Just seen the 'foul' for the red card. That is an atrocious decision. Alfie May should be ashamed of himself for his reaction. I don't like to see that of our players. Very disappointing.
A bit harsh on Alfie, Large. I agree that it shouldn't have been a red but Alfie definitely got caught - he may even have actually kicked the defender but it was a reckless challenge by the latter.
No-one seems to have mentioned the most surprising aspect of our recent run of results - that soft old, "we'll roll over at the first sign of pressure" Charlton seem at long last to be growing a pair.
Though good I wouldn’t say CBT has been our best player overall this season so far. Shrewsbury away for example he was hardly in it.
To me it has unsurprisingly been George Dobson, who has shown even more personal ability with his nice sneaky turns and direction changes, his passing has got better, and as captain has always tried to take responsibility to drive the team on. His tackling and getting teammates out of trouble speaks for itself.
One reason I am desperate for automatic promotion this season is it is probably the only realistic way to keep Dobbo and Miles.
Very good all round home performance we had to stay calm as Exeter set up to let us have the ball but to hit us on the break , some of our football was really good as we tried to find the key to unlock the 10 man defence . Exeter scored which was out of the blue , but we did not panic got the deserved goal .. second we continued to dominate T Watson won the pen no complaints there , Aneke missed May scored .. then horrendous tackle on May could have broke his leg sending off … and we really took the game by the neck .. it was one of best home performances for a while
MOM L Watson
Think you need to watch that sending off again mate. Wasn't even a foul.
Good strong performance from start to finish, unfortunately a sloppy goal we need to cut out.
The squad is looking strong now, be interested to hear from those people who was so negative about our summer business.. Always said judge at the end of the window..
Legitimate ‘I told you so’ here. Our squad looks stacked. George Elek from Not The Top 20 tried to tell us but we didn’t want to listen.
We’ve lost as many matches as Barnsley, who are in 4th spot, 10 places ahead of us, Wembley here we come boys, keep the date free!!
We have 4 wins out of 6 home games. Still annoyed about how we lost to both Port Vale & Bristol Rovers. Hope those results don’t cost us as we should never have lost those two games.
After Saturday's game, we will have played 7 at home and only 4 away.
Away form not good so far. We need a big pick up in it.
Tbf until Holden was sacked our home form was awful as well. The away wins will come soon enough.
Interesting game tactically. Very clearly a lot to work on if we’re playing May, Tedic and Aneke together. If we can get them all to understand it’s the sum of the parts that matter most, they alongside CBT will cause a lot of teams issues this season. Defensively we still need a lot of work on off the ball positioning.
Really pleased with with the win and you can see green shoots starting but we shouldn’t be under any illusion that Exeter completely changed the game when the took their number 7 off and brought on Wildschutt who looked like he’d won a competition to play a professional game.
Him coming on allowed T. Watson and Tedic more space to get forward which ultimately led to the penalty.
Overall it’s great to get the win, but even more pleasing that there’s obvious areas all over the pitch that we can still get better.
We’ve lost as many matches as Barnsley, who are in 4th spot, 10 places ahead of us, Wembley here we come boys, keep the date free!!
We have 4 wins out of 6 home games. Still annoyed about how we lost to both Port Vale & Bristol Rovers. Hope those results don’t cost us as we should never have lost those two games.
After Saturday's game, we will have played 7 at home and only 4 away.
Away form not good so far. We need a big pick up in it.
We have played 3 of the current top 6 away from home already this season. Plenty of time to turn the away form around.
Good result in the end but the red card (that wasn't) turned the game. It was very even at that point and I wouldn't be 100% confident that we would have gone on to win if it stayed 11v11. I'll take a 4-1 win at home anytime though, just need to back it up with another win on Saturday if we are gonna be serious about promotion.
CBT showed his class last night... Great anticipation for the equaliser and the composure to beat his man and then beat the keeper to set up the fourth was brilliant. The player marks will drive you mad if you think about them too much.
The first half looked like the oppo could sit in a low block, win possession and two passes later find themselves on the edge of our box. So much space. Their wide players had enough time to build an IKEA wardrobe. Seen us do it so many times. Only the sending off changed the game, so still questions to be asked about our defensive ability.
Apples clearly still unhappy with some players in the squad not doing their running but he can afford to leave them out now. Now he can say: If you want to play, this is what's required. That's the benefit of having competition and not just first team players and squad players.
Great to see us battle back from going a goal down. We don't look beat like we used to.
