POSTED: April 23 2018 10:11:19. By Oscar Courtney - SOUTH MANCHESTER U8 LIONS V U8 TORNADOES



Sunday 22nd April, St. Ann's Road North, KO 10am, Supplementary Cup.

Another tough tie for the Tornadoes, where once again we were paired against a team, a good level or two above us.

We've played South Manchester several times this season and have never come close to competing against them. Why the league's Divisional Secretary insists on putting us in these 'higher groups' will forever remain a mystery to me. In this Supp Cup group, we've played 4, lost 4 and managed to score 1 goal, whilst conceding 19.

I for one will be relieved to move up to 7 a side next season and have a different Div Sec!

As for the game itself?
We battled and we tried. Occasionally we even strung some passes together and threatened the opposition's net. But mostly it was panicky and rushed. However, for sustaining untold pressure and thwarting many certain goals, with his last ditch blocks and tackles, the MOTM award had to go to George Wadeson.

Continuing with the overall theme though; I know the 3G pitch didn't suit us, but I am becoming increasingly concerned by the decline in standards of play. Whilst the effort is mostly there, from the boys, the composure on the ball seems to have regressed, along with the positional awareness and tactical nous. Three players all going to tackle one opponent and leaving two opponents unmarked, one of the two midfield strikers not tracking back to help defend. Blithely ignoring pre-match training instructions, the list goes on.....

We really need to get back to passing the ball to each other and moving off the ball to support the play. We were definitely making inroads towards this, in the first half of the season, but sadly that all seems to have evaporated. As the year has progressed we've becoming increasingly reliant on the powerful surges of some players. This isn't helping the development of the team and isn't how I want us to play football.

This is an issue that Richard and I will be examining in the coming weeks, as it's becoming very obvious that there's quite a large range of abilities within the current team set up.

Oscar

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