EXETER CITY v CRAWLEY MDT

[malcolms]

So timewasting / cheating is ok as long as it gets you promoted ? Any teams that are playing Wycombe go and read their fans forums, Ainsworth seems to make it part of their basic training.

Do you really think that "cheating and time wasting" gets you promoted, you don't think its about amassing more points than your opponents? To do this you have to score more goals and concede fewer than the other teams.

 

[Stelios]

The trouble is a bit of time wasting has always happened but now it seems to be morphing with 'game management' and is a deliberate tactic from the 1st minute to break up play, kill off momentum from the opposition etc. It allow teams to re-set and re-group etc. It's clearly coached. It's not just a subbed player walking off slowly in the 85th minute any more.

From next season I think I read here a subbed player will have to walk off the pitch at the nearest touchline. Not walk across a whole pitch to the dugout. But that doesn't deal with the ****housery tactics and 'dark arts' of some teams. The 'injuries' and 'cramps'.

Remember when Mourinho went mad at his physio? It wasn't because he was concerned about the welfare of his player.............

 

[shoot on sight]

The trouble is a bit of time wasting has always happened but now it seems to be morphing with 'game management' and is a deliberate tactic from the 1st minute to break up play, kill off momentum from the opposition etc. It allow teams to re-set and re-group etc. It's clearly coached. It's not just a subbed player walking off slowly in the 85th minute any more.

From next season I think I read here a subbed player will have to walk off the pitch at the nearest touchline. Not walk across a whole pitch to the dugout. But that doesn't deal with the ****housery tactics and 'dark arts' of some teams. The 'injuries' and 'cramps'.

Remember when Mourinho went mad at his physio? It wasn't because he was concerned about the welfare of his player.............

For what it's worth I think Crawley came with a simple game plan which as time went on became even more cynical. Ref was u/s.But it got them the 3 points they needed for safety.
They really pressed us hard and were denying us time on the ball almost from the first minute. The intention being to cause us to panic and make mistakes and give the ball away-which worked with the lead up to the first goal.Given the heat and the intensity of their pressing they realised that they would be unable to keep this up all game so stage two of that process was to engage in blatant time wasting and lots of feigned injuries in order to give themselves a bit of a breather etc.
They also certainly in the first half tended to keep at least one and sometimes two players out wide almost on the touchline. With our back four playing fairly centrally their wing players then had time on the ball having received pretty good diagonal balls straight to their feet. The second goal came from their right-side wing player having time to sweep the ball into our box
Pym on the highlights looked as if he could have done better with third goal and I echo some of the earlier comments about his more recent performances!

 

[richard_portland]

Wasn't at the game yesterday but seems to me we could have got at least a draw even if we didn't play well. The first goal in particular looked avoidable with multiple opportunities to simply boot the ball away from goal. Bowman's goal was well taken and the highlights showed a couple of very good chances we probably should have converted which could have given us at least a two all draw but we didn't.

We will have to do it the hard way now, really need the win on Monday although a point might keep us in touch.

 

[Red Bill]

Do you really think that "cheating and time wasting" gets you promoted, you don't think its about amassing more points than your opponents? To do this you have to score more goals and concede fewer than the other teams.

So what point were you trying to make in your post that Ramone replied to?

 

[Sexton Blake]

The trouble is a bit of time wasting has always happened but now it seems to be morphing with 'game management' and is a deliberate tactic from the 1st minute to break up play, kill off momentum from the opposition etc. It allow teams to re-set and re-group etc. It's clearly coached. It's not just a subbed player walking off slowly in the 85th minute any more.

From next season I think I read here a subbed player will have to walk off the pitch at the nearest touchline. Not walk across a whole pitch to the dugout. But that doesn't deal with the ****housery tactics and 'dark arts' of some teams. The 'injuries' and 'cramps'.

Remember when Mourinho went mad at his physio? It wasn't because he was concerned about the welfare of his player.............

The trouble is a bit of time wasting has always happened but now it seems to be morphing with 'game management' and is a deliberate tactic from the 1st minute to break up play, kill off momentum from the opposition etc. It allow teams to re-set and re-group etc. It's clearly coached. It's not just a subbed player walking off slowly in the 85th minute any more.

From next season I think I read here a subbed player will have to walk off the pitch at the nearest touchline. Not walk across a whole pitch to the dugout. But that doesn't deal with the ****housery tactics and 'dark arts' of some teams. The 'injuries' and 'cramps'.

Remember when Mourinho went mad at his physio? It wasn't because he was concerned about the welfare of his player.............

Sadly a lot of truth in what you say only way to combat it, easier said than done I know, get ahead and do not give them the platform and opportunity to game manage in this manner.

Correct about the sub having to leave pitch at closest exit point. What I would also like to see is a return to the days, probably pre the introduction of a 12th man, when players unless very badly injured would be helped off and treated on the touch line which would put a stop to the current nonsense.

Having said that with the thoroughly sensible law now in place regarding head injuries that will not stop managers telling players, when their opponents are on the attack, to disrupt play by dropping to the ground feigning a head injury and causing the referee to stop play.

 

[Stelios]

So good you posted me twice

I'd like to test the rugby way of just letting the physio run on during play whenever a player goes down but allowing play to carry on around them. Could it work in football? Would the player receiving treatment be 'active' still? i.e. would he count as one of the 2 defensive players for offsides? The trouble is if someone has been knocked out or having a heart attack you can't have the game carrying on around them. It just feels something needs to be done to stop the fake injuries.

 

[malcolms]

So what point were you trying to make in your post that Ramone replied to?

Just the long held impression on these boards that Wycombe, Lincoln and others have somehow been successful through cheating and time wasting rather than accumulating more points by scoring goals and not conceding them....

 

[elginCity]

So what point were you trying to make in your post that Ramone replied to?

The belief that time wasting and cheating is incidental to a team's success for some, but not all.

Has to be a factor; disrupting the flow and momentum of a game when it suits can be an effective tactic over the course of a season.

 

[Egg]

Apropos Crawley's game management, haven't seen anyone mention a new tactic employed yesterday which, thus far, I haven't even seen the Crowleys and Lincoln – who, it seems to me, have this down to an art form – use.

When we scored our goal, the Crawley bench took the opportunity to boot two or three of the fourth official's spare balls onto the field of play – an attempt, one presumes, to delay the restart for a few seconds and just take a little bit of heat out of the situation.

Matty T was, understandably, incandescent. The fourth official, apparently, not much bothered by it. Certainly, he saw no need to summon the referee over and tell him what happened.