Blackpool v Scunthorpe United

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Football League Championship

Blackpool :
Gilks, Crainey, Evatt, Baptiste, Seip, Southern, Bouazza (Bangura 86), Emmanuel-Thomas, Adam (Euell 83), Clarke (Ormerod 85), Burgess. Subs Rachubka, Edwards, Martin, Taylor-Fletcher.
Subs not used:

Scunthorpe United :
Murphy, Byrne, Jones, Mirfin, Friend, A.Wright, Togwell, Sparrow, McCann (Ngala 78), O'Connor (Slocombe 63), Hayes (Forte 82).
Subs not used:
Spence, Canavan, Thompson, Woolford.

SULSESC REPORT

by Steve Rodwell at Bloomfield Road

ELEVEN years ago, at Bidford Grange in Warwickshire, having played 17 out of 18 holes in heavy rain, I was the wettest I've ever been on a golf course.

In 2009, at Bloomfield Road, Blackpool, I was the wettest I've ever been at a football match.

Even though it had been raining most of the day (and the preceding week) I was still willing to believe the forecast that the showers would become more intermittent in the afternoon. Poignantly, the rain did stop briefly for the minute's silence that preceded the game for Remembrance Day, which was well observed by the crowd (and so much better than the cop-out of a round of applause) but five minutes into the game the rain came back and proceeded to tip it down for the remainder of the game.

With no shelter in Blackpool's Gene Kelly stand, what fun we had. For 24.50! They didn't have the decency to offer those waterproof ponchos you sometimes see at games; they did have a few for sale (for a quid) but they only had about a dozen, so soon ran out. The stewards seem to think they were offering some consolation by telling us the new stand would soon be open, as though we were regular visitors!

It's very rare these days to find football grounds, especially at Championship level, where the toilets (which were covered) are a better place to be than the stands. Fortunately, it wasn't cold and I had my trusty golf waterproofs (the same ones I used at Bidford) to offer some protection.

Scunthorpe put out quite a defensive line up; 4-5-1 with Matt Sparrow, Andrew Wright and Sam Togwell all forming part of the midfield, with Paul Hayes playing alone up front.

The first-half of the game was pretty even and not particularly eventful. Cliff Byrne put in a couple of cracking crosses 'early doors' but with only one up front and a midfield not particularly keen to support the attack, they were wasted. Hayes did have a couple of good chances and Sparrow, who was playing well, probably wasted the best chance.

Scunthorpe's 'game plan' was working, in that it prevented Blackpool from creating too many chances - they were mostly reduced to shots from outside the box. Their best effort was a curling shot from Clarke that came back off the post.

Half-time thoughts were that Scunthorpe possibly had the best of a poor first-half and, perhaps, ought to have gone in ahead.

I thought Hayes, while working hard, wasn't particularly suited to the lone striker role; he doesn't have the necessary burst of pace and is too used to flicking the ball off, which meant he wasn't holding it up well.

So what happened early in the second-half? He burst through the Blackpool defence but shot far too early and the ball went straight into the goalie's hands. A few minutes later, the same thing happened, though this time he was further forward and it was one of those situations where he was either going to score or be brought down for a penalty. The outcome was that he dinked the ball over the advancing goalkeeper, 1-0. Surely if we continued to play like this, we would win, because this season we always win when we score first. Hang on a minute though, don't we always lose at Blackpool (well, 14 out of 15 times).

The goal seemed to spark Blackpool into action, although for the next few minutes it seemed as though Scunny might add to the lead as they created a couple of chances on the break. However, things then went awry.

Adkins is always banging on about 'controlling the controllables', so the manner of the first goal was frustrating. O'Connor needlessly gave away a free-kick in or near the centre circle for shirt pulling. Why, oh why? From the resulting free kick, Evatt lost his marker, Jones, at the far post and headed in.

As the game restarted, I was thinking that George Friend was having a steady, if unspectacular, debut when almost immediately he gave a suicidal back pass to Mirfin who, under a challenge, pushed the ball back to Murphy. He struggled to clear but from the resulting scramble Bouazza shot goalwards. Murphy made an excellent save. Trouble was, he was two yards outside his area. He knew he was off because instead of berating everyone, as is his want, he trotted back to his goal line.

If there was any doubt about Murphy's sending off - after all, Mirfin had got back behind him and might have been able to block the shot - it was removed by his pathetic attempt to make out the ball had hit him in the face.

On came Sam Slocombe. His first touch of the ball was as it brushed his gloves on its way into the net straight from the free-kick. Double whammy! I know it was his League debut, and the conditions were terrible, and he's only young, and the free-kick was fiercely struck, but 'he's got to be disappointed' with conceding that goal. Flat palms and strong wrists would surely have deflected the ball over.

After that, the ball rarely left the Scunny half, as Blackpool poured forward. They rattled the woodwork a further couple of times in building up to the inevitability of the third goal. It was a tap-in for Burgess, though it looked to me as though he kicked the ball out of Slocombe's hand after he gathered a cross, but a 'Lasher at work said "your goalie spilled the ball".

At 3-1 down with 10 men, Scunthorpe then went five at the back with N'Gala coming on for McCann, but it didn't really change things too much. Baptiste scored a fourth with a long-range deflected shot. They didn't even allow us the consolation of second goal, when in a rare foray forward in the dying seconds a shot from Forte, a late subsitute, turned into a cross that Sparrow put away into the roof of the net. I was in line with play at the time, gaining a little shelter by some portakabins near the exit and I reckon Sparrow was level. Still no one could really be bothered to complain.

Apparently they can charge 24.50 because some seats for home supporters, who are not members, cost 25 quid, i.e, they aren't charging away supporters more. However, they ought to be forced to offer comparable seats. Failing that, I reckon we should turn the sprinklers on the Blackpool supporters when they come to Glanford Park and see how much it, literally, dampens their spirits.

As a footnote, Ian Holloway and some of the Blackpool players are coming to my daughter's school on Thursday and the children have been asked to think of questions they can ask. I've primed her to ask: "Do you think you were lucky to beat Scunthorpe in your last game, since when it was 11 vs 11 you were second best and given that if on the same day Gomes stayed on the pitch (and saved a penalty), Murphy should not have been sent off, he would have saved the free-kick, the third goal was a foul, the fourth goal was deflected and what might have then been the winning goal for Scunthorpe was wrongly disallowed for offside? And when are you going to finish the ground?"

But somehow, I don't think she'll ask it.