The rewilding of the Shrews, Port Vale hit the top, Carlisle hit rock bottom
14 October 2024 | Weekend Notes brings you the biggest stories, stats and insights from the EFL weekend.
● BIG STORIES ● CHEAT SHEET ● 5IVELIGHTS ● THE VIEW FROM ● FANTASY FOOTBALL ● WATCHING BRIEF ●
Is your glass one-third full or two-thirds empty?
There’s no hiding the fact that the glass isn’t full. The second international break of the season has shrivelled our docket somewhat.
However, we still had 12 EFL fixtures this weekend, which is two more than armchair Premier League fans get in a regular gameweek. The absence of the Championship and large swathes of League One also gives us an opportunity to shine a light on the likes of Shrewsbury, Port Vale and AFC Wimbledon. Finally, we have a ‘state of the nation’ Monday pod to look forward to (one of my favourite types of Monday pod).
If your glass is two-thirds empty, then it’s about to be one-third full.
Welcome to Weekend Notes.
🚨 Big Stories
A selection of decisive moments from across the EFL.
🕺 SEVEN! (goals per game) — Crawley 3-5 Shrewsbury, Peterborough 3-3 Rotherham — Having seen their side score 8 goals in their first 10 league games, even the most optimistic Shrew wouldn’t have backed them to hit 5 at Crawley. And yet, helped by a red card, a penalty and a goalkeeper finishing the game on one leg, that’s what they did. One team’s first away win since early March is another team’s 6th consecutive defeat in all competitions, however, with Rob Elliot overseeing Crawley’s last three. At Peterborough, two Rotherham returns brought equally predictable results: a booking for Steve Evans and a goal for Jonson Clarke-Harris, before the latter went off injured with the Millers 3-1 up at the break. Posh scored from two wicked Jack Sparkes corner deliveries to claim a point.
🎶 Moore, Moore, Moore! — MK Dons 0-1 Port Vale — Following an impeccable minute’s silence for former MK youth product George Baldock, who tragically passed away last week at the age of 31, it was fitting that a young wing-back made the headlines… even if he was playing for Port Vale. A sumptuous cross from 17-year-old Jack Shorrock was converted by Antwoine Hackford to send Darren Moore’s Valiants top of the league. Back-to-back 1-0 wins away at Notts County and MK Dons are eye-catching results, but Vale are actually unbeaten in all competitions since the end of August, and they’ve won 5 of their last 7 league games. Their stuttering start is firmly in the past.
🏡 Honey, I’m home! — AFC Wimbledon 4-0 Carlisle — After four weeks without a home game, when they beat Mike Williamson’s MK Dons 3-0, Wimbledon returned to Plough Lane and beat Mike Williamson’s Carlisle 4-0. No need to make it personal, lads. A 50-minute hat-trick from Matty Stevens (hereby known as Hatty Stevens) put the Cumbrians to the sword, while the new-look back three were solid, Ali Smith controlled the game from the base of midfield and James Tilley was a constant menace on the wing. Carlisle, promoted from this division less than 18 months ago, are now propping up the EFL – Ali Maxwell dives into that debacle below…
🍷 Bottoms up! — Barrow 0-1 Morecambe, Gillingham 1-2 Accrington — As we approach the season’s quarter-mark, the 2024/25 iteration of League Two is shaping up to be one of the tightest in years. Six teams already have ended a gameweek in 1st, and it feels as though anyone can beat anyone – or lose to anyone. This weekend, 3rd-placed Barrow (3rd going into it) and Gillingham (2nd) lost at home to Morecambe (24th) and Accrington Stanley (23rd). Write off Derek Adams’ Shrimps at your peril: this was their first league win of the season, and their first clean sheet since March 5th, but it’s been coming. Accy have won two in two, having gone through all of August and September without a victory in any competition, and exit the dropzone as a result.
📊 Monday Morning Cheat Sheet
From the WhatsApp group to the watercooler: stats to keep you ahead of the game.
🔢 PPG, easy as 1-2-3… 10 — The only team hitting two points per game in League Two this season are 10th in the table: AFC Wimbledon, three matches behind most teams due to soggy postponements.
🏰 A Womble’s home is his castle — On that note, Wimbledon have won their last 6 league matches at Plough Lane by an aggregate score of 18-3; the last time they won 6 consecutive league home games was in the Conference South in 2008, when ‘home’ meant Kingsmeadow.
🧃 Five, alive — Winning 5-3 at Crawley marked the first time in 13 years that Shrewsbury have scored five goals in a league away fixture – the season starts here…
👨🍳 Letting him Cook — Andy Cook has scored 14 goals in 20 Bradford appearances against Tranmere, Walsall and Mansfield, the three clubs he previously represented in the EFL (though it’s ‘only’ 18 in 40 if you include Barrow and Grimsby, his former employers in non-league).
