Welcome from Slade Green Meadows as the train does its loop round to the home of football.
The third consecutive grey, drizzly Saturday of home games in a row, here’s hoping we secure the same result at the end of this one.
Team news when it arrives, come on your reds!
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Comments
Be interesting if its 442 or 4231
Surprised Lennon has kept his spot although guess its to do with the preference of having a Left and Right footed CB pairing
Sad to see Aribo dropped, thought he deserved to keep his place.
It's certainly harsh on Aribo, but it was going to be harsh on whoever wasn't picked. I know what you mean about wanting to keep players in the team who play well, but there's been two weeks of training between our last game and now. And this is hopefully a reminder that you really, really have to work hard in training to keep your place in this team. JFC's all around game and positional sense is better than Aribo's at the moment, and against a team who have a lot of good attacking threat on the counter, I understand wanting someone who is more tactically disciplined. No doubt it's harsh on Aribo, but football is harsh sometimes. I hope this makes him a stronger player and he does enough in this game if he has a part to play, and in training that forces Robinson to pick him next week.
Robinson can't stand on sentimentality and pick someone because they were good in the last match, he has to pick the player who is best for the match today. I thought earlier in the season he didn't rotate enough (though it was hard because we kept having players in the same position get injured). He's going to need to do that with this team, and I hope he's willing to.
Now, how Lennon has kept his place is beyond me. I know Bauer is less comfortable on the left, and Thomas and Buckley-Ricketts have pace that could trouble him, and that Oxford don't have a big, strong physical forward that can bully Lennon and dominate him in the air, but still. The only strong explanation I can think of is not wanting to rush Bauer back after last time when it seems he definitely came back too soon.
All-in-all, good team, good bench. Let's hope the run in starts today.
In my opinion I know people have said KR loves Reeves yet reckon he loves Forster-Caskey more, reckon he's one of the first names on the sheet
I agree Robinson loves JFC and that he's one of the first names on the sheet when fit, and rightly so in my opinion. I know November and December seem like years ago, but it's worth remembering that JFC was really good in the first half of the season, including popping up with really crucial goals against Bradford and then two against Rochdale.