The Rub of the Green

I don’t believe in luck. I think it’s invented by people who lack control of their lives and want to have something to cling onto.

There’s lots of superstition in football, and it has always amused me. Remember Alan Cork saying he wouldn’t shave until Sheffield United were knocked out of the F.A. Cup and then finding himself becoming gradually more hirsute as they surprisingly got to the semi-finals?

By the big day his grizzled beard made him look like Robinson Crusoe, and if they’d got to the final he would have resembled Shrek the Sheep, that poor cloud of a creature they found in a cave in New Zealand last year that hadn’t had a shear taken to it in its life!

What about ex-Chelsea striker Adrian Mutu, who believes he will always avoid bad luck on the pitch as “curses can't touch me because I wear my underwear inside out”?

Or Argentine goalkeeper Sergio Goycochea, famous for his heroic performance in the 1990 World Cup semi-final penalty shoot-out? He put his impressive penalty-saving record down to the fact that he urinated on the pitch before facing a spot kick!

Many Brazilian footballers take superstition a step further even than that: they believe it’s lucky to leave their new boots in a locker overnight with their old ones because they thing the older pair will teach the new ones all they know!

As you might guess from my disparaging tone I don't subscribe to such notions. I've never believed that there's such a thing as luck in football. You get slices of fortune because you are good. People used to say that Liverpool got too many penalties in the 1980s, but they spent more time in the opposing side's box than anyone else so they were bound to!

Likewise, I don't see why luck should even itself out throughout the season. Why should it? Each game is discrete, so why should a match next month be influenced by what happened last week?

Yet I'm starting to doubt. Is it just coincidence that ridiculous slices of bad fortune keep happening to Wrexham? We seem to get a new bolt out of the blue every couple of games at the moment. We've often been poor in the last couple of years, and that would explain a lot of our misfortune, but what about last Saturday? For two away games in a row we'd played well, we were completely in control with ten minutes left, then had our third ludicrous red card of the season against lucky Macclesfield, going on to concede two in injury time, the winner being a mishit cross!

It's tricky for someone who doesn't believe in luck to confront the notion that we might just be the unluckiest side around at the moment, so I’ve decided to stick to my principles and declare that there’s no such thing as luck! The fact that we haven’t had our just desserts in recent weeks, months, years even, is just an unfortunate pattern, and basic probability suggests that this pattern will soon change.

Before long our decent play will get a fair reward. Before long the misfortunes that have occurred to us will stop, and we’ll benefit from some good fortune. There’s no such thing as luck, and our season will pick up soon. Touch wood.

Incredible!

What a difference three days makes!

It's hard to believe the side which beat Accrington so comfortably last Friday was basically the same one which collapsed the previous Tuesday. Admittedly, the personnel had been tinkered with, but the shape of the team remained the same. More importantly, the players who remained from the Chesterfield debacle were different men, if you see what I mean!

I must admit I worried when I saw the team sheet before the Lincoln game. I was surprised to see us playing with three similar centre-backs, strong in the tackle and the air but not the quickest. Likewise, I wasn't sure about Michael Carvill as a wing-back. I've been very impressed with him this season; he might develop into a very good player for us. However, he's not the biggest and he has very little experience of such a defensive role.

As it turned out, the system worked fine against Lincoln. The centre-backs looked comfortable and Carvill's tenacity and pace enabled him to cover back well. We'd been good value for our win, the only criticism being that we hadn't taken our chances to beat Lincoln comprehensively. I left The Racecourse thinking I was wrong; the following game made me feel I was right all along.

The way Chesterfield took us apart, exploiting all the weaknesses I'd hoped were just in my mind, made you realise just how poor Lincoln were. Their lively strikers gave our back three all sorts of problems, and up against a German Under-19 international Carvill found himself exposed.

Subtle alterations to the side changed its balance completely last Friday though. We looked more balanced on the flanks through the inclusion of a more defensive right wing-back in Simon Spender, who played with the determination of a man aggrieved to have been harshly left out in the first place. In the centre of defence Shaun Pejic's pace was once more invaluable, and has more experience of playing in a back three than anyone else in the squad by virtue of his time under Denis Smith.

