First the good news. We managed a point to stop the rot and avoid a record sixth successive League One defeat. None of the five bottom sides managed to make any ground on us either.
The not-so-good news was that it was another home performance without creating an effort on target. Sunderland dominated possession for long spells and should have been ahead at half-time but they wasting several great aerial chances and Craig MacGillivray made a couple of decent saves.
After the break we saw more of the ball but our chances were limited to a couple of headers, the best of which saw Lavelle narrowly miss the near post from a corner. Jayden Stockley might have stole it at the death when he drifted clear of the backline but fluffed his volley.
Other than that, Jackson persisted with his 3-5-2 formation even though we don't have the personnel to play it and in practice it was a 5-3-2. The clean sheet was hard earned given Pearce and Gunter were together in the nominal back three with Lavelle. Jaiyesimi and Purrington hardly got across the halfway line and it was left to Fraser, Dobson and Lee to be creative. Fraser had moments but is clearly still not fit and was eventually subbed for Gilbey. Dobson toiled hard again and earned his wages but Lee was a disappointment once more.
Stockley did his best work in defence and Burstow again huffed and puffed but saw little of the ball and had limited support when he did see it.
I think we should be able to beat hopeless Gillingham at the Valley shortly (they were beaten 3-0 at home today by Bolton) and a victory over Burton and/or Morecombe with a couple of draws should be enough to secure our League One status for next season.
Away from the match, those marketing geniuses over-seeing the distribution of targeted complimentary tickets for home matches as part of the increasingly naive Fill The Valley initiative also managed to anger paying supporters today when it became apparent that bundles of tickets are simply being handed out from a food outlet in Plumstead. It appears to be making little difference, however, as the gate today was 13,000 which included nearly three thousand visitors on top of 9,000 already paid season tickets. The season ticket offer for next year is going to have to be far better thought-through if we aren't to see a fair sized drop in renewals as increasing numbers of supporters now deem it poor value-for-money (apart from the poor football). If the club doesn't get a grip soon, Fill The Valley could turn into Empty The Valley. It really is a mess and should have been sorted out before now.
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