Around the National League

Another couple of interesting results in the National League tonight. Like us, Wealdstone have now won five on the bounce to sit 2 points behind us with an extra game played. A late goal at Halifax was enough although the home team were down to nine men at that stage after playing with 10 since the third minute.

Dagenham also beat Boreham Wood, our opponents on Saturday by the only goal in the game with Tshimanga having his shot from a penalty saved.

Unfortunately we are one of the few games off tonight so an opportunity for the teams below us to catch up. Games to watch tonight are Sutton, home to Dagenham, Wealdstone away to Eastleigh and Maidenhead away to Aldershot. Stockport don’t play tonight.

It is actually a quiet November after a busy October, tonight would have been our only midweek game and we also don’t play on the last Saturday of the month as our opponents, Dagenham are through to the second round of the FA Cup. This means the Halifax game on Saturday is our only game during the second half of the month. 6 league games in December plus the FA Trophy match.

Sutton kicked off earlier tonight and have managed a 1-1 draw with Dagenham so 3 points behind us with a game in hand, their goal difference is three worse than ours so all in all a good result.

You would have thought that, with covid threatening to truncate this season as well, the National League would be making an effort to create rearranged fixtures on the cup dates between teams which have been knocked out.

For instance, the home matches against Aldershot or Hartlepool, or perhaps a few others, could easily have been brought forward to 28 November.

No real pattern to judge who will pose a threat or be able to maintain a challenge.
Its a pretty strange season with so many unpredictable results and teams who were expected to be really strong just stumbling along struggling for form and results.
When you consider how tough and competitive Yeovil Town were last season and who have yet to win a game it makes you wonder whats really going on and how certain clubs have been affected by the Covid crisis.
Very apparent that our club were indeed well prepared to tackle any issues to go forward positively.
One man created that positively and there's no one better at motivating players. Still feel we are very fortunate to have GJ at the helm.

I see also today that the EFL has just announced that "five" substitutes will now be for the rest of this season.
Not sure if this will filter down to us in the NFL but I would imagine would be sure to benefit the bigger clubs with stronger and deeper squads.
Talk also of return for fans by Christmas though personally I think that sounds a bit premature.

Not been impressed by Wealdstone so far, would hope for 3 points on that showing when we play them next.