Match Thread: Bradford City v Port Vale

[dazzerjames]

Askey has showed absolutely nothing to turn this around. It’s his mess. It’s as bad as brown and aspin, why does he deserve longer? At least aspin signed a few half decent players. 
 
Let’s keep askey. Keep falling down the league and then have a clear out (again) of all his rubbish signings and then let him sign some more and repeat. We are going backwards not forwards 

He turned it around last season in the second half. This year the league is tighter with no one really running away with it. Next 2 games for me

A win and a draw or 6 points needed

If Worrall and montano are back I’d fancy us for that.

[werstayinup]

14 hours ago, boslemportvale91 said:

Or Possibly Askey realised he's crap and wants rid or maybe Theo isn't happy with not enough first team football.

Whatever the answer is, its a waste of a two year deal. Askey has had a nightmare this summer regarding recruitment 

Maybe Theo isn't happy with the manager for whatever reason and is making it difficult,it only takes a couple of bad eggs to ruin a dressing room,its the same with work you get one person who can bring the whole mood down in a workplace 

[werstayinup]

14 hours ago, Vale1995 said:

Ahahah behave mate they are probably nowhere near ready for the first team they havent even trained with the first team askey is running out of options and them being named stinks of desperation 

The club rates Bailey very highly and have hopes for him,dont know much on the other 2 lads 

[Doha]

4 minutes ago, werstayinup said:

if he has bad eggs then let him ship them out and see who he can bring in,do i trust him in the window not sure but we just got to see

But why? Bennett, Evans, Mills, Archer, Whitehead, Kennedy, etc etc 

I am still waiting to have it explained to me how McKirdy and Robinson dictate his permanent lack of a plan B, his fear of changing a game, and his dreadful transfer record. 

There’s an awful lot of “just wait until January we’ll storm up the league” from some quarters on here as if he’s magically going to change his entire personality and technical managerial capability by transfer listing two squad players. It will suddenly free him up to stop playing dire dire football, achieving a shot on target once a game and waiting until injury time to bring on one sub out of five when a game needs changing drastically. 

It makes no sense. 

[werstayinup]

13 hours ago, Paul6754 said:

Absolutely but Hurst has been fading after ca 60 mins. Lets see how he goes.

Hurst is the one thing to come out of this poor run,he will need to work on his fitness but that will come,he could have a good future at Vale and beyond(as clubs will like players like him),he can also play in Midfield and imo as a number 10

[werstayinup]

12 hours ago, Vale1995 said:

Credit where credit is due. Defended a lot better tonight what a suprise with mills out the team. Much better performance and managed to limit them to half chances. Not much going forward but a point away is never a bad result and if they had given a peno which looked stone wall could of been a completely different story. Whether this result covers up the cracks or could potentially be a turning point only time will tell. Do i think askey is the man to take us forward no. But it looks like he is here to stay so hopefully carol gives him something to play with in January because we are crying out for some quality as i think any team with a bit of quality themselves will manage to get goals against us. I think we are desperate for a fit atheletic cm who can be box. a proven goalscorer and 2/3 defenders. If we can get them in then maybe we can turn the corner. 

Oh my life what is going on here i am actually agreeing with you here,decent post

Peace and love brother

[werstayinup]

12 hours ago, Joe B said:

No Jean, but I would have liked us to look at least 'not Sunday League' going forward.

Smith playing at right back was better but doesn't explain one of the most turgid games of football I've ever seen.

Bradford don't score many so I won't quite be celebrating tonight as an example of defensive Catenaccio brilliance quite yet.

They dont that is correct but they had won their last 3 with a new manager bounce and lets be fair here Askey changed the defence(dropped mills as people wanted) and we got a clean sheet,took a point off a team in form. I like Brisley(not been given much of a chance imo) we play him and a clean sheet.

Plus points for us are Gibbo isn't far off and wozza will be back soon,that will make a massive difference for me.

[mr.hobblesworth]

Completely agree with what Doha says. Someone mentioned a while ago about how McKirdy could make a good number 10 but there's no way on god's earth that Askey would have the flexibility of thinking to bring that about. Substitutions never effectively alter our formation and we remain incapable of changing games when we're on the back foot. We have a squad that is massively underperforming and ostracised players who should be thriving in this league. I can't think of any players that have improved under Askey either, even Aspin managed that.

Having said that, I'm getting increasingly hacked off with the amount of people pulling the club to bits on here. Lots of revisionism going on, with people who were delighted with the squad and praising Askey just a few months ago now pretending that they were wanting wholesale changes back in the summer. I'm still incredibly proud of the club off the pitch and think the Shanahans are the best owners we've had in my lifetime, so it's galling when so many are chipping in with unfair criticism. In the last few days we've had spoilt little brats demanding statements from the board and claiming they're shareholders just because they used to turn up and watch games, slagging off the WNE thing, slating the kits, moaning that Leon Legge was shouting encouragement from the bench when dropped, asking for half the squad (including Legge) to be paid off, questioning the professionalism of the board, blaming the likes of Sinclair and slagging the club for feeding vulnerable children. There's no nuance, or acceptance that mistakes can be understandable, just a clamour to say 'I told you so' and badmouth the club.

