Town at Cambridge

[Bluemike]

Hutchinson Starts at Cambridge
Saturday, 22nd Jul 2023 11:17
New loan signing Omari Hutchinson makes his first appearance in a Town shirt in this afternoon’s first friendly against Cambridge United at the Abbey Stadium.

Vaclav Hladky is in goal with youngster Ryan Carr, who signed from Carlisle in January, at right-back, Leif Davis on the left and Luke Woolfenden and Cameron Burgess the centre-halves.

Lee Evans skippers in the centre of midfield alongside Massimo Luongo with Hutchinson appearing likely to be on the right of the three behind striker Freddie Ladapo with Conor Chaplin and Marcus Harness to his left.

Cambridge include on-loan Blues striker Gassan Ahadme, ex-Town duo Paul Digby and Jack Lankester and one-time Playford Road academy schoolboy Ryan Bennett in their XI.

The Blues are in action again at Stevenage at 3.30pm with a different XI set to start.

Cambridge United: Stevens, Digby, Morrison, Bennett, Brophy, Thomas, Lankester, Dunk, Okedina, Janneh, Ahadme.

Town: Hladky, Carr, Woolfenden, Burgess, Davis, Evans (c), Luongo, Hutchinson, Chaplin, Harness, Ladapo.

Pretty strong team, must still have injuries in defence what with young Carr starting at LB, hopefully Clarke or Donacien are good to go at Stevenage later.

[hallamblue]

Janoi, Clarke and Edmundson all injured I think.

A few kids in that team / bench …. Looking good for the future . I can see that Carr forcing his way into cup games this season if not a few mins cameo for first team at find point. He looks really assured for a kid.


Ps there’s Live match updates min by min in the EADT online …

[Bluemike]

1-0 Town, Leif Davis in the 2nd minute

Hutchinson's first assist for the club

[Cabanas Blue]

1-1 at half time.

[Bluemike]

Uninspiring lol

[Bluemike]

Lost 2-1, McKenna Out

[hallamblue]

Other than the youngster Carr and 2nd string GK that was our normal defence.

Also Morsy was not in MF today. HE protects the defence.

Our actual “defence” isn’t all that snd never has been, in my humble opinion.

[hallamblue]

Town 1-0 down from the start v Stevenage .

“ Edmundson statuesque and Walton spills the shot into the net”

Yer our defence is just fine !

[Charnwood]

Do we ever do well against Cambridge United. I think we’re now 1 win from 8 played.

[Bluemike]

Preston was a true reflection of where we are with a full strength side, these bloody meaningless half teams and Two games in a day are pointless imo

[hallamblue]

I know we are mixing and matching players in these friendlies, but our defence is a huge concern to me. We can’t defend the ball in our box. I’m sure the coaches realise we need strengthening.

Personally I feel only Burgess is an effective CB, and he’s what I’d rate as average. But out of him, Woolfie and Edmundson, I’d say he’s the best CB. I’d be looking for 2CB’s, but I doubt the club will be lol.

[hallamblue]

Preston was a true reflection of where we are with a full strength side, these bloody meaningless half teams and Two games in a day are pointless imo

Well for “ minutes in the legs “ as McKenna says , they are probably invaluable. But for me anyway, it does highlight our frailties in our defence. I know / realise I keep,banging on about this to the point I suspect of peeing people off on here. So apologies for that. I know Rome wasn’t built in a day, and it takes time to get the finished article, but I just hope the club attend to the central defence. It’s not good enough …when the ball enters our box.

[Bluemike]

There will definitely be a CB in before Sunderland, would be madness otherwise

[hallamblue]

I Trusty you

[marko69]

Preston was a true reflection of where we are with a full strength side, these bloody meaningless half teams and Two games in a day are pointless imo

100% spot on

[Andym]

But for me anyway, it does highlight our frailties in our defence…… I just hope the club attend to the central defence. It’s not good enough …when the ball enters our box.

I think we have a few injuries at the back, and we seem to be fielding players out of position and youngsters. So I don’t think it’s quite as bad as it seems.
However I do agree we need to strengthen. I’ve said before that you achieve promotion by attaching but, once achieved, you need to pay more attention to defence. That’s where Norwich went wrong so many times. Strikes in the championship will be higher quality than we’ve been used to.

[hallamblue]

The big thing I noticed from the game PNE was first touch has to be 100% spot on, or you lose possession… And the opposition is generally very quick to capitalise on any loose ball.

[arana peligrosa]

Two defeats on one afternoon, both to lesser league opposition. Not overly concerned, these are just exercise games and promotion or not we've always struggled or got beat by opponents from leagues below us.

Two different teams utilized, experiments and all, guess McKenna was just splashing away out there without need of real effort or focus. Read some post-game reaction from TWTD, the requisite panic from one or two corners but nothing new. We still got further friendlies lined up before Sunderland and time to address the situation. Disappointed to lose twice on one afternoon but it's far from the concern some would make out.

The croc(odile) sighting back in Town probably caused more alarm or made more of a news story.