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Following what was arguably the worst performance in Hereford FC’s short history on Tuesday, and possibly one of the worst games I’ve ever seen, a break for the FA Trophy could be just what’s needed as some sort of hangover cure. It will hopefully give all concerned the chance think about how to rectify what’s not working in the National League North before a run of vicious forthcoming fixtures.
There are of course injuries, Lloyd, Latty-Fairweather and Evans are hugely missed, as is the influence of the captain Hodgkiss, but the default overall tactic in all matches now seems to be to let the opposition have the ball and wait for them to make a mistake at the back for the pace of Storey and McLean to exploit. If that really is the case it’s incredibly negative and doesn’t show huge faith in the squad’s ability to do anything more proactive than that. It was a sensible approach against Portsmouth, it was just about forgivable at home against Fylde (particularly as it worked), but against Peterborough Sports, especially at home, it’s not good or ambitious enough.
Surely the time has now come to move Aaron Amadi-Holloway up front. He’s obviously now fit, and it would offer some attacking threat that was literally non-existent in the first half on Tuesday. The defence will then have to cope without his help, but that’s what those players were brought in to do in the summer. If more goals start to be conceded in AAH’s defensive absence, there’d at least be something to watch in losing 3-2 rather than 1-0. Also, starting with both Luke Haines and Jethro Hanson underpins that ultra-defensive mindset that seems to pervade the current tactical approach.
A front four of Storey, AAH, Barnett and McClean looks potentially full of threat, with Pinchard playing in his correct position behind, alongside one of Haines or Hanson. An added benefit is how good Storey and McClean are generally at tracking back. I get that 4-4-2 isn’t cool anymore, but neither is limping toothlessly through football matches in the way Hereford currently are. Can you limp toothlessly? I suppose you can.
Having said all that, if Tuesday night, last Saturday (which was also far from pretty) and the loss at Kettering were all just down to tiredness after a heck of a lot of travel recently, hopefully several youngsters will be used here to give as many first teamers as possible a rest before a run of very difficult games up to and over Christmas. If that means increasing the risk of going out of the Trophy early it might be worth it, because as things stand very little progress has been made between this time last season and now in terms of being properly competitive in the NLN. You’d have to put a lot of spin on it to argue otherwise. It may be no bad thing if AAH is wrapped up in cotton wool on his sofa at home at 3pm on Saturday.
Swifts ply their trade in the Isthmian League North Division, and their Scraley Road ground (or the Aspen Waite Arena to give it its grander title) has been something of a fortress so far this season. They’ve won all six of their league games there, and if they’ve seen any footage of Tuesday’s horror show at Edgar Street they’ll strongly fancy another win here. They’ve beaten Beckenham, Chipstead, Potters Bar and Royston to get this far in the competition, a list that will have fans of soulless dormitory towns salivating. There’s presumably a website catering for just that audience.
Given that 100% home record, it wasn’t too surprising to learn that they play on 3G, a surface that generally seems to skew things markedly in favour of the home side. It has to be hoped that the visitors bring their Bromley plastic pitch form into this one, rather than what was produced at Scarborough and Bradford. The ground used to be a carrot field, but now even Herefordshire’s very own Monty Don would struggle to grow carrots, or indeed anything, on it.
It simply can’t get any worse than Tuesday (can it?), so perhaps this will be the start of a consistent upturn, aided in time by the return of some of the injured players named above. It could be a completely different story when the starting XI is back to full strength, and if the Bulls can turn things around in that string of upcoming tricky games they’re still high enough in the table with games in hand to slot comfortably into the play-off places. I’m not pretending there’s any evidence to suggest the probability of any of that, but I just wanted to end on a positive note.
COYW