gain some confidence from this result, and most of all some self-belief, which seems to be missing, and there is no reason for it to be. Football wise there was only one team out there tonight. If our final ball had been better then it could have been the proverbial cricket score.
Matt Cooper, Anthony Gardner, Alistair Brown, Ben Harrison, Rob Bodie, Martyn Jackson, Josh Hancock, Michael Powell, Jon Dawson, Alex Titchiner, Danny Andrews.
Subs: Anthony Sheehan, Jonathan Breeze, Joshua Crofts, Michael Moseley, Stuart Plant.
‘but the fact is unless we can score 3 goals we ain’t gonna win any football games and the game at this stage of the season is all about WINNING.’
Hate being right!!! PHEW is the only word after last night, we should have been out of sight and realistically 3 nil is out of sight unless you’re Witton or Spurs!
First hour we played some lovely stuff, incisive passing, final ball sometimes lacking quality but very busy work and looked great going forward, and we deserved to be a couple up at half time, fantastic strike from Titch for the first goal. He really must stop bullying centre halfs and pick on someone his own size
I thought we pressed very well and kept Nantwich high up the pitch, for the first hour or so, that may have taken its toll though, the pitch was very heavy, pudding like in places, and a combination of tiredness and nervousness meant that once Nantwich scored, the panic set in, shape disappeared and it was backs to the wall.
Very surprised that the full backs weren’t switched back and that other than a forced substitution no changes were made, risky or brave not sure which! Midfield just died and Powell in particular was awful for the last 25 minutes
Fortunately Nantwich only scored the once more when I’m sure most Wittoners were feeling the inevitability of another inglorious failure.
The referee had a good first half but then chose not to give two blatant penalties for fouls/pushes (he saw them) and arguably a third one for hand ball.
Positives, it was a must win game and we did, and we have a centre forward whose found his goalscoring boots now hes back home!
Quite a transformation from Saturday! I was so pleased to see us grab the initiative from the start - it makes such a difference. Powell back to midfield and Danny on song transformed our creativity. Fantastic first goal and a comfortable first half. We can laugh now at the defensive mistakes but their first goal was a real classic - Coops saves a shot that was going wide but palms it to one of our defenders who manages to set up their striker from 3 yards…you couldn’t make it up! Still, despite all the wobbles I thought the last few minutes were relatively comfortable. The ref was very peculiar with his decisions, but most of the late fouls and off sides went our way.
Apart from a bad spell in the 2nd half I thought we were really good in overall terms. Titch makes such a difference, as we hoped he would, and he’s still not 100% fit, as we saw when he cramped up late on. Saturday looks a big challenge and Barwell winning was a kick in the teeth, but we’re not marooned at the bottom, so bring on Droylesden away - if we lose that, well…
Plenty of positives up the point of going 3 nil up, although have to credit Cooops with a vital stop at 1 nil.
Great to have Titch back and scoring - their No5 couldn’t deal with him at all.
I agree the ref had a poor game, and he missed what looked a certain foul on Hancock (i think) before they broke for their 2nd goal.
But overall, great character to grind out the win. As nice as it would have been to blow Nantwich off the park for the full 90 (rather than just the 55/60 minutes!), the way we battled out the last 10 minutes will also be a huge boost to the confidence.
I enjoyed seeing the solidarity of the whole team celebrating our 3rd goal together in the corner - however, they need to regain their focus quicker than last night, as we let Nantwich straight back into the game!
No reason why we can’t get something from Saturday’s game now. Chorley on a bit of a dodgy run currently.
