Scunthorpe United v Wolverhampton

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Football League Championship

Scunthorpe United :
Murphy, Byrne (McCann 56), Crosby, Martis, Williams, Sparrow, Cork, Morris, Hurst (Forte 49), Paterson, Hayes (May 56)
Subs not used:
Lillis, Butler

Wolverhampton :
Hennessey, Foley, Darren Ward, Neill Collins, Gray (Rob Edwards 57), Jarvis, Henry, David Edwards, Elliott, Keogh, Ebanks-Blake (Stephen Ward 88)
Subs not used:
Stack, Potter, Eastwood

SULSESC REPORT

by Andy Skeels at Glanford Park

BARNSLEY at home was the final straw for me, the Tykes’ equaliser deep into stoppage time being the moment when I gave up all hope of us still being a Championship club come August.

Since then, two more defeats have been added to the L column in the league table, which doesn’t exactly give us renewed cause for optimism.

To make matters worse, in contrast to the previous week’s decent effort at Southampton, this latest setback was entirely deserved as United produced their poorest display in many weeks.

Wolves should have had a hatful and we wouldn’t have had too much cause for complaint had the visitors scored five or six.

A rare error from Joe Murphy, who let Edwards’ low shot go under his body and into the net, gave Mick McCarthy’s men an eighth minute lead and the match was as good as over just 45 seconds into the second- half when new signing Ebanks-Blake raced clear to thump in the second. Ironically, United had had a half chance to equalise straight from the kick-off after the restart, only to see Wolves go straight up the other end and double their lead.

To be fair, the Iron did create chances throughout the match, Ian Morris and Andy Crosby both missing good opportunities in the first period. But if you don’t take your chances, you won’t win; and sadly, that has been an all too familiar tale for the last four months at Glanford Park where, over the course of the last 11 games, we’ve picked up just five points. If that’s not relegation form, I don’t know what is.

The report on the BBC website perhaps summed it up best, saying ‘Wolves dominated a poor Scunthorpe side’, while head honcho Adkins was left to ponder afterwards on our need for seven wins from the last 18 games.

Seeing as we’ve managed only six from 28 so far, it’s going to be a very tall order…