Braintree Away

[Bluemike]

Midfielder Andre Dozzell has been named in the Blues squad for Saturday’s friendly against Vanarama National League Braintree Town at the Ironmongery Direct Stadium (KO 3pm).

The 19-year-old played the first half of last week’s 1-0 behind-closed-doors defeat of Kilmarnock at La Manga but tomorrow’s match will be his first on UK soil since he suffered a torn cruciate knee ligament against Birmingham on the opening day of last season, an injury which ruled him out for the rest of the campaign.

Manager Paul Hurst is taking his first-team squad to Essex with all the travelling party likely to play a part at some stage, as is usual at this point in pre-season.

Tickets are priced at £10 for adults and £5 for senior citizens and under-18s, and are available on the gate.

Anyone else giving this a look tomorrow ?

[AylesburyBlue]

Midfielder Andre Dozzell has been named in the Blues squad for Saturday’s friendly against Vanarama National League Braintree Town at the Ironmongery Direct Stadium (KO 3pm).

The 19-year-old played the first half of last week’s 1-0 behind-closed-doors defeat of Kilmarnock at La Manga but tomorrow’s match will be his first on UK soil since he suffered a torn cruciate knee ligament against Birmingham on the opening day of last season, an injury which ruled him out for the rest of the campaign.

Manager Paul Hurst is taking his first-team squad to Essex with all the travelling party likely to play a part at some stage, as is usual at this point in pre-season.

Tickets are priced at £10 for adults and £5 for senior citizens and under-18s, and are available on the gate.

Anyone else giving this a look tomorrow ?

Just you two numpties :p
But only 40 mins away so why not.

[Bluemike]

Yes indeed, why not, a nice sunny day and a short trip, beer, food and footy, what's not to like.

[AylesburyBlue]

Yes indeed, why not, a nice sunny day and a short trip, beer, food and footy, what's not to like.

Braintree is a crack den....

[Bluemike]

WTF has that got to do with anything ?

[AylesburyBlue]

You were trying to make it sound like a jolly holiday :p

[Bluemike]

To some it is lol

[Bluemike]

Well that was bloody woeful, only a friendly it may be but please at least compete !!! Downes and Gerken done ok but the rest !!! At least we can change the whole lot second half.

[Bluemike]

Overall a very poor showing, it may only be the first pre season game but I expect better than that, second best throughout and apart from a couple of chances we created little and didnt trouble their keeper.

Not sure I liked Waghorn playing in behind Roberts, didn't seem to work for me and I thought I'd seen the last of Sears as a winger!! Gerken and Downes did ok first half while Nydam was very good second half, Dozzell and Folami had decent cameos but apart from that there is much to work on. PH is clearly not happy with it either which is a good thing but with so many players unavailable there is no need for panic just yet. New players in next week all being well.

[rossi]

well it's only the start of the friendlies, so I don't think anybody can read too much into things apart from the fact that we should always be able to beat a Conference South side no matter what, so from that angle it's very disappointing.

What disappoints me the most is that according to the report on TWTD we started the game with 2 defensive midfielders - I was led to believe that under Hurst our style of play was going to change. SKUSE OUT!!!!!

[Tangfastic]

I know this is the first friendly in the UK and we have players missing .... but I think it’s a bit embarrassing. We’ve had bad pre-season performances before and adjusted when the season kicks off. However, the level we’re playing against you’d have thought we could have played at 70% and got a result. Also, with the squad players coming in, you’d have thought would have been desperate to impress the new manager. I’m not panicking, but was hoping to get more positives out of game where we should have done better in second or third gear.

[marko69]

Every season, (I personally) say the same thing...... these friendlies matter. Yes, for the manager (New manager) to see what’s what, but also the result. It matters.

I’ll use the Jambofuckers as an example. They travelled the 80 or so miles north to Forfar yesterday. Very much an experimental game with new faces (or faeces) and also youngsters. They got that job done convincingly and if not for some decent Forfar defending, could’ve been more.

Hand on heart, not angry and going nuts, but ITFC should be winning vs Braintree Town. Every ITFC fan who attended yesterday were no doubt expecting a decent win with the new air of positivity around the place.

After that “shock” to their system, I suppose the fans could rightly assume that, West Ham aside, there shouldn’t be any more friendly defeats this season. And hopefully the ‘ammers are stuffed as well.

[number 9]

A disappointing result indeed! I don't think Hurst will put up with that sh*t! If he does, we're f*cked!

[Bluemike]

He definitely won't

[Mach_Polish_Blue]

I'm seriously concerned.

I don't buy that crap :'it was only a pre-season game'. To remind you all we had lost 6-1 to Charlton in the pre-season last year and nothing was addressed after that. Subsequently we had a freak August spell where we won four league games that was paper over cracks as the problems were never solved. We knew we needed cover in the defence as all our central backs were injured. We waited till the last day of the transfer window where the Goldson move failed.

We seem to be waiting again ! Why? Because Evans sits on his wallet for the rest of the summer relying on small fees, freebies and loans. It's been over a year since Berra left and we've sold Smith (replaced by a short term plaster in Carter-Vickers) and Webster since.

I'm sure Hurst has some targets particularly central defenders but his job his extremely difficult due to the Evans' policy.

[AylesburyBlue]

It was a god awful result and a shyte performance by the sound of it. BUT where MM would have said it’s pre season, PH said it wasn’t good enough and it re affirmed some things..... that alone is re assurance he won’t tolerate similar performance and he knows the side needs strengthening.