Turning the season around

What will it take to turn our season around? It seems a complex question but I suspect it isn’t. The indications are that there is one aspect of our play which is letting us down.

Arguably it is not defence. We have conceded 20 goals. That’s the same number as Chesterfield in 8th place. Our defence could be better and both Tom Davies and Jordan Turnbull have made schoolboy defensive errors, but defence isn’t our problem. There are 10 clubs who have let in more goals, we are average for the division and our league position is not down to our defence.

The real problem is scoring goals. Nobody has scored fewer goals than us. This is the main problem. Our strikers either can’t score, never score or aren’t being given the chance to score. 

This is a conundrum. Before his injury last season Luke Norris was reasonably reliable, but since a series of injuries have suggested that Luke’s best days are behind him. Similarly, Kris Dennis has not put the ball in the back of the net frequently enough. At Carlisle he couldn’t stop scoring, at Rovers he has never got into the habit. Harvey Saunders has bags of energy but it stops there. Josh Davison has been given chances, but hasn’t really made an impression since joining in the summer. The remaining forwards, Taylor and Sol Solomon, are seen as being too inexperienced to make an impact. 

It could be that our forwards just aren’t getting the service. Chances are not coming from out wide, from in the middle or from up in the air. The team appears to lack a continuous strategy and instead vary their approach from game to game. Injuries don’t help the situation but there is a sense that the constant chopping and changing means the team don’t settle in to a clear style. Omari Patrick missed the first half against Morecambe, and we played dreadfully. He has been our most consistent player since the start of the season, he was dropped because he wasn’t deemed to be making a big enough effort. That seems strange as Patrick has got back to defend and got forward to score goals. How much more effort is required?

It’s tempting to think all our problems will be solved by the January transfer window. There is an assumption that there will be money to spend. Then there’s an assumption that we will sign good quality players that will lift the team. The evidence from our summer signings suggest, with the exception of Patrick, suggests that not the case. In the summer we were advised we would only be able to have a smaller squad but with more quality. What we seem to have is a smaller team, the evidence of our League position indicates that the quality has yet to emerge.

Onwards and upwards then. We’re all in this together, let’s hope that the next few weeks sees improvements.