Macclesfield
Martin
Abbey
Ridler
Tinson
Adams
Byrne
Priest
Keen
Lambert
Lightbourne
Glover

The Swans line up for this clash was pretty much as expected. Steve Brodie returned to the side following his absence at Oxford last week, to form part of a three man midfield with Cusack and Coates. Williams and Watkin made up the front two, Evans and Howard performed the wing back roles, with the centre of defence occupied by the now familiar trio of Mumford, O'Leary and Sharp. Testimonial man Freestone was, of course, between the sticks.

There were some comforting words from Colin Addison following this disappointing result. He commented, quite rightly, that we dominated most of the possession and had most of the attacking play. He also claimed that we deserved at least a point, and he was quite right. But what was really worrying for the 3,500 Swans fans in the ground was that, despite our possession, we never at any stage of the game really looked like scoring; and until we see the return of Sidibe, or another striker who carries a genuine threat, it is difficult to see where our next win is coming from.

We did have our moments in front of goal. As early as the sixth minute Coates was set through on goal following a neat touch from Watkin. But desperate to work the ball on to his left foot, rather than gambling on the right which the angle favoured, he succeeded only in drilling the ball comfortably into the hands of Martin in the Macclesfield goal. Most of our attacking play in the early stages came via the high ball towards Williams, searching for the flick-on, or the threaded ball to the feet of Watkin, who was too easily shrugged off the ball. But it was the latter tactic which created our other strikes on goal in the half. On 15 minutes he swivelled and struck a decent low shot which was well saved by Martin; and a similar effort later in the half was this time deflected over for a corner.

It wasn't until the 23rd minute that Macclesfield began to show any sort of attacking ambition, when George Abbey struck a dipping 30 yarder which was well claimed by Roger. There were further Swans efforts from Mumford and O'Leary, but these were very much in the "speculative" bracket, and they failed to trouble the visiting defence. As the half wore on Macclesfield visibly grew in confidence, and began to probe the Swans defence, mainly by seeking out the tricky feet of the excellent Lee Glover. Indeed this nearly brought them the lead on the half hour, when Glover swivelled in the box and drilled a low shot towards the far corner, which Roger saved brilliantly with an outstretched right hand.

Another good effort followed a few minutes later from Glover, but this time he saw his shot flash wide. The half was concluded with a spell of scrappy play which epitomised the whole affair, with neither side having fully come to grips with a difficult playing surface and a swirling breeze.

The half time break saw the departure of the very disappointing John Williams, who frankly looked exhausted from about 10 minutes into the game. He is clearly not match fit at present, but with such a dearth of strikers to choose from, there are very few attacking options open to Colin Addison. In this instance he chose to bring Lacey into a central midfield role, allowing Cusack to push forward alongside Watkin. For the first few minutes this seemed to re-enervate the Swans, but we were soon caught out by a sucker punch from the visitors. A neat cross from Lambert on our right side was met by the head of Chris Byrne, who sent a looping effort over the retreating Freestone. Some commentators blamed Roger's hesitancy for this, but in reality we can only lament the absence of a Smith or Bound at the heart of the defence who would surely have dealt with the ball more conclusively.

The Swans continued to press forward in search of an equaliser, but clearly lacked any kind of real cutting edge, and could only produce a couple of wayward shots on goal. Indeed, the visitors looked more likely to double their lead with rare forays on the break. On the hour we tried an ambitious double substitution which saw Casey and Phillips replace Coates and Howard. Certainly the introduction of Phillips gave us a lift, and we began to exert some concerted pressure in the last quarter. Unfortunately, it was generated more through passion than through composure, and as a result, there was little direct threat on Martin's goal. Our best moments came late in the game. A terrific shot from Cusack struck the bar on 82 minutes, and an excellent free kick in the dying minutes from Mumford found the head of Sharp, but his powerful effort flashed just wide of the post.

In the final minute Lee Glover broke through again, rounded the last defender and seemed certain to double the visitors' lead, only to be foiled by a superb block from O'Leary. And in injury time we witnessed a truly remarkable example of refereering ineptitude, when a scything foul from Chris Byrne on Phillips resulted in nothing more than a free kick, an incident which really summed up our day!

Freestone 7 Personally we wouldn't fault him for the goal.
Howard - 6 Never really got forward effectively. If we are going to persist with a wing back formation, we must try to get them into the game in attacking positions.
Evans - 6 See above
Mumford - 8 Held the defence together well, and brought the ball forward in a style reminiscent of Ante Rajkovic (well done Mumf)
Sharp - 5 As one person commented, he didn't get a decent contact on the ball today.
O'Leary - 6 Mobile, but limited, in defence
Coates - 6 A bright start but faded badly
Cusack - 8 Plenty of endeavour...kept going and was unlucky not to equalise
Brodie - 6 kept running, and buzzing, behind the front two, but found it difficult to influence the game today
Williams - 4 Just didn't seem fit
Watkin - 6 A couple of decent efforts first half (could the bloke on the North Bank who keeps slating him please get his name right...there is NO "s")

Lacey - 6 A decent half, but not enough influence.
Phillips - 7 Brought more of an engine to the midfield
Casey - 4 Had a bit of stinker; needs to do some soul-searching after this one.

Addo's tactics - 7 Tried everything tactically to try to shake things up; thought he was going to send Peter Nicholas on at one point! But at the end of the day, nothing came off for him.

This game has left us with one sobering thought. If we thought we were clear of the relegation struggle we really should think again. We are only 8 points off the bottom, and many of the teams below us have games in hand. If we keep failing to produce the goods at home, and come up with many more medoicre efforts like this, we can very easily get sucked back into the relegation quagmire. Perhaps the imminent returns of Sidibe and Smith will begin to make that differnce - they are certainly both key players for us and are desperately needed back. We certainly need to find some points from somewhere. On a positive note, of course, let's hope that the departure of Petty really is also imminent, and that some funding will soon find its way to the team, as well as to our proposed new stadium. There will be no joy in supporting a team in the best ground in the Conference.