Thurrock-January 2015 results

Hello friends, we finished quite well in the final stages of 2014 and 2015 will be coming soon. Half a season gone and we are lying in 5th place 7 points off the last automatic promotion spot. The team had seen an improvement of the performances in the last few games and we hope we can keep the good run going. This month will see a few of our loan contract signings expiring and i hope to extend the loan of the players to the end of season especially Moreno Marra, he has become extremely important for us to the promotion chances. I am please that Moreno Marra as well as Bram Meijer and Vincent Nyssen will be here with us for another 5-6 months. One new player will be joining us this month, he is a N. Ireland international with 7 caps to his name. He is a 23 years old regen and his name is Damian Russell. The fans are feeling uneasy with the signing, i hope he can prove them wrong with his performances.

We will start the month with a FA cup fixture against Championship side Swansea and here is the results of January.

We started the month with a FA cup loss to Swansea but recovered well after that to win 2 and draw 3 in the league. Some high scoring games over there, a bit of concern on the defensive side in our team. But i was particular pleased with the way we hammered Grimsby.

In this FA cup third round match against Swansea, we were clearly the underdogs. I employ two defensive minded midfielders hoping that they could break down their attacks and limit their chances. Their superiority over us meant that they kept us under a lot of pressure in the first half, attacking our goal  and even hitting the woodwork twice. I thought we did very well in holding them and we brought the first 45 minutes to a stalemate. We kept on frustrating them in the second half but ultimately we can’t keep a clean sheet when we finally conceded a goal in the 68th minute. Though we went out of the FA cup but i was pleased with the spirited showing from the players.

Our first league game was against 16th place Burton not an easy opponent which doesn’t reflect on their position. We got a scare early when they hit the woodwork not long after the starting whistle. We took an unexpected lead just when they going to increase the tempo. Richard Jones fired us in front by heading in a goal from a corner. Petr Kopecky put us two up when he was put through by Jonathan Worthington to roll the ball in. They pull a goal back just before the half time whistle is blown. They looked the more dangerous team in the second half and equalized through a corner after some hard work. Moreno Marra our current best player put us ahead again after combining with Petr Kopecky to power a goal in. Our efforts went to a waste when a mistake by our goalkeeper allowed them to level things thrice in this game. It was a pulsating match for the neutrals but definitely some disappointment for us to lose 2 points there. Troy Archibad-Henville  also picked up a knock in this game and will be out for 2-3 weeks.

Next up was a home game against 13th place Grimsby. I employed control strategy as i was more confident with my team now and we really took control of the game. Moreno Marra was sensational as always when he gave us the lead in the 8th minute, smashing the ball to the top corner. We only had one goal to accounted for in the first 45 minutes. 5 minutes after the second half whistle, Thomas Hitchcock scored another wonderful goal when he brought the ball at the byline for  over half the field to put the ball past the goalkeeper. I had to substitute Bram Meijer with Kevan Hurst when he picked up a knock in the 67th minute. Etzaz Hussain(a loanee from Hull, sorry i never put up his screenshot) came in for Kevin McDonald in the 74th minute and scored his first goal for the club. Kevan Hurst rounded up our best performance at home with two goals to give us a 5-0 win.

Another home game coming up and it was against 7th place Oxford. It was a pretty even game with both teams going in front and having shots at goal. We took the lead in the 22nd minute and guess who is the scorer? Yes Moreno Marra again..firing a low shot past the goalkeeper. But they immediately peg back when we conceded a long shot from their midfielder. Just before the break, Moreno Marra produced a fine cross across the goal area and Kevan Hurst was there to smash the ball in. We conceded another equalizer through another long shot from the same player 3 minutes after the break. We had Moreno Marra to thank for when he headed in a goal from a corner in the 55th minute which proved to be the winner. An all round performance from him two goals and a assist.

Next up was a away game to 17th place Rushden, they had been struggling all season but still have a lot of good players in there. This was another high scoring game that was delightful to watch for the neutrals. Thrice our defence was split open by the opposition and i was actually quite disappointed with the goals that we conceded. We had Thomas Hitchcock to thank for as he crawled us back into the game twice with his goals and provided an assist for his strike partner Petr Kopecky to score the equalizer in the 74th minute. I was a bit nervous in the final stages as the players started to play suicidal football by gifting the ball back to the opposition several times. We were lucky that they could not find the winning goal.

Our next game was against 9th place Torquay. Before the start of the match, i managed to secure the loan of a striker name Scott Harvey from Doncaster. Coincidently he was a former loanee in Torquay, i loaned him as Vincent Pericad is disappointing and i hardly use him now. I wanted to give the front department more cover. Scott Harvey scored 17 goals for Torquay this season and i remembered he scored the winning goal against us in the previous meeting with Torquay. Back to the game, we were immediately under a lot of pressure from Torquay and only settled to game after 20 minutes. The whole game was a sloppy affair and we were restricted from playing our normal game due to the number of fouls committed by the opposition. It ended 0-0 and we were lucky to gain a point because they had few clear cut chances but couldn’t take it.

Beside the loss to Swansea in the FA cup, our unbeaten run in the league had saw us climbed to 5th place, 6 points off 3rd place Tranmere. If not with the three draws, we would have been level on points with them. Nevertheless i was pleased with the players and efforts, the challenge all along has been the consistency problem in our team. I hope by having a good run of games, they will be able to maintain the good run going.

We will playing 5 league games next month starting with a difficult fixture to the leaders Bournemouth. After that we will be meeting two mid-table teams and two teams in the bottom half. I hope we can at least get a draw with Bournemouth and win the rest of the games.

Dear friends, this is my latest update of how my team fares in January and i will be looking forward to your comments and feedback. See you in my next post for the updates in February.