I’m starting to like 2026 already…
So, welcome to the first post of this year. I was going to do something after Exeter, but I had far better things to do that relive that particular evening.
Like deworming my pet dog (I don’t have a pet dog and never will).
I’ve put that horror show out of my mind, and I’d much rather focus on Northwest Orient 1 Ryanair 3 instead.
A game that I think most of us had the usual low expectations for up until kickoff. And ones that got even lower when they scored after about five minutes.
Before I go on – this is going to be a slightly different “proper” report as I was in the press box for this one.
My handiwork is here (at least, the on-whistle report is), though the rewrite I had to do had the same words as JJ later said in his post-game OS interview afterwards. Oh well.
So this might be a bit more “stunted” and “dry”, if you see what I mean. The trouble with legit press duties is that you have to be focused on the game itself than the rest of it.
Though I can’t deny it was nice to sit there afterwards and write a grown-up report with that post-victory afterglow.
An afterglow I think we all thought was way off after we went behind…
You could have been forgiven for having that utter sinking feeling when that happened. Another game, another loss, another bunch of feeble excuses, and a slump that was likely to last until April.
Yet it seemed to kick us up the arse a bit. No passing about at the back, which crippled us against Exeter.
But instead, there was an urgency that I haven’t seen for some time with us. Maybe towards the end last Monday, but this wasn’t as desperate as back then.
You still have to score when you’re playing well, needless to say. Which is why when Seddon crossed for Smith to force their player into turning it into his own net, it was a sigh of relief as much as unbridled joy.
Decent finish, to be fair. If only one of our own players could do that.
Could we have got a second before the break? I’m not sure, if we’d had a fully-firing Matty Stevens then perhaps we could.
The trouble is, when you’re playing well and don’t score, there’s always that sense a blunder is going to fuck things up.
Even when we came out in the second half, I still felt that. So the second goal also became one of relief as much as celebration.
Again, decent cross in and Hippo finishes with aplomb. A decent bit of quality creates goals – funny, that.
In hindsight, I guess we need not have worried about the win. Even if Orient decided that they might finally start playing.
But there was still that nagging doubt in the back of our collective minds over it. Just one moment of idiocy and another matchday ruined.
Thankfully, Marcus Browne killed it off with a stunner of a free kick. Seriously, it’s a thing of beauty, and I’m in no doubt you’ve spent most of this year watching it again.
Granted, Bishop had to turn an awkward effort onto the bar, and when he did you just knew nothing else was going to happen after that.
Oh, and we should have had a fourth as well. But you can’t have everything.
What we can have is three lovely points to take back to the better part of London, and perhaps just as importantly – knowing we can actually play and win again.
As the photo at the top suggests, I had to do post-game interviews pitchside, and that photo was too good not to put up.
The word “relief” has been used a couple of times already, and I’ll use it again to describe both JJ’s and Alistair Smith’s mood afterwards.
For our manager especially, it’s been a pretty tough couple of months. We’ve lost Stevens (who came on again for some more minutes), and our goalscoring has dried up as a result.
We were awful in the second half at Northampton, the less said about Exeter (both games) the better, and the UN have banned rebroadcasting Mansfield/St Evenage because it breaks their charter on torture.
When he said afterwards that there would be a couple of beers on the coach on the way back, I bet he meant it.
The only real shame about this is knowing we’ve only got until Sunday to bask in this rather nice feeling, because we’re heading to Wycombe.
That if it’s on, mind you. The temperature in the area is dropping to -4c (so it’ll be nearer -7c near Adams Park) and although they’ve got undersoil heating – you just know it will be off.
I’d be in two minds about that. Obviously, following up a win with another one would be beyond our wildest of wild dreams.
At the same time though, we’re bound to play like absolute whale wank there, and 2026 will quickly fall to shit…
Plus points: We won. Quite convincingly in the end. Seddon’s crossing. Browne’s free kick. Going up a gear when we went behind. Playing like we had a point to prove.
Minus points: Their goal.
The referee’s a…: Did he do much to annoy us? I’m not sure, he didn’t seem to be high up the arsehole scale.
