Not bad. Not great

So, the season has continued and i now have completed Septemter. The order of the fixtures I previously listed have changed because some matched were postponed due to Neal Eardley going to represent Wales. But the five teams played remains the same. Here is how the games went:

Oldham 3 - 1 Carlisle

This was our first fixture the Johnstone's Paint Trophy and it is a competition I feel we can realistically win if we put some focus to it. We completly dominated this game attacking well and defending imaculatly. The first goal was an on target Hughes shot which got slightly deflected by Peter Murphy, for some reason it went down as an own goal. Maher scored in the 28th minute and the final Oldham goal came from Steven Kabba who put in a great attacking performance. Carlisle's only goal came from a long-range free kick by Kavanagh which was a great effort, they had no clear cut efforts in open play. The defence were very good, especially centre-back Zambernardi. I was concerned after the game as my physio informed me he was weighing in 11 stone overweight, turned out it was just that he had Michael Bridges in his back pocket! MOM and star of the day was Maher in the centre of the park and he played great. We have reached the next stage of the competition and will face Stockport, a local rival.

Yeovil 0 - 2 Oldham

Back to the usual, same good performance with no difficulites in the league. Lee Hughes scored the fastest goal I have seen on FM scoring in 15 seconds. His partner was Alessandra and he also scored which is predictable, this happened in the 12th minute. We enjoyed 56% of possesion which away is very pleasing. Chris Taylor picked up the MOM award although a number of players could have recieved it as they all played well, with nobody playing great or badly. After this result I was feeling very confident.

Oldham 0 - 0 Bristol Rovers

Unfortunatly all good things have to come to an end, and for our winning streak that occured today. I was frustrated because we played quite well and we just didn't get that goal. Alessandra picked up a knock against Yeovil and Kabba got injured representing Sierra Leone so I played an experienced front line of Hughes and López. Neither could find the net annoyingly and even when we went all out attack in the closing stages deadlock could not be broken. 8 shots and only 1 on target tells the story in my opinion and I am going to have to write it off as one of those days. For a team that has found goals easy to find so far this must be viewed as a blip.

Oldham 2 - 2 Brighton

This is my worst result of the season so far. A 2-2 draw with Brighton is not that bad but the thing is that we led 2-0 up till the 84th minute. The lapse in concentration, as it could be described, is something I do not want to see happen again. Ferriera and Alessandra both got injured in this game. I will start with the positives; it started very well with Hughes showing he does know how to score, twice. The positives probably end there with MOM Hughes. A huge portion of the blame for this result lies with Celestine Babayaro, in the first half he hacked someone down nastily and I thought he was going to get sent off, he got away with it and I dismissed it as a mistake. In the 84th minute he hacked a striker down in the box to give them a penalty and a big fat ticket back into the game which Elphick gratefully took. Then what confuses me most is I switched our tactic to defensive to hold our result, but somehow Jason Jarrett managed to find his way through to score an equaliser in the 93rd minute. Cruel admitedly, but a lesson to the players hopefully, resiliance is needed.

Hereford 1 - 3 Oldham

That is more like it indeed, especially under the circumstances I shall describe. Due to injuries to Alessandra and Kabba it was the ageing strikeforce of Hughes and López deployed. Admitedly they lack pace but thier finishing ability meant I was confident. This aforementioned confidence evapourated shortly though as López was taken off injured on the 32nd minute and Hughes likewise in the 42nd. The situation was bad as the best options on the bench were young Matty Wolfenden just back from a very long injury and winger Fernandes. A shift in formation to 4-5-1 was used and I sat back and crossed my fingers wondering where the goal would come from. Fabrice Fernandes scored a brace from wide right midfield (44th and 48th minute) and I was full of joy. They scored in the 66th minute but that was irrelevant and own goal strached the lead late on. Fernandes rightly got Man Of the Match and I was really proud of my midfield who chipped in to save the day.

I am going on holiday tomorrow for 10 days and therefore there will be no blogs for a little while. When I arrive home the blogs will restart though guarenteed. Feel free to leave comments while im gone as I will get back to you when home. As this is the last blog for a while I shall summarise where we sit.

Stats

League Table - end of September

As you can see my side sit in a very respectable 3rd place and we are only 1 point off league leaders Leicester. If we had found a goal against Bristol Rovers and held our nerve against Brighton then we could be sitting 3 points clear, but thats football. As the only team not to lose a game I am pleased, although we play a strong Leeds side next so things could change. Lee hughes is currently the league's top scorer with 7 goals, which is good for him and the club.

When I get back from abroad I face a really tough fixture list. In the league we play Leeds (A) and then Leicester (A), that could make or break our form. In between them is our JPT fixture against Stockport (H). After that we play Leyton Orient and Millwall, both at home.

I wish everybody reading and following my blog an enjoyable Easter Break. C'mon The Latics.