Further up the field things looked more coherent. Of course the form of Neil Roberts is crucial, as his ability to hold the ball up knits the side together going forward. On Friday he was outstanding, giving probably his best performance since returning to The Racecourse. Further back the energy of Chris Llewellyn in a more withdrawn role, popping up time and again behind their right wing-back, was a delight, and Mark Jones continues to return to something approaching his best form. I can't help feeling that if success awaits any side at this level that can harness the ability of a player like Jones.

And so we travel to Macclesfield full of optimism. Bearing in mind that we first tried a 3-5-2 formation this season against them and were totally dominant, we should be confident that once more we can impose ourselves upon them. The problem is, of course, that a team that can improve so dramatically might deteriorate just as quickly!

Accrington Agony

They say returning to the site of a trauma can be therapeutic. On Friday I'll find out!

Wrexham's world changed when we visited Accrington last season. Before that match we were looking forward to a promotion challenge, unbeaten in seven and playing with confidence. We didn't look like we'd let many in and were getting goals from all over the pitch. That all stopped at Stanley.

The real cause of our decline probably occurred the Saturday before, when Neil Roberts was injured early on against Swindon. The importance of losing him wasn't immediately apparent as we went on to beat Dennis Wise's side that day, putting an abrupt halt to their perfect start to the season. The loss of Roberts was masked by an effervescent performance from Jon Newby, but we all know now that it was a one-off!

We took a large following to Accrington, assuming the heroes of the season's cutest tale would just roll over and die before us. Accrington Stanley, who are they? We were about to find out!
Once we arrived it felt like a different world. The ground's in the middle of a pretty rum-looking estate, more “Supernanny” than “Location, Location, Location.” Bare-chested lads lounged on their bikes eyeing us languidly as we arrived in the car park.

I say car park, but I'm being generous. Basic? Let's just say I've never been nettled in a club car park before! As we left I noticed a sign, scrawled on a scrap of paper which was lying in the grass, saying the gates would be locked thirty minutes after the game ended. This was a problem for me as I stay behind to interview the players so I sought clarification from a bloke leaning against the gate smoking, which I took as a sign of authority. He said to ignore it as they don't lock the gate any more. The reason? During the last game the locals cut the padlock off the gate with some bolt cutters so they could see what they could plunder from the cars!

Inside the ground I was swiftly apprehended by a Norwegian groundhopper, here to maintain his membership of the ninety-two club by visiting the newly promoted club. He grilled me on the unwieldy name of the ground. I tried to explain that I wasn't from Accrington to no avail, showed him the name on the ticket and in the programme but still couldn't shake him!

Eventually I managed to extricate myself and made my way up to the press box in the back row of the stand. That'd be the sixth row, by the way! I found myself next to a local radio reporter who further got my back up by being the least professional person I've ever come across in the press.

He crossed the impartiality line and left it far in the distance, but wasn't as bad as when we lost 3-1 to them on New Year's Day though (Oh yeah, they hammered us at home too!) On that occasion while I was commentating, so there was no chance of answering back, he greeted their late winning goal by shaking his fist in my face and shouting “We need this more than you!” He was long gone by the time I'd finished broadcasting but I look forward to making his acquaintance!

As we overtook them on the last day I suppose he was right, but it didn't feel like it from January to May! Not that I'm bitter, but the fact that better performances against Accrington home and away would nit just have given us more breathing space last season, but also would have sent them down's galling!

Throw in an early chance to clash with Lee McEvilly, our most divisive player of recent seasons, and the Football League's failure to punish their breaking the rules on the registration of players for the second time in close succession, which would have spared us a lot of last season's stress, and you've got plenty of reasons to bear a grudge.

It was a cathartic experience to relive that, but there's only one real cure for the pain; a win tonight!

Surprise Surprise!

There were many pleasures to be gained from the win over Lincoln, but one of the most pleasant surprises was the performance of Michael Carville. Not that I didn't know he was a good player; he showed promise last season and has played well on the wing already this season.

What surprised me was he could do so well as a wing back. To say I was shocked before the match when I saw he was fulfilling the role is an understatement. In fact, I tried to work out a different syste which we must be playing, as I couldn't believe he'd be used there (My theory as based on the unsuccessful use of Garrett as a right-sided midfielder last season, and an assumption he'd be used as a wing back, which was something of a disappointment!)

