One week on from the underwhelming performance at Plough Lane, Michael Flynn’s side served up more dross for the Town Faithful in the most lacklustre showing in many years at the County Ground.
With Town’s injury list now reaching nine first-team players, the manager had thirteen professional players for Saturday’s game, as revealed by Flynn in his post-match interview, his side started with a 4-3-3 formation as that’s what he had available to him.
Embarrassing situation for a non-league manager to confess, let alone a team who are supposed to be challenging for promotion to League One this season.
We know injuries happen at every club, as we’ve seen over the years at Town, but in this situation, the people who set the budget and head up recruitment only have themselves to blame for our squad size.
As much as Saturday’s result was down to a lack of personnel, the players didn’t do themselves justice, as their performance was mirrored in the atmosphere inside the County Ground.
Again, the midfield three were anonymous throughout after impressing a few weeks ago, they now look rudderless.
If Wrexham does approach Town with anything near the rumoured £350K for Saidou Khan next month, there’s no chance we could turn it down.
If that money did go straight back into the first team, it could finance 2-3 new faces and make a huge difference.
It wasn’t only in the middle of the pitch Town lost the key battles, as our back four didn’t hit the levels expected, with both centre-backs well below par.
Udoka Godwin-Malife hasn’t been the same player we saw in the opening months of the season, as he looks lost playing in a back four instead of a five, which served him well.
With the security of two other centre-backs, he was playing as a midfielder at times, bringing the ball forward, sadly he and Harrison Minturn haven’t shown yet they can work effectively together.
New faces in defence will be high up the list of priorities when the window opens on 1st January.
Looking back at the weekend, Dan Kemp was again the stand-out performer amongst a sea of underperforming players.
With his situation still up in the air, it’s painful for every Town fan to know we could be losing the best player at the club in a couple of weeks, we still have some hope Milton Keynes won’t recall him, but despite Kemp having no future with Mike Williamson’s side, they could still earn a fee in January.
If this scenario plays out, hopefully, Clem Morfuni can put his money where his mouth is and stump up the fee needed to bring Kemp here on a permanent deal.
Sadly, I don’t see any situation where we can keep hold of Jake Young past 31st December.
Either Bradford City finds room for him and plays to his strengths, or he finds a new club, and with his scoring record this season, he could easily jump up to League One, possibly the Championship.
Next up, is a trip to Prenton Park this Saturday, as Town faces an underachieving Tranmere Rovers side who find themselves 21st in League Two.
Nigel Adkins had been overseeing an upturn in form with wins over Forest Green Rovers, Gillingham, and Newport County, but momentum was halted on Saturday with a 1-0 away defeat to Walsall.
Town needs to take advantage of that recent setback and show the last two results and performances are a blip, and we can return to the side that earned wins over Mansfield Town and Accrington Stanley.
Lastly, I want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas!