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Here we go then, 6pts from 9 over the festive period, and as commented elsewhere, unbeaten in 2023, and the U’s travel to Harrogate with considerable hope that the progress will be maintained. The U’sual Ramblings #19 arrives with a flurry of activity for the U’s in the transfer market, with Matty Bloomfield clearly starting to model a team of his own design. More on those later, but it remains to be seen how many of the new arrivals make at least the bench, or even a start at Wetherby Road. This blog will be a little shorter than usual due to ongoing family matters.
The world outside U’s World I for one have thoroughly enjoyed the spectacle of the US Republican party tear itself apart trying, and failing repeatedly to even elect a House Speaker before the new members of Congress could be sworn in. They managed it, eventually, late last night, but only after 15 rounds of voting — you have to go back over 200 years for the last time it took at least that long. Senator Kevin McCarthy did inevitably prevail, but one wonders at what cost where concessions to the far-right Freedom caucus is concerned?
Senator-elect Republicans arrive for the 118th Congress
Pertinent to my current family matters, and following multiple reports of, for instance, patients spending days on trolleys, Rishi Sunak and several other ministers are due to meet with health experts and senior health officials to consider the ongoing crisis. The all-day forum is titled an “NHS Recovery Forum”, but Labour say patients deserve “more than a talking shop”. It has been estimated that as many as 500 patients could be dying each week because of delays to emergency care.
U’s World Following on from the departures announced last week, Matt Bloomfield has so far picked up three new signings: left back/ left winger Connor Wood on a loan to the end of the season from Leyton Orient; midfielder Arthur Read on a two and a half year deal from Stevenage (fee undisclosed); and defender Fiacre Kelleher (it’s pronounced more or less how it reads, Fee-A-Cra), again on a two and a half year deal, this time from Bradford City.
Matt’s first signing of the January transfer window, Connor Wood started his career at youth level in the Leicester City U21s and had graduated to the U23s before Bradford City signed him in 2018. After 115 appearances for the Bantams, Connor moved to Leyton Orient in 2021, making 36 appearances in his first season. However, with Orient (like Stevenage) doing surprisingly well this season, he has struggled to make appearances, and will undoubtedly look on his loan to the U’s to either (a) remind Head Coach Richie Wellens that he can still have a future at Orient, or (b) impress enough to secure a permanent move to the JobServe.
Arthur Read, with a name straight out of 1950s football, looks like a no-nonsense sort of chap to have in the midfield. Arthur started at youth level with Luton Town back in 2016. Although he had brief loan deals at Hemel and Brentford, his professional career didn’t really kick off until he was loaned to Stevenage in 2020. The loan went well, and Stevenage signed him on a permanent deal at the end of it. After over 80 appearances, including 20 so far this season in a Boro side doing surprisingly well under Steve Evans, we can but hope that he brings some steel and tenacity to our midfield. It is telling that in those 20 appearances, Arthur has only been on the losing side twice, at promotion rivals Salford City and most recently in the League Cup at Portsmouth.
Signing as a youth player for Celtic back in 2015, Fiacre spent half a season on loan at Peterhead in 2016/17, before moving (relatively) south to spend the greater part of his career generally around clubs in the north and north west, including two spells on loan at Solihull Moors (okay, that’s more Midlands), Macclesfield, Wrexham and Bradford City. With well over 200 games under his belt already, and only 26 years old, he looks a very useful and experienced addition to a squad that habitually seems to leak goals these days. Fiacre has also played hurling, so if nothing else he’s clearly as hard as nails and utterly insane.
Breaking news — we have apparently also signed 29 year old defender Connor Hall from League 1 Port Vale
Welcome all to Colchester United!
Stat attack The football transfer windows have been a thing since the 2002/03 season, when FIFA mandated it for all domestic leagues, and following on from the 1995 Bosman ruling. Indeed, UEFA chief executive Gerhard Aigner stated that one of the reasons for its imposition was to “stop the confusion that has followed Bosman, though in reality it was designed to promote squad stability during a season (and no doubt line the pockets of agents with clubs almost coerced into transfer activity because of the restricted windows available).
Leaving aside New Years Day fixtures, since the January football transfer window has been in existence, our first fixture has on face value seen a phenomenally poor return for the U’s. In the last 19 seasons we’ve won just two, drawn eight and lost nine. However, context is everything, because six of these fixtures have been FA 3rd Round matches, five of which we lost. Still, not a particularly good record however you look at it.
Our solitary victories were the Championship 3-1 win over Nottingham Forest in 2006 (I was at Gloucester City v Salisbury City that day), and most recently John McGreal’s 2-0 win over Cheltenham Town at the JobServe in 2017. Our worst defeat was one of those FA Cup 3rd Round matches, with Aidy Boothroyd’s U’s getting tonked 7-0 at Deepdale back in 2010.