⛔ MK denied No.25 — After scoring in their last 24 home league games, MK Dons finally drew a blank hosting Port Vale, ending a run that stretched back to October last year.
🪶 Magnificent Magpies — David McGoldrick’s stoppage-time equaliser against Chesterfield made Notts County the first team in the Football League or Premier League to have two players on 5+ goals for the season; Alassana Jatta had scored his 5th earlier in the same game.
🚍 Marauding Mariners — Grimsby have won 3 league away games in a row, having won just 2 of their 28 before that… and one of those was against Salford, too.
🎾 Tiebreak time — The score is now 6-6 in Rotherham United Wins vs Steve Evans Bookings this season, with the Millers manager’s mardiness making for an all-time classic encounter.
🎦 5ivelights
In no particular order, a collection of our favourite goals or clips from across the 72.
Presenting: the perfect assist, courtesy of Valiant 17-year-old Jack Shorrock
You go Conway, I’ll go the other… not a bad way to score your first senior goal
Save of the Week is sewn up as Jed Steers a header wide
Leaving Jack Sparkes sparko – that man has a family, Mallik
Notts County fans found guilty of stealing Chesterfield’s roar (sound up)
The View From…
Carlisle: Teething issues or major problems?
Watching Wimbledon beat Carlisle 4-0 at Plough Lane on Saturday, there was no lack of positive, Dons-centric narratives: a newly mended pitch, a sixth straight home league win, a Matty Stevens hat-trick and a clean sheet despite the presence of a midfielder at CB (James Ball) and two very attack-minded wing-backs (James Tilley and Josh Neufville).
But throughout the game, and since, I couldn’t and can’t stop thinking about Carlisle. I was genuinely angry on behalf of the travelling fans — some 700+ traversed 300+ miles to get there, only to watch their team whimper their way to a heavy defeat and consequently reach rock bottom: 24th in League Two. There was no jeopardy in the game at all, because it was a complete mismatch on a tactical level and a physical level. At times, it felt like a pre-season game between teams in different divisions.
There is important context to, and caveats for, Carlisle’s failings. A match involves two teams, and Wimbledon are good. Settled. Big. Strong. Great shape. Great press. Set-piece threat. Omar Bugiel an absolute demon up front. And Carlisle are missing around 10 first-team players through injury.
Still, Wimbledon didn’t have to work particularly hard to score. In fact, they scored with their first shot: a header from a corner on 8 minutes that skidded in from 13 yards. Then Stevens tapped home the rebound after an Alistair Smith long shot was pushed straight to him, and it was 3-0 by half-time thanks to another corner bouncing in off United defender Cameron Harper. Stevens had his hat-trick five minutes after half-time, nodding in at the back stick during the second phase of another corner.
Carlisle attempted 672 passes. Their efforts yielded three shots and 0.07 xG. It seemed to be requiring a huge effort from them just to progress the ball into Wimbledon’s half. With regularity, Dons stole the ball in Carlisle’s half, either by intercepting it or by simply tackling the player with it. And, when the visitors did get into the attacking third, there was no coherent plan for creating a chance.
Carlisle had very little about them. The away end boos were understandable, and Mike Williamson took no issue. Panic buttons have been smashed. Alarms are ringing.
But from here, the only way is up, right? Well, let’s examine the issues and see if they are fixable.
At the moment, every set piece feels like a big chance. That has to be sorted.
Harry Lewis is an issue in goal. Fbref has his save percentage at 47.7% this season, so more than half of the shots on target that Carlisle face are going into their net. His poor form stretches back 12 months, even before his arrival in January as a supposed upgrade on Tomáš Holý. But Carlisle’s other goalkeeping options are Gabriel Breeze (20), who has made four career league appearances, and Jude Smith (21), whose senior experience stretches to 25 league games for East Fife in the 2021/22 Scottish League One season.
There are issues in central defence. As a unit, they’re not yet comfortable enough with their massively increased responsibility in build-up. Plus, centre-backs are largely responsible for the defending of set pieces, so they’re not doing their job very well with the ball or without it. Aaron Hayden (injured) and Terell Thomas (away on international duty with St Lucia) may help the situation, but neither leap off the page as ‘Williamson type’ CBs.
The currently available midfield players also don’t seem a great fit. To play in central midfield in this sort of system, you have to be so comfortable receiving the ball in tight areas, with a defender on your back. You need to be able to control the ball with an opponent on your back, and know when to recycle and when to play forward. Furthermore, you must be able to do this consistently for 90 minutes, because any lapses cause huge issues.