We’ll play better than that and not win . but 3 points no matter how they come are much needed . points that I’ve not seen mentioned I think AMB was like slow motion trying to stop their goal at his near post exeter should have had a pen first half and Alfie encroached in to the D before Aneke struck the penalty great turnout for Exeter on a Tuesday night 741 and a healthy 10,834 Addicks seats issued 😀
Eieieio
Nah, mate, in the studio with playbacks you clearly see he timed his run perfectly. Which incident are you talking about for an Exeter pen? There was some diving going on in the first half.
Cracking rhyme above though so your over-pessimism is excused
I shuddered when I saw Chuks was starting, seemed way too early, but he looked genuinely fit, whereas in previous attempted comebacks it looked like our approach to getting him fit was "getting minutes into him". Add to that CBT easily able to last the full 100 minutes, and I have to say as a long -term critic of our backroom set-up, somebody has done a good job with those two.
Louie Watson has the potential to be as influential this season as Mark Kinsella was. He may not have the thunderbolt in his locker, and he's a bit more tetchy, perhaps not captain material at least at this stage of his career, but his reaction to not starting last week has been top-drawer.
Alfie is in the D and Chuks hasn’t even struck the ball in this pic his striking foot is blurred .
Exeter fella in first half near corner of box was moving away from goal and T Watson just took his ankle late , ref didn’t even give a free kick , ridiculous .
We’ll play better than that and not win . but 3 points no matter how they come are much needed . points that I’ve not seen mentioned I think AMB was like slow motion trying to stop their goal at his near post exeter should have had a pen first half and Alfie encroached in to the D before Aneke struck the penalty great turnout for Exeter on a Tuesday night 741 and a healthy 10,834 Addicks seats issued 😀
Eieieio
Nah, mate, in the studio with playbacks you clearly see he timed his run perfectly. Which incident are you talking about for an Exeter pen? There was some diving going on in the first half.
Cracking rhyme above though so your over-pessimism is excused
I shuddered when I saw Chuks was starting, seemed way too early, but he looked genuinely fit, whereas in previous attempted comebacks it looked like our approach to getting him fit was "getting minutes into him". Add to that CBT easily able to last the full 100 minutes, and I have to say as a long -term critic of our backroom set-up, somebody has done a good job with those two.
Louie Watson has the potential to be as influential this season as Mark Kinsella was. He may not have the thunderbolt in his locker, and he's a bit more tetchy, perhaps not captain material at least at this stage of his career, but his reaction to not starting last week has been top-drawer.
Alfie is in the D and Chuks hasn’t even struck the ball in this pic his striking foot is blurred .
Exeter fella in first half near corner of box was moving away from goal and T Watson just took his ankle late , ref didn’t even give a free kick , ridiculous .
Yeah bizarrely Tel and Brownie seemed to note that he wasn’t in the area but forgot that it’s the D that is relevant for encroachment
I have to say I enjoyed that and Exeter played their part too.
They were excellent in the 1st half and our equaliser really fired us up.
Tennai was caught between his winger and #12 who was roaming and not being tracked by Watson. In the end Tennai was marking both and neither at the same time. Also question marks about his heading and it looked like Exeter were targeting that aspect of his game so presumably others will too. I thought May thrived in an unfamiliar position and covered every blade of grass. Pleased for him to get a couple of goals
What was most exciting was it was an unexpected formation and lineup but everyone seemed to largely know their role. Even I couldn't work out the formation based on the team sheet so I would think their gaffer had a problem too The subs were all positive too.
I can't lie....if I could I reckon i'd have the startings of a @Fanny Fanackapan patented "tingle" but I am still not quite sold on the defensive quality of this team
Hopefully a convincing scoreline will be good for our confidence but the ref was the key player for us last night. The soft penalty and the dodgy red card were crucial.
Louis Watson and May were excellent but we still look frail in defence. I worry about Hector who looks like a more elegant version of Innis with even more unforced errors in him. And CBT and Thomas on the left flank is a disaster waiting to happen.
Tennai Watson had a better second half but was shaky first half. Exeter got their tactics spot on and isolated their pacy winger one on one (which the formation we played allowed them to do). Four or five times in the first half they did this and each time got into a decent position. Second half they changed tactics and personnel which gave Watson less defending ad more attacking opportunities. He looked decent going forwards but I have some concerns re his defending.
T. Watson started with two very weak headers, which resulted in shots from Exeter and he continued to look nervous until half-time. 2nd half he was under less pressure and improved. He's actually not that experienced....less than 100 league games for a 26yr old suggests very much an in-and-out career to date. Whether he turns out to be a better bet than Sean Clare remains to be seen.
Chucks started a game and left the field with us in front. Job done.
He seems to hassle the defenders and get some sort of shot away - I don’t mind that at all, as anything can come if it.
