This match seemed like two teams with nothing to play for. A look at the league table would suggest that's the case, but surely with new managers in charge at both clubs, both sets of players should have wanted to impress. And with the big changes going on at Huish Park, Yeovil fans in particular could have expected more from this evening.
Driving home from the game I had plenty of time to consider the angle for this report. One idea that was soon discarded was to write a sarcastic report, about how exciting it all was. Well, it seems that the PA reporter for sports.com had the same idea. Unlike almost everyone else, he seemed to think it was all rather impressive. [ PA report ].
Yeovil's first effort came after six minutes, from the tried and trusted throw-in flicked on at the near post, featuring Jamie Pitman and Paul Steele. This time it went nicely to Warren Patmore, but his header was deflected away for a corner. A few minutes the home side had their first attempt of note. Pluck's good cross to the far post was met by Forbes, who put his header well wide.
One worry early on was that Danny Hockton might get the better of Anthony Tonkin. I suppose that he did to an extent, but more trouble was caused initially on the other side, where the experienced Dave Piper was given a few sticky moments by the excellent Dean Martin (no, not that Dean Martin). He beat the defender all ends up, but when Carl Alford was in the middle screaming for the cross, he shot at the near post, giving no great difficulty to Yeovil keeper Tony Pennock.
Warren Patmore seemed surprised that a ball into the area found his feet, perhaps because the Boro defenders should have dealt with it. Wazza took his time, controlled the ball, and launched it over the bar. Although this was apparently an easy chance missed, Warren was mostly having a good game tonight. Yeovil's main line of attack in the first half was for Jamie Pitman to launch it to Wazza, and he won more of these balls than in the last few games put together, but the support wasn't always there to create much from it.
Disappointingly, Yeovil weren't using the width of the park as well as the home side, or as well as they had done in most recent games, and this continued throughout the match. Lindegaard didn't get involved as much as he might, and Glen Poole (playing on the left instead of Matt Hale) frequently found himself having to come into the centre of the park, and then having trouble with the lack of right foot.
Stevenage should have taken the lead right on half time, as Tony Pennock came out to punch a corner clear, and missed it by a country mile. Carl Alford was on hand to hook it over the bar. It's difficult to argue with the number of goals he gets, but the Fat Boy is rarely effective against Yeovil, for some reason.
After the break, Yeovil perhaps saw more of the ball, but still carved out few clear-cut chances. Wazza again showed something that I've maintained for a while: He's the best crosser of the ball in the team. He knocked a super ball over from the left onto the head of Dean Chandler, but the defender didn't time his jump quite right, and headed the ball over the bar.
Yeovil looked better when Rob Cousins replaced Glen Poole, though the lack of width was then even more prominent. As the Yeovil possession was in the middle, it made sense to have someone of Cousins' ability in there. The clearest chance of the game fell to Barrington Belgrave. He did well to shake off the attentions of two defenders as he broke clear, but then with only keeper Taylor to beat, he fired over the bar.
So, neither side were any great shakes. My first half notes were extensive, perhaps giving some credence to the sports.com report's claims of this being a chance filled game, but a closer look at those notes revealed that in none of those did either team really go close to scoring, so one's memory of it being a justified 0-0 seem about right.
A certain Yeovil fan who shall remain nameless shouted at Mark Smith rather too frequently "you're not very good". This was unfair. Not because Smith wasn't poor (he wasn't as great as some report, in my opinion), but because few others were significantly better. Mind you, if Yeovil had put away a couple of the clear chances, we'd probably have come away happy. We're fickle like that ;-)
Results and updated table
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