Peterborough United 2 v Charlton Athletic 1

Last night's disappointing performance and result against fellow promotion hopefuls, Peterborough United, was entirely predictable. We all know we are struggling to put out a side capable of winning more games than we lose at the moment. That's a result of injuries and salary cap regulations which means our ability to improve our squad is limited, so it is going to take time to significantly strengthen what we have. What we should be able to do, however, is manage our players in such a way as to ensure we get the best we can from those we have available and, for me, that is not happening.

The side we started with last night wasn't the strongest available to us. Accordingly, our game plan, wasn't as positive as it could be and our substitutions were mismanaged and cost us three points. All of this sits with Lee Bowyer. I will say now that I remain fully behind the manager. His record stands for itself and I believe he can take the club forward. This may all be part of the learning process but he has to learn but there are worrying signs that current lessons aren't sinking in.

Peterborough have a strong home record and score plenty of goals. We have shown repeatedly since the loss of Inniss and Famewo that we struggle to defend for any length of time without conceding goals. Faced with that fact, we need to ensure we have the strongest attacking frontline and a midfield capable of relieving pressure on our defence and supporting the strikeforce. Too many times in the last few months we simply haven't done that and we did it again yesterday.

It is blatantly obvious to anyone with an ounce of insight that Omar Bogle is not a goal-scorer. More clear still is that he appears to have very limited technical ability and when he is in the side we struggle very badly upfront. That's not an opinion, it's a fact. He was brought in because he was available to us (at the time and for the budget) and looked like Chuks Anneke Mark 2 which would hopefully allow us to rest one of them at all times. The problem is that the likeness ended at their physical size and appearance. When he was hauled off after 32 minutes the other week, I thought Bowyer had finally had enough and had realised that he simply doesn't offer enough to the side to help us win games. The priority signature of Ronnie Schwartz also signalled that Bogle was on his way out. Sadly, he has continued to get minutes, albeit as a sub most recently but we started with him last night with Anneke on the bench. It was no surprise to me then that we had no attempts on goal last night whilst Bogle was the focal point of our attacking ambition. 

The penalty we scored after 14 minutes should have given us a platform to score again and go on to win the game but we didn't have the ambition or the personnel on the pitch. Instead, we settled back content to manage the game and did that well enough to half-time. Deji Oshilaja was having a fine game at the back but I was annoyed we hadn't kept the same back four that did so well at Bristol Rovers on Saturday. Maatsen, Ohsilaja, Gunter and Matthews had kept a rare clean sheet, why drop Matthews and bring back Pearce so quickly when we have been shipping goals with him in the backline?

It was fairly obvious that Darren Ferguson was going to change things in the second-half and he did. Burrows came on after 58 minutes and Brown on 64 minutes. Posh were clearly upping the ante and we were retreating further into our shells. The equaliser was coming but when it did, it was down very simply to a communications error between Oshilaja and Pearce both going for the same bouncing ball. A shout was all it needed but it didn't come. Oshilaja might have feared the worst with Pearce having made a horlicks of a similar ball the other week and decided to try and avert the danger himself but it all went wrong and Szmodics was left free to beat Amos.

What we needed at that point was to take the game back to our hosts and give ourselves the chance to score another goal. It was clear Anneke was needed. Millar had been doing well and Forster-Caskey, Saturday's other man-of-the-match, was also strong in the middle. Fresh legs were needed but why make a three player change at once? Anneke and Schwartz were a no-brainer but why also change a well performing Forster-Caskey. Before those three found their feet, Posh got a second and it was Forster-Caskey's replacement, Andrew Shinnie, who was complicit in the goal.

After that we were chasing the game but Peterborough did what we fail to do so often when we are front. They kept going forward and came closer to a third than we did to an equaliser. Szmodics should have got a hat-trick but Ben Amos made a stop he had no right to and which went some way to atone for the second that he might have done better with.

As the clock ran down, Bowyer then did something I can't forgive. He brought Gilbey on. Gilbey has struggled since joining us. He has had injuries but when he has been on he simply hasn't done well enough. With no shortage of similar midfield players, Gilbey has stood out in recent weeks for not standing out. In his last two games he hardly touched the ball and should have been dropped before he was. Bowyer rightly called him out in my mind and I said he should only come back into the side if he could demonstrate a determination to compete and add something. In my mind, that wouldn't have been for weeks. He needed to understand he had lost his place and to come back we had to see a clear change. Instead, he was thrown on last and once again showed nothing. 

It's simply too easy to be part of this squad and take your turn on rotation. It's no surprise then that some players aren't giving their all or are playing despite better players being available on the bench. Until that changes, we can't expect to start winning more games than we lose.