Match of the Day Colchester United v Walsall 30th April 2022 Sky Bet Football League Two (Tier 4) Attendance 3,520
Match of the Day for this blog, and the random memorabilia match selector has brough us right up to date with last April’s home match against Walsall. This was our last home match of the season and given the turn around that Wayne Brown had achieved as Interim Head Coach, definitely a good reason for me to take the train across to Essex on a bright spring day, meeting up with family whilst there.
Although the U’s had spent far too long floating around (but never in) the relegation zone, with Wayne Brown taking over from Hayden Mullins the U’s had started to instil some belief in the squad, not least starting with that emphatic 3-0 victory away at Salford City. By early April we’d put aside any thoughts that relegation was likely and were instead focussing on how high up the table we could finish. Walsall started the day two points and three places ahead of the U’s, likewise with nothing more to play for than their final league position, possibly reflected in the relatively low turn out for the Saddlers support (328 according to the Gazette but didn’t look anywhere near that many in the North Stand).
Leaving Shamal George on the bench and recalling Sam Hornby, Wayne Brown’s U’s lined up that afternoon:
This one was very much a slow burner for the first twenty minutes or so, although the U’s were gradually being to gain control of the game. On 24 minutes that control was rewarded with a goal. A 28 yard free kick from Alan Judge struck the wall and pinged up in the air, catching the Walsall defence somewhat flat-footed as it spun off the surface. A neat bit of keepy-uppy between Huws and Sears, after Freddie’s first weak effort had been parried by ‘keeper Carl Rushworth, culminated in Freddie poking home with his left foot from inside the six yard box for his 16th of the season.
However, what should have been the springboard for more goals for the U’s didn’t quite work out that way. Walsall responded almost immediately, forcing a good save from Hornby to deny Sam Perry from close range. Freddie went close after that, firing just over from a well-executed Noah Chilvers pass, but with just over five minutes from half time Walsall were level.
This time is was the U’s defence’s turn to be caught floundering from a lofted free kick. Having failed to clear the ball out of defence, it fell to Brendan Kiernan on the corner of the 18 yard box, who lofted an excellent shot past the dive of Sam Hornby and into the far corner of the net. Much as it pains me to say, it was a very well taken goal indeed. They could have even got a second before half time, with some neat twisting and turning trickery from Manny Monthe, but his final shot was weak and easily held by Sam Hornby.
Into the second half, and with Wayne Brown replacing Huws for Akinde, our hope that the U’s could reimpose themselves on the game didn’t last long at all. After just three minutes of the second half, the second goal that Walsall were threatening arrived. A good pass out to goal scorer Brendan Kiernan saw him fire an exquisite pass right across the face of Sam’s goal, behind the U’s defensive line, to present an easy tap in for George Miller. To his credit, Sam did well even to get a hand to it, but the ball was clearly already over the line when he did, and even if it wasn’t, the back spin off the turf took it into the net anyway.
The U’s knuckled down though, and at least started to show signs that they weren’t going to let the game run away from them. On 56 minutes our tenacity was rewarded with a somewhat soft looking penalty, not that many at the JobServe were complaining. Good work from Noah Chilvers cutting in from the right saw him try a set-up a neat one two with Wiredu in the box. As Wiredu flicked it on, albeit too high really, he fell like a sack of spuds. I’ll be honest, I didn’t see anything at the time, and even watching the highlights it was only the faintest of touches from defender Donervon Daniels, but it was enough for referee Dean Whitestone to point to the spot.
With sixteen goals already, there was never going to be any debate about who would take the goal, so up stepped Freddie Sears. For the briefest of moments I was in despair, with Carl Rushworth going the right way for Freddie’s spot-kick, but although he got a firm hand to it, the ball bobbled, spun loose, and ended up looping over the prone goalkeeper and into the corner of the net for number 17 — PHEW!
For the final half an hour both sides had a real go at trying to grab the winner, with Monthe in particular going very close when he fired over from close range after another goalmouth scramble. Not that the U’s didn’t create their own chances though. Chilvers narrowly missed the target with only Rushworth to beat, and a few moments later nearly atoned for the mistake, only this time to be denied by the legs of Rushworth — and thus the match finished honours even for our last home game of the season. Not the win we’d wanted, but a decent game nonetheless, and of course a welcome opportunity to meet up with family.
Colchester United 2 (Freddie Sears 24’, 56’p) Walsall 2 (Brendan Kiernan 39’; George Miller 48’)
Our final match of the season, the following Sunday at Hartlepool United, saw the U’s victorious winning 2-0 to leap frog a whole bunch of teams in lower mid-table (including Walsall) to finish in 15th place. Oldham and Scunthorpe (the latter confirmed several months earlier) were relegated to the National League, with FGR, Exeter, Bristol City and via the play-offs Connor Hall’s Port Vale promoted.
The YouTube highlights reel is still available for viewing.
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