However, Carville made me take my reservations back. I was worried his small stature would be a problem, but it was never exploited-he battled for everything, made some aggressive tackles and was typically feisty, while going forward he kept offering us a pacy outlet on the break.

Whether he'd be equally successful against a better side we might discover on Tuesday; if that goes well we might see if we can get away with playing him there in an away game on Friday too!

Garrett's Back!

Brilliant news! Garrett is still inexperienced, but he's a battler and mobile, two qualities we need in the centre of the park. His arrival gives Spann more time to acclimatise and takes a bit of strain off Danny Williams too. The sooner we can return to the solidity of the end of last season the better, and if rebuilding that side's what it takes, fine-as long as Jeff Whitley doesn't come anywhere near us again! Just don't stick Garrett on the right again Brian!

Who's first on your teamsheet?

I heard a phone-in last Wednesday on Talksport asking fans who was the first name on the teamsheet for their side. We get the usual replies-Terry for Chelsea, Fabregas for Arsenal. So I asked myself, who'd be my first choice, and the answered worried me. I haven't got one!

To not have one indispensible player suggests we've got a problem. No-one to rely on when the going gets tough? No-one whose form is so sound you couldn't contemplate the team without him? Great.

Until lately I'd have gone for Danny Williams, and I'm still a fan of his, but his bad back has an effect on him, I think, and he hasn't been quite so influential lately. Likewise Mark Jones, if in form, and Juan Ugarte, if fit and at his peak, would be dead certs. But they're not and we don't have what the Americans call a go-to guy. I think at the moment it'd be a toss-up between Matty DOne and Michael Proctor, but I'm not firm on this.

Racecourse Anxiety Syndrome

I'm getting worried by the noises coming out of the changing room about playing at The Racecourse. Too many people are saying they're desperate for the fans to be behind them, and I don't think they mean that in a critical sense. The line coming from the players is that they feel the fans have every right to be disappointed with the performances on the pitch and are anxious to give them something to cheer about.

The key word is anxious. It seems there's a genuine fear of upsetting the crowd, and judging by how many times we've heard such sentiments, it appears to be an all-pervading idea amongst the squad. Well, anxiety never leads to good performance, so it's an idea that needs to be purged from the club.

When you're in trouble, home form can haul you out, and the fans are, to my ears, not too harsh on the players. We need to make the most of home advantage and get the players to embrace playing at The Racecourse, not fear it.

There has been a lot of mockery in the press lately over Sammy Lee's decision to employ a hypnotist to prepare his players for the mental demands of the Premiership. The reports have been typically stupid, full of cliched talk of dubious characters with twirly moustaches making players think they're chickens. Seems to me that a person capable of getting through to the players that playing for our fans is not something to fear would be a big bonus.

I don't believe in early season 6-pointers but....

Saturday's an enormous game-Lincoln are the only side around with form so bad it can rival ours! They've lost four in a row and reading their fan sites it sounds like they're not looking too clever. We've GOT to beat them before we start to get cut adrift at the bottom of the table!

Robbo's still a key player

Dropping the captain is always a bold move, and often an indication of crisis.
Neil Roberts has not been on top of his game so far this season, and as we are finding goals hard to come by and Michael Proctor has been looking sharp, you could see where something was going to give.

I've been surprised by the enthusiasm of so many fans for him to lose his place though. Roberts has been apportioned an unreasonable share of the blame for our miserable start to the season, and the clamour in some quarters for him to pay the price has been unfair.

Yes, Roberts has not been himself this season. He hasn't been looking threatening in the box, but perhaps more crucially he hasn't held the ball up as well as usual, and that's his strong suit. I would have made the same decision as Carey, but to make him shoulder the blame is ridiculous.

There are plenty of reasons why we're struggling. A team functions well when all its constituent parts are working, and that plainly hasn't been the case this season. It's like when a player comes back from a lay-off and immediately succumbs to another injury. Because one part of the body has been weak, tries to compensate and, in acting unnaturally, creates a weakness somewhere else.

Likewise, while the attack has been taking plenty of flak for failing to score, the problem is much more deep-rooted than that. Has the service been good enough to allow them to flourish? While Roberts has not held the ball up as well as usual, is he totally to blame? We've been launching long balls at his head all season, which hardly plays to his strengths. If we wanted to play like that we ought to have brought in a six foot three target man.