Tedic made a lot of runs without getting supplied and we need to wake up to this variation in play.
My 2 moans are: Our corners are not good enough.
Oppo corners - please leave May in the centre circle to give us some kind of out-ball. Even against 10 last night, we never had anyone upfield to give us a way out.
Chucks started a game and left the field with us in front. Job done.
He seems to hassle the defenders and get some sort of shot away - I don’t mind that at all, as anything can come if it.
Tedic made a lot of runs without getting supplied and we need to wake up to this variation in play.
My 2 moans are: Our corners are not good enough.
Oppo corners - please leave May in the centre circle to give us some kind of out-ball. Even against 10 last night, we never had anyone upfield to give us a way out.
I'd rather leave Corey there. That guarantees at least 2 defenders will stay back. Alfie can battle and defend as he showed last night but Corey as the outball is the answer
I can't believe people are watching the red card incident again and still think it's even a foul.
No but the guy has dived in with both feet to win the ball when there's absolutely no need. I didn't even notice much complaint from the Exeter players and didn't see any protests from the bench at the time. It looked bad in the ground. Obviously, on the replay, it's not a foul, but the lesson for that bloke is, don't dive in with both feet.
What's that saying... Play stupid games, win stupid prizes!
Always been a big advocate of 4/3/3 its the only way to win games onwards and upwards.
You Alfie May be Joking 🤔 and I believe that is a Shay Given from you but most teams especially in the 3rd tier or lower will mix and match and always have one or two players out of their favourite position because of availability.
4-3-3 can be fine as long as the central striker isn't isolated and 3-5-2 works if you have both Edun and Watson on top of their attacking game as well as fitness to get up and down quickly and they are covered when passes go astray and we are caught in transition. Other formations are available and with players with brains you can change during a match 💁🏻♂️
You would imagine a couple of personnel will change on Saturday but 4-3-3 will stay while it's working and fluid with bodies attacking the box and not like the bad old days when Stockley was isolated in the middle with DJ stuck on the right wing and Washington getting chalk marks by the west stand with Morgan as the attacking midfielder when he couldn't hit a cow's arse with a banjo.
If Albie Morgan scores a blinder from 25 yards on Saturday I take full responsibility 😲
My slight frustration of last night was our hesitation to go direct and make use of Tedic & Chuks. Not aimless hoofing but crossing from deep or lofting the ball into the box. When Watson finally did it, Chuks hit the bar and we equalised.
Any other League One team with those monsters up front would be making life for the opposition very painful.
Always been a big advocate of 4/3/3 its the only way to win games onwards and upwards.
You Alfie May be Joking 🤔 and I believe that is a Shay Given from you but most teams especially in the 3rd tier or lower will mix and match and always have one or two players out of their favourite position because of availability.
4-3-3 can be fine as long as the central striker isn't isolated and 3-5-2 works if you have both Edun and Watson on top of their attacking game as well as fitness to get up and down quickly and they are covered when passes go astray and we are caught in transition. Other formations are available and with players with brains you can change during a match 💁🏻♂️
You would imagine a couple of personnel will change on Saturday but 4-3-3 will stay while it's working and fluid with bodies attacking the box and not like the bad old days when Stockley was isolated in the middle with DJ stuck on the right wing and Washington getting chalk marks by the west stand with Morgan as the attacking midfielder when he couldn't hit a cow's arse with a banjo.
If Albie Morgan scores a blinder from 25 yards on Saturday I take full responsibility 😲
All I can say is sorry Exeter, we've had bad decisions go against us this season & tonight was payback time.
Saying that, we looked the better team & although they had a few corners & some half chances the only real save AMB had to make (apart from the goal) was in injury time where he stopped it being 4-2.
Didn't like the line up with May in midfield & Tedic out wide but after 30 mins May grew into his role & started finding pockets of space around the edge of the box.....which then into the 2nd half got bigger & more productive, leading to a sumptuous pass out to CBT and then raced into the box to bury the loose ball.
L Watson also grew into the game & his ball play & pass should have led to the first goal, only for the lino to flag Chuks offside (no need for VAR as they have no idea either). After that the midfielder battle was ours, with Watson, Dobbo & May passing it around for fun.
Shame Chuks couldn't get on the scoresheet after hitting the woodwork twice but Apples will have to sort out our penalty taker once & for all. None of this "its mine, no you take it" malarkey.
All in all a very pleasant evening.
My first home win on CAFC TV ✔ GD bettered ✔ The Golfie's well & truly put to bed ✔
But please Mr Apples, let’s Sa play our players in their proper positions, and once we get all out players fit we might just threatened the top 6.
You said we were, “a shambles” last night!
