Wrexham:November 2011

Seasons Greetings from Canada as I bring you another update on my Wrexham story.

November kicked off with an away game to Dagenham & Redditch and our early pressure paid off with Fofana pouncing on Alex Smiths rebounded shot off the post to make it 1-0 just after 10 minutes. Fofana would then float the ball into the box from a set piece for Oliver Nicholas to head home and our lead was doubled five minutes later. With a good opportunity to make some serious damage we sat back on the 2-0 lead and  the lads seemed more content to defend than anything else. The home side could not break us down though and we added a well deserved third late in the game as Fofana scored again being first to react to a ball slipped into the box by Dolinajec.

It was time for our FA Cup 1^st Round encounter and a trip to face BSP side Southport. We easily had the measure of this team but again it turned out to be a frustrating afternoon in front of goal with chance after chance either being saved or going narrowly wide. How we never won this I don’t honestly know?

After a long break for international fixtures our next game was also away from home to Stockport. By the time the 90 minutes was over I was left scratching my head as to why we had 54% of the possession and could only muster 3 shots on goal.  Stockport got the only goal of the game in the second half when keeper Martin Hansen pushed away a crossed ball from the right but our defense was slower to react leaving the home side with an easy effort to take all three points.

Next up was our FA Cup replay against Southport and both loan strikers Modest and Asante had returned to their clubs. Before the free transfer deadline had expired I picked up another MC in Nathan Rooney to rotate with Williams and Gilmour as well as MR Owusu-Ansah who would both make their debuts. We absolutely dominated the game but could not get a decent cross into the box to save our lives and allowed Southport far more shots than they deserved and we were fortunate that they hit the woodwork twice. As it was a decent build up down the left found  ST David Nwaogu in the box and he slid it back to Rooney to hammer home for the winning goal on his debut. The victory set’s us up with a home tie against Notts County in the second round.

The following game was also an FA Cup match due to having the replay which saw us at home in front of a good crowd of almost 8,000. Notts County kept us under pressure for the entire first half with three attempts hitting the woodwork but somehow our luck held in tacked until the 49^th minute when we failed to clear a corner and the ball was scooped into the net.Some 15 minutes later a great run by Smith ended with a decent cross into the box and there was Fofana running in to stroke the ball home and make it 1-1. Five minutes later an in swinging corner by Williams was fumbled by the County keeper over his own line and we were in the lead. We held on for the remainder of the game and so enter the draw for the Third Round.

Two days later we were drawn away to Premier League side Burnley.

Our midweek encounter with Aldershot was also at the Racecourse Ground and after an entertaining but fruitless first half it was the usual Alex Smith cross but this time finding Baheng to score the opening goal early in the second half. An injury to Nicholas momentarily disrupted the defence and Aldershot found their equalizer some 10 minutes later to tie the game. It didn’t last long. A through ball by Williams found Fofana who did some trickery with his feet and swung the ball passed the keeper into the corner of the net. We added a third when Fofana muscled his way into getting possession and his cross was met by MR Nzuzi to head in the third. A very nice win and a valuable three points.

League Table

So a bit of an up and down month but we are still in the title race and I am delighted that we have reached the FA Cup Third Round.

December of course throws up it’s usual insane fixture list and we have no less than eight games to play including title challengers Southend and bitter rivals Shrewsbury.

It will be interesting to play Southend as I always found them a difficult opponent in FM2010 so we will see if anything has changed come the next update.

Thanks for reading everyone.