Bottom of the League: The Only Way Is Up…
from swindonweb.com
Five games into the 2010/2011 League One season Swindon Town find themselves without a win and astonishingly sitting bottom of the table with only 3 points.
This is hardly what I had expected, let alone the rest of you, as well as what the club predicted back at the start of August. I was so confident I put £30 on Town to finish in the top 3 at odds of 14/1. With Town now out at 33/1 I might as well have put my money into an Icelandic bank.
However, despite the situation we now find ourselves in, I couldn’t have been more disappointed to hear the growing minority who were asking for Danny Wilson’s head following Town’s goalless draw away at Carlisle United.
Why would we want to change manager now? Particularly now the transfer window has closed. Is our situation down to Wilson failing to motivate, or because of a group of new players slow to learn the system and fill the big gaps from the loss of Greer, Ward and Paynter? I think the latter.
Town are indeed slowly improving. The defence have found some level of stability and have overcome the rash of individual mistakes that ruined the first 4 league games. Now we’ve gone two games without conceding.
A Prutton-less midfield looks more balanced and assured. At Carlisle we generated the highest number (12) of chances on goal for Town in any of our league games this season, although our finishing left a lot to be desired.
In any other situation an away draw at Brunton Park is a sound result. It only doesn’t appear so now because of what has preceded.
Lets look ahead. Later this week the loan window reopens. We can expect a flurry of signings to strengthen the team. Judging by the quality of Wilson’s loan signings so far, with the exception of Ben Hutchinson, they’ve all proved to have been very successful. The team can, and will, have the opportunity to improve further.
So get behind Wilson and the team against Southampton next week. No need for panic just yet…
The Washbag 
As I wrote earlier in a reply to a post in the Swindon Advertiser, this is not an issue from the last few games, but a continuation of poor results which started towards the end of last season.
Yes, we are bottom of the league, and of course it would be ludicrous to make the case to replace DW, but the overall form is a concern. If you look at the last 15 competitive games:
The last 6 league games of last season gave us 6 points from a possible 18.
We won one game out of 3 during the PO Semis and final.
Lost the Carling Cup game against Leyton Orient a few weeks ago.
Picked up 3 points out of a possible 15 in the league this year.
This comes to 12 points out of a possible 45 (for illustrative purposes of course as cup & PO games don’t accumulate points) over this period. This is a 26% capture rate which is extremely poor; it equates to approximately 36 points over a season, keeping in mind that Southend , one from bottom got 43 last year.
It is cause for concern? Well, it’s too soon to say, but team-wise, this year we are not as good as last year:
– There is not yet a settled strike partnership up-front.
– The way we play requires a strong person up-front to hold up the ball like Billy did; Thomas D is not strong enough in the air and Vince does not have the technique.
– The easy-on-the-eyes flowing passing football from last year, I have only seen in the last 2 games when Ferry played.
– We seem to be more dangerous when we do not have to dictate the play (e.g. Southampton), unlike last year where we could do both – make the play as well as soak up pressure and counter-attack.
– The playing style of both Prutton and Douglas is too similar and too easy to break down.
– Last year we scored easily, but gave away silly last minute goals in at least 8 games, now we started giving silly goals away from the start of the game instead.
Do I worry? No, not yet, but I have re-calibrated my expectations. Whereas I was hoping for a top 2 finish, we would do well if we make the play-offs based on current form.
We have to put back-to-back wins together, become more arrogant and ruthless, something I am sure we can do as we did the middle part of last season.
The next few games will be tough, with Southampton, Huddersfield and Plymouth in the next 4 games.
I read other posts telling people not to worry stating it’s only early in the season; that may well be true, but I’d rather see the points on the board as other teams above us do have……
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Thanks for the comment.
You’ve pretty much summed up the season so far.
I trust you’ve sent this by email to Danny Wilson 🙂
I’d agree with you.. no need to worry just yet. League One is very close and a win against Southampton can take up to mid table. It’s not just us who are struggling despite early predictions, see Plymouth, Brentford, Charlton and of course Southampton.
Come on You Reds!
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