Day 236

After thinking it through, I decided to play Chris Shuker on the left wing. It’s incredibly bad luck that every one of my four specialist left wingers is injured—Olembé, Laurant, Russell, and even reserve player Nicky Nicolau. I considered going with John Nutter, but I felt we’d be stronger with Toumani Diagouraga coming into central midfield and Chris Birchall sliding out to the right wing. There were still major question marks over Diagouraga’s fitness, following his recent injury, but I put the ball-winning midfielder in for his debut anyway.

Ben May replaced Omar Koroma up front, again. I really hope this is Koroma’s last injury. We need him. Meanwhile Samba Kanouté returned at right back; Bore dropped to the bench. Jean-François Christophe made the bench, too, in line for an appearance for the first time since he was carried off on a stretcher against York six weeks ago (which itself came after a two-month injury lay-off and month of training).

The troubles we’ve had speak to the importance of my decision to strengthen and expand the squad. I shudder to think how badly we’d be going in the midst of these injuries with the shallow squad depth I inherited at the start of the season.

Alfreton started the more menacing of the two sides. They got three shots off in the opening fifteen minutes—to our zero—and even hit the bar once. I tweaked our tactics in an attempt to grab more of the possession and take control of the game.

Out of nowhere, in the 33rd minute, Barnes-Homer scored. It was excellent team play—a simple triangle of passes, from Diagouraga to Woods to Barnes-Homer—and a composed finish. We didn’t deserve the goal, but I wasn’t going to give up the lead. We kept pushing forward, searching for the magic ingredient that makes us click without Koroma or a specialist left winger.

At half time, things were still tense. Ben May was having a poor game. I tried making him a target man to get the big striker more involved. Michael Woods was carrying us in the midfield, but he was also carrying an injury; I worried that he could not go on much longer.

I subbed Diagouraga off for Alan Power in the 54th minute. He’d struggled on his debut, but he had an instrumental role in our goal. Power was meant to bring more control to the midfield, which needed to keep the ball better.

May continued to look anonymous out there, so I swapped him for Laurent after an hour. Peter Bore also came, with Birchall—who was having a quiet game on the right flank—moving to his preferred central role. We improved right away. Birchall and Power started pulling the strings in midfield, while Laurent did his best to play Koroma’s role as a roaming last man.

Alfreton continued to knock on the door, however, forcing good saves from Putnins and right back Samba Kanouté. There’d be a nervous finish if we couldn’t kill them off.

It’s a good thing, then, that Barnes-Homer scored his second in the 88th minute. A brilliant long ball along the right wing from Kanouté set Laurent off on a run. Closed off at the byline, he passed short to Bore. Barnes-Homer met Bore’s cross with a diving header that was too good for the Alfreton keeper, assuring our victory with two minutes to spare.

It was a disappointing performance on the whole (owing in part to the wet conditions, I expect), but we got the three points and a clean sheet. That puts us one step closer to the title crown. Highlights were solid performances from Barnes-Homer and Kanouté, good defensive rallying in the second half, and a few miscellaneous passes from Birchall and Diagouraga over the course of the game.

Michael Woods will be out for a week following a gashed arm suffered early in the match. He’s likely to miss both the next match against Southport and the following one at Fleetwood.