Notts County December 2010

Here we go again my friends, the story continues! After the fabulous triumph against Liverpool in the Carling Cup we had to keep our feet on the ground and work hard to earn promotion to Coca-Cola Championship.

The first game of the month was away at 7th placed Milwall, a solid team. We had some problems in the middle of our defense, Martis was away on international duty and Muniesa was suspended for the game. We started the game well, put Milwall‘s defense under pressure, and Tomas Pekhart converted that pressure into the 1-0 lead. Milwall got back level only 12 minutes later, they scored with a fantastic free kick effort from 30 yards out. Midfielder Matt James settled things again with a nice shot from the edge of the area, in off the post! Szalai completed a good first half with a powerful header, that allowed us to have fun and relax in the second half.

We had another away game coming up, at 6th placed Colchester. We dominated the first half but missed a couple of good chances to score. We got lucky in the second half, one of Colchester‘s defenders handballed in the box and gave us the perfect opportunity to score. Sburlea didn’t miss the penalty kick, we were in control. Things turned bad in the 76th minute, Tinga got sent off for an unnecessary vicious foul in midfield and Colchester started to put us under pressure. We nearly got away with the three points but it wasn’t to be…

Next up, a home game with 14th placed Walsall, we had to win it. And we didn’t have much trouble, midfielder Giampiero Pinzi scored two identical goals in ten minutes, both goals from corner kicks. He was left free as a bird inside the box and he volleyed the ball home twice! And that was it, we missed another few chances but Walsall never looked capable of causing any problems.

The next game was the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy semi final, away at Hartlepool. We defeated them 3-1 in the League One game in October, I hoped to achieve the same result again. Pekhart opened the show with a fabulous shot from the edge of the area, in off the post! Tinga earned forgiveness for that red card with a thunderous drive from 30 yards out just before the break, we were in control. Nikita Andreev fired another missile in the second half and the scoring stopped there but it could have gone a lot worse for poor Hartlepool :)

Back to League One, the next game was away at 13th placed Carlisle. Our opponents played pretty well in the first half but we punished them twice on counter attacks. We dominated the second half and I had a good reason to be happy, right winger Kamil Grosicki finally scored his first goal for the club!

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