Poke

[Southampton Gull]

Poke will be ok for Saturday I spoke to Connor Thomson and he said pokey should be fine.

But did Matt say he would be fit?

[Scott Brehaut]

Has anybody spoken to Damien Davey? He will be the man in the know!!

[brucie]

The situation with Poke is indicative of the way that this whole farcical season has been handled. Trying to play a whole season with one professional keeper and one who is albeit an amateur is farcical in the extreme.
This situation should have been resolved after the Southend home game when Rice was shown up for what he was - but no more heads in the sand. A joke.

[Gullscorer]

I must put in a word for Ricey here; he has been unfairly maligned by many. Sure, he's not the world's greatest keeper, but his playing opportunities have been limited.

Given that the Southend game was his League debut, I thought he put in a decent performance. If he didn't look as assured as a more experienced keeper, that was understandable, but no way was he to blame for Southend's goals.

The first two were down to errors/poor play by Oastler and Nicho, the third by poor defensive marking, and the fourth, with the Southend player put clean through, would not have been stopped by most keepers.

We have been blessed with some good keepers over the years, and more recently with Olejnik, so perhaps that has made us more impatient and over-critical with keepers like Rice. But he performed OK on his last time out as a sub for Poke.

Give the boy a chance..!!

[AustrianAndyGull]

I also think the criticism is harsh on Ricey. He is a good keeper but not at league 2 level. The only problem is that given Pokey keeps us well and truly out of the brown stuff nearly every week and Ricey is nowhere near as good as Pokey then it will mean we will inevitably concede more goals. That's the concern.

[tktufc91]

What does it say about Ricey though if the management would rather play Pokey with an infection in goal than a fully fit Rice?

[jonnyfive]

I hope we save Poke for the other 3 matches, in which we have a prayer of getting a result.

Stick the circus juggler in at Priestfield - Gillingham to win by 2 or more is 17/4, and Ricey should be more than capable of throwing in 3 or 4.

[Gullscorer]

What does it say about Ricey though if the management would rather play Pokey with an infection in goal than a fully fit Rice?

What does it say about the management though, when certain players who have underperformed for most of the season continue to be played beyond their use-by date..?

[ROADRUNNER]

torn muscle in the chest due to coughing and sneezing from the chest infection he had, and thats from accora himself, so hows that mystic forking meg! (ferrari)

[royalgull]

Oxford was his full league debut and he was easily one of our best players that day.

Ricey hasn't got a chance at this football club sadly, he could have 3 great games on the spin, we'd concede a goal and instantly he'd cop the flak regardless of whether it was his fault or not. Even had a bit of that from the Bradford game, that was a worldie of a cross and the big centre forward tucked it away, there was nothing he could have done about that. I'm certain had he conceeded the 2nd goal people would have caned him for not doing better with the original shot. But that's the way it is and nothings going to change that.

As for 'what it says about him' it doesn't say anything, do you think if Howe was 50/75% fit we wouldn't pick him Saturday? You want your best players on the pitch at all times and you patch them up and try and keep them going as much as possible. Poke's our goalkeeper, he's been predominantly good this season after an indifferent start so it makes sense that we'd do all we can to get him on the pitch on Saturday. Will he? Well wouldn't you like to know!

[ROADRUNNER]

he wont be playing saturday royal, he needs rest and hopefully will be fit for barnet, it is a muscle tear due to coughing!

[Plymouth Gull]

Definitely no chance of playing on Saturday? Hmm.

[ROADRUNNER]

thats what dd is saying. it wont heal without rest and he doesnt see him being ready until at the earliest barnet, im not mystic meg and who knows maybe he will make a recovery by saturday but at the moment he is saying no chance. i hope he wrong as i would love to see pokey back on saturday.

[brucie]

Its got nothing to do with Rice not having a chance. That is tosh. He is a liability and now we will most likely have to play him in our most important game in christ knows when.
The situation just goes from bad to worse. No wonder we are going down.

[Bloggy]

Time to park the bus!