Harrison Biggins played deepest in this game. To my eyes, he has always been at his most effective playing ahead of build-up as a box-crashing #8. Harrison Neal is a player I like for his work rate, tenacity and ball-winning ability, rather than his chops as a deep-lying playmaker. Josh Vela played, too, though it wasn’t entirely clear what his role was, and he’s also not a defensive midfield dictator.
Callum Guy will be better suited to this. His appearance off the bench here marked a return after 11 months out injured. Two other absentees, Ethan Robson and Dylan McGeouch, both seem more suited to the DM role as well, but neither appear to be close to a return.
The wing-backs, Archie Davies and Cameron Harper, have been among Carlisle’s best performers this season. In Williamson’s classic 3-2-4-1 formation, the wing-backs are normally about as attacking as they come, and need to provide goal contributions. Davies seems a solid all-rounder more than a super-attacking type. On the left side, Harper has plenty of quality in his left foot, but it seems likely that Jordan Jones will play there when fit. Perhaps Harper will thrive at LCB.
I would expect Williamson to want to play two players in #10 roles behind a striker. These should be smart, technical players who operate in the pockets, drifting into the seams of the defence. They should offer goal threat and/or creative ability. They are crucial in the execution phase. In theory, the defenders and midfielders progress the ball into the attacking zones and then it’s up to the #10s, the wing-backs and the striker to do the rest.
Carlisle don’t have a single player of this profile in the squad. 21 year-old loanee Dominic Sadi, who looks like a lively wide player, has been taking up one of these roles; he has something about him, for sure, and has probably been Carlisle’s biggest goal threat this season, but it’s a role he will have to learn on the job, rather than one that is likely to come naturally. Aside from Sadi, we’ve seen Vela play as a left-sided #10, without success.
We’ve also seen strikers Luke Armstrong and Charlie Wyke playing together, and playing separately. The front two aren’t a great fit for a team that needs many contributors to the possession-based style and is unlikely to cross all that often. I see Armstrong as being more able than Wyke to engage and disrupt outside the box, but he’s less reliable inside the box as a goalscorer, so what do you choose to prioritise? Right now I’d say Armstrong, because they’re not creating much for Wyke to convert anyway.
In my eyes, there’s an issue with the composition of Carlisle’s squad, and the style of play being implemented.
I’m finding it tough to pin the current issues on Williamson. He walked into a club that had lost 35 of its previous 52 league games. The squad has 10 absentees. And – crucially – even with everyone available, it isn’t a squad built to play the style of football they’ve recruited him to play.
People will see it as naive for the new manager to continue with a heavily possession-based style, but that is what his bosses have hired him to do. He has a clear, defined style of play. It’s led to success. In the same way, Steve Evans has a style of play that has led to success and clubs hire him because of it, and ask him to replicate it.
But this is a squad built for Paul Simpson. Dropping Mike Williamson in there is like hiring an Italian chef to cook in a kitchen stocked with Japanese produce. There’s a reason MK Dons hired Scott Lindsey rather than, say, Pete Wild.
Having come down from League One in the summer, Carlisle are now bottom of League Two. A reshape of the squad feels necessary in order to best suit Williamson’s style. But there are 12 more league games – more than a quarter of the campaign – until the transfer window opens, and the January window is tremendously terrible for quality and value. Williamson is going to have to work out what to do with this squad of players. That potentially means either adopting a different style (unusual for a coach) or a lot of awkward performances like this one.
If the fans don’t like the style of play – and it is a damned tough watch right now – and if they don’t believe in the long-term potential of the team, then their distaste will be continue to be loud. In turn, that will make it harder for the players to play without fear.
Williamson has been hired as a silver bullet, but the gun is being held by shaky hands.
🏆 Fantasy Football
Go head-to-head against team NTT20 in our EFL Fantasy Football league
In a weekend where intimate knowledge of League Two was highly valuable (and presumably a fair few managers forgot to select a team entirely) a middling score simply wouldn’t do…
Damn it. This weekend, as always, we owe a lot to the city of Bradford.
IanEvattable still tops the overall ranking, but Tenzo’s Troopers and Bigmikelufc97 were the gameweek’s champions.
📺 Watching Brief
Upcoming live EFL games
Thursday 17 October 2024
20:00 Shrewsbury v Exeter
Friday 18 October 2024
20:00 Leeds v Sheffield United
20:00 Newport County v Chesterfield
Saturday 19 October 2024
12:30 Cardiff v Plymouth Argyle
12:30 Luton v Watford
12:30 Oxford United v West Bromwich Albion
12:30 Preston v Coventry
12:30 Reading v Crawley
12:30 Wycombe v Peterborough
12:30 Accrington Stanley v Barrow
Sunday 20 October 2024
15:00 Hull v Sunderland
All EFL games will be shown live on Sky Sports Football or Sky Sports+