Well what a week for the stripes. After the awful home performances against Boreham Wood and then the FA Cup game against Gosport Borough, City travelled to Gosport for the replay on the Tuesday and lost. So a potential money spinning cup run was thrown away as City's terrible recent form continued.
Cue forum melt down (well melt down of sorts, this is Bath City, it is a maximum of 100 or so posters not millions!) and shouts for the managers head, chairwomans head, the whole boards heads and whoever decided to stop making powdered Bovril (that might just be me...) But it appeared as if nothing further was to happen as the days ticked on, and no announcements were made. However, as I was getting ready to leave work on Friday afternoon I find out Adie Britton had stopped being manager of City, moving to be Director of Football Development, with Lee Howells stepping up from Assistant to Manager with Jim Rollo helping out on the coaching side. Couple this with the announcement that top scorer Kurtis Guthrie was to leave the club and it was a hectic week!
For all the awfulness of last season, and the recent run of poor form this, it should not be forgotten how much Adie has done in his time at City. The club rose two leagues from the Southern League to the Conference National, beat Grimsby away, and generally has been an all round lovely, knowledgeable, intelligent man who has answered questions openly and honestly. Hopefully he will continue to be an asset to the club from his new position.
Onto the game, on national non league day, the stripes were playing Hayes and Yeading United who were relegated with City last season. With Guthrie having left, and Griffin being injured Sean Canham started up front on his own, Harry Hooman (on loan from Cheltenham Town) made his debut at centre back, and for reasons unknown to me, or frankly anyone, Gethin Jones started at right full back.
Within 7 minutes the folly of this decision was exposed when Gethin allowed H&Y's number 11 DanWishart acres of space to put a cross into the which was tapped home by Williams. Wishart was to have a superb game, and ran Jones ragged the City stalwart having absolutely no answer to him, and being beaten time and time again.
H&Y continued attacking well, but slightly against the run of play City equalised, Sean Canham nodded the ball back to Connolly, his shot cannoned off the underside of the bar, but didn't cross the line, however, good following up from Chris Allen allowed the midfielder to bundle the ball home.
H&Y definitely had the better of the play in this period, although a well worked move by City showed the football they can be capable of, and Canham will be disappointed with the soft effort he had at the end of it. Morgan was on the end of a fairly reckless tackle at one point in the game, that had a few calling for a red, but I have been informed by people in a better position than me, that it wasn't a red.
H&Y took the lead again with a carbon copy of their first, Wishart went past Gethin like he wasn't there, and delivered a cross which was met by unmarked Anderson who fired home. The stripes really need to get to grips with the defensive side of the game, as we are currently giving away too many soft goals.
However, Bath City responded and equalised before the half was up, when a good cross by Brown was met with a diving header by Sean Canham which smashed into the post and ended up in the net.
During the first half, one lone fan unfurled a banner which read "Britton + Rigby out" whether he had painted this before Adie quit I do not know, however, I assume that was the case! But fair play to him for having the conviction to show his anger at the ground.
The main notes from the second half, Glyn Garner pulled off a superb save when a powerfully struck freekick curved massively after Garner had shifted his weight, nevertheless Garner managed to get a hand to the ball and push it over the bar. The other main point is that City attacked better in the second half, and for a large swathe of it were the dominate side.
However, all of this is irrelevant when the last 2 minutes are taken into account, a long ball was played towards the City box, Wishart chased the ball, but was met with a perfectly timed tackle by Hooman (it was perfectly timed, I saw Palmers video footage) but incredibly the referee pointed to the spot. The inevitable happened and the penalty was converted, meaning City lost a game that the least they deserved was a draw. Upon the final whistle H&Y's number 4 celebrated like he had won the World Cup, that I think Josh Low noted as he had words with the player, while some fans had a few words for him as well.
So another loss for the stripes, but they did look like scoring, which is better than recent weeks, but my God Charlie Griffin needs to get fit soon and a morale boosting win is desperately, desperately needed.
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