Having missed the big day at Vauxhall Motors when Burton Albion clinched promotion to the Conference,
my own most memorable away day following the Brewers is of a game in which they
were beaten; the day at Torquay, of course, when promotion to the Football
League was confirmed.
In terms of regular games and performances,
however, I am struggling to think of anything to match Saturday’s stunning
victory at Fleetwood Town.
It was the completeness of the performance
which will stay in the memory.
It started with the methodical, determined
way the players went about snuffing out such threat as Fleetwood had in the
first half on a dreadful, heavily sanded pitch.
It may be a cliché, that you have to earn the
right to play, but it’s very true and the Brewers did that. They had the better
opportunities in that first half, too.
In the second half, they took over the game.
Jacques Maghoma had had a quiet first half, the ball not running for him, but
he did little wrong in the second half and, aside from the goals, there was one
moment when he skipped away from one opponent and nutmegged another to turn
defence into attack which was worth the admission, as they say. It was no
surprise to see him and others Tweeting about it later on: “Jaguar skills!”
said Stuart Tomlinson. “I knew you’d be buzzing. All I could hear was your
voice!” answered Maghoma. The camaraderie between them on Twitter tells us plenty
about the spirit in the dressing room.
The longer the game went on, the less heart
Fleetwood had for the contest, as Burton wore them down and Maghoma tormented
them. I don’t buy any argument from the Fleetwood end about it not being a
penalty, or a red card. Maghoma had slipped past keeper Scott Davies and had no
reason to fall with an empty net in front of him. Davies clipped him and the
referee had no option.
Nor am I much concerned that Fleetwood had a
patched-up side because of injuries. So did Burton the previous week against
Rotherham. Fleetwood have a bigger, more expensively-assembled squad and if, as
we were told, they have loaned out a number of those surplus players, well,
that’s the choice you make. They were unbeaten in five going into the game, so
they were hardly in dire straits.
It was good to see Gary Rowett’s theory about
his side being fitter than others late in the game and being able to exploit
space against tired opponents proved. Some of the passing between Maghoma,
Billy Kee, Michael Symes and, later, Calvin Zola was wonderfully intuitive and
Fleetwood had no answer.
It was good to see Maghoma also answer those
who claim he is a selfish player by presenting a chance on a plate for Zola at
the end when he might have gone for his own hat-trick.
And it was good, too, when a chant of “one
Gary Rowett” broke out among the large away following. Rowett will know as much
as anyone that he was not the universally popular choice to take over when Paul
Peschisolido was sacked but he has won over most of the doubters now.
Two of them, Mick Arnold and Doug Harvey,
went public on the Burton Albion Facebook page in the last week to say “we were
wrong.” Good on them! As Doug said: “Thank God Ben (Robinson) saw something in
him…”
Indeed.
Let’s not pretend all days between now and
the end of the season will be as good as Saturday at Fleetwood. But hey, it was
very good indeed.
++++++
And finally, a picture quiz for you. Who is
this current Burton Albion player, captured during his schooldays? A pint, some time, for the first to answer it correctly, either here, by messaging me on the fans' forum, through Facebook or by emailing me at work, ccrawford@derbytelegraph.co.uk
No comments:
Post a Comment