[werstayinup]

12 hours ago, Santa said:

Funny you mentioned that. While I was watching our midfield three play, Neil Mackenzie sprang to my mind as well.

He was decent at Countdown, to be fair to him.

wow a blast from the past,truly shocking player for us i remember an absolute shocker at Bury(that was the game i grabbed Glenn Oliver i think 🙂 )

Regarding the Midfield i dont think Whitehead will be a part of it in a game or two's time and maybe not Burgess either.

[werstayinup]

I have said all along that if you can be 6 points off the play offs by January then you have a great chance of going for it after Christmas,in the next game or two if we can bring in a couple and get the injured players back then lets hope for a few wins on the bounce.

Yes Askey is annoying not wanting change etc BUT we do know he can win games and before this post gets slated i have been in the Askey out camp but realise he isn't going anywhere so will certainly back him for NOW,i now hope for an upturn in results after last night.

[werstayinup]

12 hours ago, vale victory said:

What an absolute snooze fest, nothing going forward whatsoever, we didn’t even look interested in attacking them

Smith did well at right back far far better than mills
Him and Fitzpatrick are 2 very weak links and poor players neither of them will get you promoted

Rodney had a poor game but was so isolated it was untrue

All in all nothings changed regarding my opinion of Askey and won’t it won’t I’m afraid , like Santa said in the other thread he’s reached the point of no return

I’ve got no confidence in him making the signings we need to turn it around either

Smith played RB for a full season at Torquay and got player of the season so he can play that position.

[werstayinup]

12 hours ago, 1 said:

Who can we realistically get rid of in Jan. Player wise. Theo is here for 2 years? He won’t budge. Same reason Whitehead and Cullen. 

No getty riddy, no new passy shoot shoots.

Theo and McKirdy will certainly be gone as will possibly Cullen and maybe even a couple more as well,Clark has already gone that frees up a space straight away

[philpvfc]

Smith is a far better centre back, he’s too slow for a full back, you only have to look at the game at Walsall last season to see that. Saying that, he is better than Mills in that position.

[werstayinup]

11 hours ago, andy jones said:

Ok apologies for suggesting you anti Askey posters would be gutted tonight.

I accept we are all Vale with different views but some of the comments on here pillorying Carol for not sacking him were absolutely disgusting attacks on what she has achieved after saving the club in the first place.

Yes the last 6 weeks have been awful results wise but so many games went against us in injury time. Two when we had battled with ten men. Ok there weren't 5 first team missing in all those games but injuries to key players have had an affect.

Regarding the 'poor' signings in Summer. Well if I remember right we paid the vast majority of our budget on retaining our existing squad and it seemed most on here were delighted we did.

Then Carol dug even deeper to try and get Maynard. Disappointing to miss out? Not sure actually as he has scored how many in the league this season?

So we got Robinson who had one of the best goals / minutes records last season.

6 weeks ago Askey was good enough to get us comfortably in play off positions even though we had by then conceded a couple of late goals that cost us being in top three.

6 weeks isn't a long time when Carol has as 3 year plan to ...

Get us promotion

Create a quality Academy to develop young talent for the first team.

Overhaul the off field activities including bringing in professional staff she can trust.

Create an incredible reputation within the city including nearly 200,000 meals for those in need (disgracefully described as a 'few meals for elderly' by one poster.)

Put seats in the Lorne Street to give us a proper stadium look to be proud of after all these years (again written off by the same poster as a few plastic seats)

And last but not least agreed to pay an immense amount of money to save the club.

So please, let's just lay off the criticism of Carol's running of the club and accept that she has undertaken all of the above and will decide all appointments of people who work for her without having to take the abuse being aimed at her both on here, and other social media.

If anyone is letting our football club down its those throwing the personal abuse who should be ashamed of themselves.

Happy New Year

Best post on here in a while that one tbf

[PV1973]

Despite last night being a decent result and a solid enough defensive display, it’s clear it’s not the way to push us forward. Smith will make do as right back, but you can see by his defensive positioning and what he does in the opposition half with his runs shows he just isn’t a natural there. In time teams will exploit him. We cannot go through the season playing defensive fullbacks and expect to be taking games to the opposition and we will also need more drive and guile on the ball in the middle of the pitch. IMO when players are fit we need to get Gibbo and Monty back at full back. Despite how well he has done I think that Worrall will replace Hurst. Add in Conlon and Manny or even Taylor into the midfield and get back to how we know we can play. Easy to say I know, but we won’t progress setting up like we did last night.