Roberts might have lost his place for now, but he remains key to Wrexham's hopes this season. He remains a model professional and a leader at the club. For a measure of the man, look at how he has responded to being dropped. Rather than sulk, he went out and played in his old manner for the reserves on Monday against a strong Preston side. That's how you want to see a player respond.

Roberts has Wrexham in his heart; don't forget that he stayed in a hotel the night before the Boston game to ensure he was rested rather than brave the lung capacity of his newborn baby! In a time when fans have an unprecedented interest in what players get up to off the pitch, such commitment should not be forgotten.

Furthermore, he was responsible for one of the most crucial moments of last season, even though other, more eye-catching events have distracted us. With four games left we took on already-doomed Torquay knowing only three points would be enough to keep us on track to avoid joining them, but the performance was rather limp as the pressure got to the side. On came Roberts after an hour, returning from a three-week absence through injury, and with ten minutes left and a stalemate looking inevitable, he scored the only goal of the match. It wasn't a pretty goal, it was a testimony to his overwhelming desire to get his club out of the hole, as he forced his way onto a near post cross and got enough on it to squeeze it home.

That's just the sort of indomitable spirit we need to haul us off the bottom of the table. Roberts might not be firing on all cylinders just yet, but don't write him off.

Keeping It Simple

Everyone's debateing what's gone wrong this season; well let's get to the point.

We haven't kept a clean sheet all season, and if we don't score at Stockport today we will equal the second longest run of games without a goal in our history.

Not scoring+letting goals in=bottom of the table.

Simple!

Heresy

Here's a thought. Would we be more dangerous going forward if we'd kept McEvilly?

Comedy Ref's No Joke!

Criticising the referee after your team lose is the easy way out, but I was always one to take the path of least resistance, so here goes!

At the end of the commentary on Tuesday's match I described Darren Drysdale's performance as the worst I'd seen at The Racecourse in thirty years of supporting Wrexham. It was the sort of rash thing you say on the spur of the moment without thinking it through. However, having sat down in the cold light of day and weighed it all up, it turns out I was right!

Errors of judgement are natural, but when everybody groans at the identity of the referee before the match and he then goes and performs like that you really have to wonder!

Let me make one thing perfectly clear; I am not accusing Darren Drysdale of cheating, or even of a conscious bias against us. However, when he has constantly been given grief every time he takes one of our matches, he might well build up an unconscious aversion to us. The fact that our complaints against him have tended to be justified makes no difference.

Mister Drysdale has been in charge of our games twice before. In August 2005 he sent Simon Spender off as we lost 1-0 at home to Carlisle, and United scored the winner from the subsequent free kick, but that was nothing compared to his earlier masterpiece!

In March 2005 we led 2-1 at Swindon before Mister Drysdale took a hand, giving a daft free kick from which the home team equalised with less than fifteen minutes left, then awarding an equally laughable penalty to allow Sam Parkin to complete a hat trick and condemn us to a cruel defeat.

That's three of our games he has reffed. We've lost them all and in at least two of them his decisions have been the decisive factor! They do say that if you don't notice the ref he's had a good game; I wish someone would tell Drysdale!

In Italy clubs were able to refuse to have particular referees officiate their matches. This is obviously open to corruption as referees try to please the big clubs rather than be blackballed from their matches. However, I wish the Football League might consider keeping Drysdale away from us, for the good of all concerned.

Still look on the bright side. Tomorrow's referee is Colin Webster, and we've done rather better under him. We've won five of the nine games we've played under him, including the 5-3 win at Oldham in the LDV Vans Trophy Northern Final, on our way to winning the cup. He also took a 2-1 derby win at Tranmere in 2003 and away wins at Macclesfield and Hull on the way to promotion the previous season. Furthermore, he's never felt the urge to send one of our players off! Let's hope he keeps it up!

Trouble Up Front

It's probably a bit naïve to be yearning for a goal-sniffer up front; after all, just about every team wants one. However, I can't help thinking that with a little more predatory behaviour in the box we'd have got off to a flyer this season!