That was at half time when we had just equalised after playing our main striker in midfield & another striker out wide.
Still not convinced about Apples & on another night we could have lost 3-0 (they had a good pen shout at 0-1).
Great to see us win, but find it funny how some people show up today, that stayed away after the Shrewsbury draw.
Riding off a 4-1 win to state how good the squad is, "told you so", etc. Then again, it's football and I wouldn't have it any other way.
Appleton knows that we aren't defensively solid so we need to outscore the opposition, hence the starting lineup. I questioned us starting 3 forwards, but glad to see all had key contributions (and remained injury free which is probably my main worry).
I can't believe people are watching the red card incident again and still think it's even a foul.
In real time from the North Lower I got it the wrong way round, thought the pen was soft and the red card was probably right. Does show how difficult it is for refs as both were on the near side of the pitch
Comments
Extended highlights
To me it has unsurprisingly been George Dobson, who has shown even more personal ability with his nice sneaky turns and direction changes, his passing has got better, and as captain has always tried to take responsibility to drive the team on. His tackling and getting teammates out of trouble speaks for itself.
One reason I am desperate for automatic promotion this season is it is probably the only realistic way to keep Dobbo and Miles.
Really pleased with with the win and you can see green shoots starting but we shouldn’t be under any illusion that Exeter completely changed the game when the took their number 7 off and brought on Wildschutt who looked like he’d won a competition to play a professional game.
Him coming on allowed T. Watson and Tedic more space to get forward which ultimately led to the penalty.
Overall it’s great to get the win, but even more pleasing that there’s obvious areas all over the pitch that we can still get better.
The first half looked like the oppo could sit in a low block, win possession and two passes later find themselves on the edge of our box. So much space. Their wide players had enough time to build an IKEA wardrobe. Seen us do it so many times. Only the sending off changed the game, so still questions to be asked about our defensive ability.
Apples clearly still unhappy with some players in the squad not doing their running but he can afford to leave them out now. Now he can say: If you want to play, this is what's required. That's the benefit of having competition and not just first team players and squad players.
Great to see us battle back from going a goal down. We don't look beat like we used to.
Exeter fella in first half near corner of box was moving away from goal and T Watson just took his ankle late , ref didn’t even give a free kick , ridiculous .
They were excellent in the 1st half and our equaliser really fired us up.
Tennai was caught between his winger and #12 who was roaming and not being tracked by Watson. In the end Tennai was marking both and neither at the same time. Also question marks about his heading and it looked like Exeter were targeting that aspect of his game so presumably others will too.
I thought May thrived in an unfamiliar position and covered every blade of grass. Pleased for him to get a couple of goals
What was most exciting was it was an unexpected formation and lineup but everyone seemed to largely know their role. Even I couldn't work out the formation based on the team sheet so I would think their gaffer had a problem too The subs were all positive too.
I can't lie....if I could I reckon i'd have the startings of a @Fanny Fanackapan patented "tingle" but I am still not quite sold on the defensive quality of this team
Louis Watson and May were excellent but we still look frail in defence. I worry about Hector who looks like a more elegant version of Innis with even more unforced errors in him. And CBT and Thomas on the left flank is a disaster waiting to happen.
Our corners are not good enough.
What's that saying... Play stupid games, win stupid prizes!
You Alfie May be Joking 🤔 and I believe that is a Shay Given from you but most teams especially in the 3rd tier or lower will mix and match and always have one or two players out of their favourite position because of availability.
4-3-3 can be fine as long as the central striker isn't isolated and 3-5-2 works if you have both Edun and Watson on top of their attacking game as well as fitness to get up and down quickly and they are covered when passes go astray and we are caught in transition. Other formations are available and with players with brains you can change during a match 💁🏻♂️
You would imagine a couple of personnel will change on Saturday but 4-3-3 will stay while it's working and fluid with bodies attacking the box and not like the bad old days when Stockley was isolated in the middle with DJ stuck on the right wing and Washington getting chalk marks by the west stand with Morgan as the attacking midfielder when he couldn't hit a cow's arse with a banjo.
If Albie Morgan scores a blinder from 25 yards on Saturday I take full responsibility 😲
Any other League One team with those monsters up front would be making life for the opposition very painful.
Still not convinced about Apples & on another night we could have lost 3-0 (they had a good pen shout at 0-1).
Riding off a 4-1 win to state how good the squad is, "told you so", etc. Then again, it's football and I wouldn't have it any other way.
Appleton knows that we aren't defensively solid so we need to outscore the opposition, hence the starting lineup. I questioned us starting 3 forwards, but glad to see all had key contributions (and remained injury free which is probably my main worry).