A quick review - A game in which Orient flew out of the blocks like an asthmatic man with a limp, we found ourselves 2-0 down before actually touching the ball. Ok a slight exaggeration, but it's been a while since Orient were completely outplayed like they were in the first half hour of the game.
Again the defending left a lot to be desired. Sawyer did little to prevent the shot from Baldock to come in for the first, a free header for the second which seemed to go through Odubajo who was stood on the far post and the less said about the third the better.
In between the goals conceded, once we finally did get going after 45 minutes, we did look reasonably good going forward. Lisbie followed in well to snatch a goal back, and only stoic defending from Bristol City prevented an equaliser going in. As Slade said after the game, at 2-1 the next goal was the important one, and we failed to get it. The 3rd took the sting out of the attack afterwards and despite plenty of effort, no clear cut chances were created.
Man of the match - Not many candidates again for this one sadly. Baudry seemed the only one intent on actually playing football in the first half, playing some nice balls forward but even that fell apart in the second half. Lisbie was excellent up front, held the ball up well and took his chance well. Cox's delivery was pretty good but apart from that it was a very disappointing performance. The defence was very shaky, probably not helped by the perfromance by Jalal in goal and the midfield was struggling to pick up any second ball.
What next? - Preston North End. Having made a pig's ear of the games in hand, it's important we pick up a result here to avoid us getting sucked into the race for the play-offs behind. It'll be interesting to see which line-up Slade will go with. What's important is that we get Omozusi back as soon as possible. He's arguably been our best player this season, and against pacy wingers, he's a class above Sawyer, as was evidenced with Baldock last night. The 'keeper situation also needs sorting and it seems there's already a queue of people ready to drive up to Hull to go and pick Jakupovic up. With Jalal's confidence already shot to pieces, it will be interesting to see if Slade goes with Larkins. He may still be inexperienced, but there's not many goalkeepers who will make their 2nd career appearance in front of a crowd of over 28,000 and perform as well as he did. We can at least console ourselves with the fact that we'll do a job to play worse than we did yesterday.
Up the O's!
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