No doubt I’ll now hear tales of him mooning our fans afterwards while wearing a Franchise shirt.
Them: Shite. But then, how often do we lose to shite?
Your editor has been a regular at Brisbane Road this season on professional duties, and I have to admit before the game I wish I never asked to cover this particular one.
They’ve been OK every time I’ve seen them, until yesterday they last lost way back in September, although they’ve also now lost their last three.
But if I was one of their fans right now, I’d be praying to Satan about getting some new blood in.
There really isn’t anyone I would swap in their squad for theirs except for Ballard, who is somebody I wish we had the funds to get.
I expect they’ll eventually finish above us, as they’re not like us and they have more than £1.50 in spending power.
Brisbane Road isn’t a bad venue to go to, it’s nice and easy by tube and unlike so many stadia these days there’s a proper high street nearby.
They want to move though, and cash in on land value. Not sure where they’ll go, although the Asda opposite the station has been mentioned.
Their fans were deathly quiet (ours weren’t), and their drum sounded even shittier than most other places.
Though “You’re too poor to watch West Ham” got more than a few murmurings from the home support…
Point to ponder: I wonder if JJ (and the squad) will get enough credit for trying to change things?
If you read our manager’s post-game comments, he said that we’ve only had one day to work on something different, and to be fair it worked yesterday.
It might have even explained why Exeter was such a shit-show, although I think Leyton Orient was a reaction to that.
One impression I got up close (so to speak) was that everyone in the AFCW setup is aware how bad things have been recently.
Some of it has been enforced (no Stevens or Hackford), but too much of it has been self-inflicted.
So turning things around like that is a pretty difficult thing to do, and it’s to everyone’s credit that we’re trying something.
Now, you could argue Roy Keane style that it’s their job to do that. And you’ll be right.
But think about the amount of managers who don’t change anything, who rush to sign new players rather than seeing if they can improve what they’ve got.
Hell, just remember the last time we were in L1. And then rush to your therapist afterwards because you thought you finally got that out of your mind.
To be fair, I don’t think there’s been much more beyond the usual frustration at such a poor run.
Very few have called for JJ’s head, and there’s an acceptance that at this time the issues lie elsewhere.
Even so, there’s still an expectation that this bunch of players should be doing better than they have been, and while you maybe shouldn’t praise them for upping their game – they are at least trying to rectify things.
Of course, I reserve the right to call them useless fucking cunts who have difficulty locating their front door after we lose at Wycombe…
Truth is stranger than fiction: 1) The view from the pressbox (see above). That netting wasn’t there to stop suicidal Wombles jumping at 15h06 yesterday. 2) Everywhere very quiet, from the underground to Leyton High Street. Guess U2 were right. 3) Finding out Liverpool Street station was closed – the hard way.
Anything else? I’m not expecting too much in the now-open transfer window, JJ himself pretty much played down significant movement.
This time of year is normally when we get sodomised over players departing and their replacements, and we end up walking like John Wayne from now until May.
Apart from any loanees going out, I can’t see people rushing to nab any of our players, Stevens excepted.
Come to think of it – do we have many loan signings this time round? Maybe we’ve been keeping our powder dry on that score.
We’ve borrowed Asiimwe, the lesser spotted Kjetil Waehler Chelsea youngster who played once when he arrived and was hardly seen again, and now I’m struggling.
Hackford I thought was a loanee too, but I’d forgotten he’s “ours”. I know we’ve got two keepers who aren’t on loan, which makes a change.
Maybe we’ll be getting in a couple of loanees this month in positions we need them?
Plenty want Kai Jennings back from GGL, but I’d rather we kept him there until the end of the season as it’s better long-term he gets proper gametime.
I don’t think he’ll give us much more than anyone else right now, Conference to L1 is one helluva step up after all.
While things can always change, I assume it’s be relatively quiet this January.
It was interesting to note how many L1 sides announced they lost some of their players yesterday back to their parent clubs.
That’s the flip side of loanees, and it’s nice for a change that it’s not going to affect us too much.
Of course, those same L1 sides are more than capable of getting others in…
So, was it worth it? Absobloodylutely.
In a nutshell: 2026 is great.