Altrincham FC manager Lee Sinnott will be giving us the inside track on the Robins’ return to the Conference. Here’s his latest column for Altrincham Today.
Saturday’s draw against Dover means that we have now reached 30 points in the Vanarama Conference, which is another 10-point milestone that I am pleased that we have accumulated before Christmas.
When you equalise with just 30 seconds of added time left, you have to be happy with a point, but things might have been different if we had managed to score the opening goal in the first half, which we were in control of, but we didn’t generally quite get our fluid passing game going at the right tempo and that enabled the opposition to deny us space and close us down.
There were one or two occasions where we asked a few more questions of them defensively and there were signs that they were beginning to creak a bit but we didn’t manage to turn those pieces of good play into clear-cut opportunities.
Chris Kinnear has put together a big strong, well organised and disciplined team together and they do what they do very well, working their plan and making it difficult for the opposition to score. That was their 12th game without defeat and I wish them all the best on January 4th when they take on Crystal Palace, one of the clubs that I played for, in the FA Cup 3rd Round – a game that will be screened live on BT Sport.
Below: Highlights from the draw against Dover
In the second half of Saturday’s game, we went behind to a very unfortunate goal, when a shot has looped up off Shaun Densmore and drifted over Dave Parton’s head, but that opened the game up a bit and made it a better spectacle for spectators. I got a good view of Ryan Crowther’s worldie of a strike that gave us an equaliser, although he may well have meant it as a cross. Very unfortunately, we conceded again to another deflection and it looked like we were to be denied until James Lawrie popped up with another really good long range shot in the final minute of the game.
The league schedule over Christmas and New Year gives all clubs four games in 10 days and like every other team, we will need to use our squad carefully to get through that. People love their football at Christmas, but it can be a big ask for footballers.
I’m sure that we will have a big turnout of fans at Chester on Boxing Day and for our home game against Nuneaton on Sunday (both games kick off at 3pm). I said that we would roll the dice this season and see where that took us and I am very interested to see where we can go from here. I have a lot of faith in this group of players… they are a great set of lads.
Whilst we may add one or two new faces in January to strengthen the squad, the players have shown over the last couple of months that they are up to the higher standards of this league.
I hope that all Alty fans have a wonderful Christmas and that the team can make it even more enjoyable by getting good results in the two games between Christmas and New Year.