That's not meant as a criticism of the current front two. Neil Roberts always worls hard while Michael Proctor has already been hitting the net as well as showing the qualities which have already made him a cult hero at The Racecourse.

The thing is, I see both Proctor and Roberts as the sort of strikers a fox-in-the-box would love to feed off, but how do you accommodate these two and a goal poacher in the same side? I sound like I'm just calling for Brian Carey to pack his side with eleven strikers on the basis that we're then bound to score lots of goals, as a five-year-old or Kevin Keegan might reason. 4-3-3 could be the answer, although I have reservations about that system.

So do we have a goal sniffer? Eifion Williams could be the man; his strike rate suggests he's the most likely goalscorer Carey currently has available to him.

His next league goal will be his seventy-fifth, more than anyone else in Carey's squad by some distance and although he missed a great chance aganst Hereford, at least he got into the sort of position consistent goalscorers get into.

Of course, it wasn't by accident that I said Williams is the most likely goalscorer available to Carey currently. It's not really healthy to speculate on the effect Juan Ugarte could make on League Two defences. After all, we've been asking that question for over a year now, so it's best to give him every chance to get fit and sharp again. However, seeing the ball rolling time and time again across the face of goal this season I couldn't help yearning for the Basque to be lurking in the six-yard box. Roberts and Proctor are both good strikers, but they're not that type of striker.

There is another option, though. Jamie Reed is a player who has consistently scored goals at reserve level, and I wouldn't mind seeing him given a go at some point. Being on loan at Aberyswyth should help his confidence. Already he's scored a hat trick in a 5-1 win against T.N.S. and followed it up wit a brilliant goal on his home debut.

I never felt convinced by Andy Morrell when he first broke into the team; his endeavour and enthusiasm were undoubted, but he looked to lack a bit of class to me. However, he had scored consistently in the reserves and the Welsh Premier Cup, and eventually that innate ability to stick the ball in the net showed through in the Football League, with spectacular results. I reckon Reed could well be on the same sort of career path.

Give Bri a Break!

The Hereford match was depressing but still, I can't believe there are people calling for Brian Carey to pay the price!
I suppose it shows that in football you're only as good as your last game but still, sacking the boss after your first home defeat of the season is hardly a rational response. Sure, it was a poor performance, but if Eifion Williams had taken that great chance Michael Carvill created for him then we'd have been level and pushing for a winner with twenty minutes left against a side who only had two shots on goal in the entire game. Football turns on incidents like that, which is why a man who oversaw our greatest escape just four months ago shouldn't be judged in the short term.
Perhaps it would be appropriate to mention that at this point in our finest ever season we were worse off than we are now! In 1977 we also had a new young manager, fresh from sterling service for us on the pitch, but after four games had three points and were still looking for our first win!
However, the board resisted the temptation to sack Arfon Griffiths and the result was a Third Division championship, a Welsh Cup win and runs to the quarter finals of both the F.A. and League Cups.
Likewise, in 1992 we had just four points after four games and had lost our two away games 4-0 and 4-1, while by this point in 2002 we had already lost 5-2 at home to Rochdale! Both seasons ended in promotion; evidence that rushing to judgement at this early point in the season is a foolish act.
I haven't agreed with all Carey's decisions, but that's hardly unusual. Show me a fan who agrees with everything their manager does and I'll show you a mindless sycophant! Football is a game of opinions; if we weren't able to argue at the pub or in work over the ins and outs of the game then it wouldn't be worth watching!
The decision to rotate the squad for the Aston Villa game was a misjudgement in my eyes, and perhaps we paid the price last Saturday. I don't think there's anything wrong with the idea of prioritising the league, but resting the spine of the side meant the team crumbled after an excellent opening half hour and morale was damaged.
However, we must remember that managers have to make big decisions. No manager in the history of the game has ever got them all right, but by the same token, fans have to bite the bullet and admit that sometimes we disagree with the gaffer and are proven wrong! For example, I remember the stick Brian Flynn received for signing Gary Bennett, but no-one could argue that it was a mistake now!
Carey showed excellent judgement in giving Levi Mackin a run in the side this season, and proved a few of us wrong. I didn't notice anything but praise for his summer signings at the time either. So shall we give him a chance to get the season going properly before drawing hasty conclusions? Sack in haste, repent at leisure.