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Exeter City v Northampton Town - League 2 Playoff Final at Wembley Stadium

Antony Moxey

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My mum, a large football lover from her days in the south west made a good point.

Some of the team yesterday were out of contract, maybe Matt should have sorted their futures out before the game?
Players like Moxey were going into that game downright knowing it would be their last....
Yeah, but so what? You’d hope players would want to leave on a high, especially as they were in the shop window on national TV. Plus I’d suggest there’s little point in sulking given the circumstances the club found itself in - I’m pretty sure Matt Taylor would rather have played the game back in May when the players still had at least a month left on their contracts.
 

Grecianpasty

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Yes, and you can add to that - worrying too much about the other team. We were never going to beat Northampton by impersonating them.

Atangana got his place back on reputation and height - not form, he was terrible at Colchester. Leaving Collins out sent a big signal to our own team, that Taylor didn't believe in them to win on their own terms.

Taylor talked in his interview about players not believing in themselves, but he needs to remember that belief is instilled through leadership and trust.

Taylor now needs to show he is not like Tisdale and can learn from his mistakes. I also now expect him to give more chances to those coming through from the u-23s, they deserve a proper chance now, and L2 provides an easier introduction.

But all that said about the manager, the players deserve the lion's share of the criticism, it was the most feeble performance I can remember.
This resonates most to me.

We're quick to forget that Taylor has only been a professional football manager for two years on the nose. This is his biggest failure to date. We will see the strength in character that he has. I still have faith in him.
 

JayPob94

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Yeah, but so what? You’d hope players would want to leave on a high, especially as they were in the shop window on national TV. Plus I’d suggest there’s little point in sulking given the circumstances the club found itself in - I’m pretty sure Matt Taylor would rather have played the game back in May when the players still had at least a month left on their contracts.
We all know what lower league players are like. They’re journeymen and will go where the contract/money is and rightly so... too many of our first team yesterday were out of contract soon and with all the uncertainty probably couldn’t give a monkeys. I suspect Deano already has plans after this contract expires, hence his flying tackle.
 

JJ red&white

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After being extremely frustrated last night at our rubbish performance, i am trying to think of some positives. Firstly, we now have the opportunity to release some of the higher earners that are passed it (Moxey, Lee Martin, Woodman into a coaching role etc). This then means we can bring in some of our youth who are good enough for league two as proved in the EFL Trophy run. I think the fact that 90% of football clubs in league 2 are now going to be reliant on their youth/under contract players, we are in a great position given the strength of our youth and academy in general. If we had got promoted to league one, i dont think we would have been focused on the youth, and had we gone down one year later, we would be in a worse situation than if we play the youth this year and get promoted.
Taylor made a big mistake last night trying to compete with Northampton's tactics and hopefully he will learn from that. Although our performance was dreadful, there were two moments for met hat ensured our thumping, and actually could have changed things massively. Firstly, when Nicky Adams went off, we had a chance to be lifted, but conceded almost immediately. We were then on top for the last 5 mins of first half and first 10 of second half and looked like we would get at least one goal if we maintained that pressure. Then Moxey got sent off, and we knew that was game over. Had we not conceded in that fashion, and not had a man sent off, I predict we would have been right in that game, even having played poorly.
Anyway, onwards and upwards now. I think Taylor is a good manager, he is honest and i think he will learn from this. I think we have a very strong handful of young players who we can build next years team around, and i do believe that we as a club are still in a strong position despite the disappointment.
 

IndoMike

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SRJ - can I direct you to the Soccerbase website? If you look under Exeter City, then choose matches/ results then the player filter function allows you to generate stats for individual players for specific seasons

You won’t be surprised at the results for this season. We lost twice as often this season when Atangana played than when he didn’t (32% Defeats when Atangana played, 15%when he didn’t). The reverse was true for Archie; when he played we were only half as likely to lose (18%) as when he didn’t play (38%).

Those defeat stats are stark ; Archie not Atangana we lose one in six, promotion form. Atangana not Archie we lose one in three, mid table form.
Interesting.
 

IndoMike

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Wonder how much the promotion bonus (if any) was.
 

Jammers20

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Aug 15, 2009
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Bitterly disappointed after the farce that was last night. Again, like other I've taken time today to try and take positives out of it. At least now we can have a clear out, Moxey, L. Martin and others out of contract obviously wont be staying. I feel we also need to look at a few others Sweeney, Ajose, Jake Taylor, Fisher.. As to whether they are the type of player needed at the club and if they can take us forward. We need to find an identity on the pitch and play to it, whether that is as a footballing team or a more physical no nonsense team. that's for Taylor to decide. however we cant continue with players who offer nothing to either way of playing.

My only other positive is thank god we weren't able to actually go and witness it for ourselves and saved my hard earned money..

On to next season!
UTC
 

Moomin Grecian

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My mum, a large football lover from her days in the south west made a good point.

Some of the team yesterday were out of contract, maybe Matt should have sorted their futures out before the game?
Players like Moxey were going into that game downright knowing it would be their last....
That scenario just wasn’t realistic. If we went up then I could see 2 or 3 of those players being offered new deals. However, staying in L2 would likely mean we will get rid of all of them. The club couldn’t commit until we knew which league we’d have been in.

And on the flip side, surely any out of contract player would be in their best interest to put in an excellent performance so that they put themselves in the shop window?
 

Banksy

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The trouble is Jammers , it would be nice to review Sweeney , Ajose and the others positions , but tied as we are to their contracts how can we get rid of them assuming we want to. The market will be awash with out of contract players so why would another club necessarily want to take them off our hands? And if say we farmed them out and offered to pay part of their wages that would be another drain on our finances.
 

Rosencrantz

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SRJ - can I direct you to the Soccerbase website? If you look under Exeter City, then choose matches/ results then the player filter function allows you to generate stats for individual players for specific seasons

You won’t be surprised at the results for this season. We lost twice as often this season when Atangana played than when he didn’t (32% Defeats when Atangana played, 15%when he didn’t). The reverse was true for Archie; when he played we were only half as likely to lose (18%) as when he didn’t play (38%).

those defeat stats are stark ; Archie not Atangana we lose one in six, promotion form. Atangana not Archie we lose one in three, mid table form.
I think Archie is the main differential to whichever partnership plays in midfield. When Archie plays with either Nigel or Jake our win ratio is 50%+ and defeats 25% or below. Jake and Nigel together has a 50% losing record with 40% win (although two of the four wins were in the FLT). It's not surprising that our downturn in form happened when the pitch got bad and Archie hit a bit of a wall with his form and sharpness and was a bit in and out of the team. On a good pitch and fully fit, he really should be the first name down in midfield.
 
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