The U's-letter: Issue #12
Rounding up a pretty low week
This week has, at the very least, been unique. Coming to terms with how to deal with another heavy, devastating loss to your closest and fiercest rivals two years on the trot - especially where both football matches are near identical - has been hard. And everyone has done it differently. Some have simply felt numb, unable to process it. Some furious, voicing their visceral disgust at what happened. And a few are still trying to stay calm and see the bigger picture. To those, I applaud you.
There was a point on Saturday where you just had to laugh. It was simply astonishing. From my point of view, I have never been one to subscribe to leaving games particularly early (5 minutes is one thing, a whole half is another), asking for ticket refunds, wanting empty player apologies on social media, or being so furious as to be calling for them to do laps up and down Newmarket Road as punishment, or walk home instead of getting the bus.
This week, at points I changed my mind. Maybe not something I’d stand by now, but in the heat of my anger, I just wanted something from the club to show we were in this together. It just felt like too much to comprehend how we’d been made to endure standing in London Road to see the same things happen in front of us two years in a row, goaded by that lot in blue.
But, it’s done now. To win our trust back, it’s all about how we bounce back, and there’s some big games coming up that we cannot afford to throw away points in. Starting Saturday.
This week’s newsletter is a bit shorter, but thanks for reading anyway.
📰 News From The U’s 📰
James Gibbons joins Paul Digby on the sideline for 10-12 weeks (if you say 3 months it sounds worse) after picking up a knee injury at Peterborough that they thought would be season-ending.
The Exeter and Mansfield home games have been moved to a 12:30pm kick off. Mansfield makes sense after making us do the same at their place, but you really have to feel for Exeter fans making that 5+ hour trip to East Anglia from Devon.
Kaikai and Reyes are off on international duty, but the U’s fixture goes ahead.
This Saturday the club is supporting the White Ribbon Campaign - a global movement of men and boys speaking out about violence against women and girls. There’s lots of things happening around the ground that everyone should support if you can.
✍️ At The Match ✍️
P*sh 6-1 U’s
Written by Owen Kiernan. Subscribe to The Antler to read the report in full and receive regular match reports in your inbox.
I’m going to caveat all of what I write here with a big statement. I didn’t go on Saturday. I was on holiday in Berlin. After last season I told myself I couldn’t go through that again, not just the result, but the manner of the defeat coupled with all the aggro that goes with the day made me think it’s not worth it. So you’re not going to get any detailed match analysis here. I’m not even going to write the scoreline. Last year was bad enough, this year is worse.
Immediately after the game I was hurting, as much as if I’d have been there. Friends said we looked better than them for 20 minutes, that we didn’t play anywhere near as badly as we did last season. But it’s impossible to look at this game without the context of last season’s result. Three of those who started last year started again this year - if it wasn’t for injury and suspension you could have added Andrew and Digby (and arguably George Thomas) to that list. That’s five players who’ve proved they don’t care enough and aren’t good enough to wear the shirt. Five players who cost Mark Bonner his job. Five players still earning good money from Cambridge United.
It doesn’t matter though, because James Brophy scored in a cup game last week. Prepare the commemorative T-shirts! 2 goals in 160-odd appearances from an attacking player. Pathetic. Michael Morrison said we’ve “lost a lot of pride”. Didn’t we lose enough of it last year? That should have been a one-off. Procedures should have been put in place to ensure we never lose heavily to them again. I can take bigger, better teams beating us from time to time. I can’t accept half-arsed attempts in the derby, and nor should you. As a fanbase we shouldn’t be making excuses for this level of performance. I don’t want to see a single “I Was There When Brophy Scored” T-shirt at the Abbey on Saturday against Barnsley. We shouldn’t celebrate failure. Let these players know this isn’t acceptable. Let the management team know. Let the board know. Barry did the right thing last time and disposed of Bonner. Is sacking Monk the answer? I still don’t know.
We are making such great strides off the pitch, and are really becoming an organisation to be proud of. But we’re not a business, first and foremost we’re a football club, and we’ll be judged on our success on the pitch. This needs putting front and centre of every single thing we do from now on. We’ve been in the Conference and it was awful. The club had no profile, we were rivals with Histon for fucks sake. We’re a way off where we were back then, but relegation removes that buffer between us and non-league irrelevance. One bad season and we’ve gone back almost two decades. Invest in the training ground and re-brands and the matchday experience, yes. But invest in a centre forward who scored more than 5 goals last season. Invest in a centre-midfielder who is fit enough to start the season, not one who’s been paid by the club since August yet hasn’t done anything other than show a load of kids around a science centre. Invest in a defender so we don’t end up with some mug on loan who’s cost us six plus points already.
A lot of this is irrational, but this is the second year in a row this has happened. Morrison has said the players have lost a lot of pride, well guess what? So have us fans, and we don’t see this club as just a paycheck. We must respond on Saturday, if we don’t then I fear for Monk. Bonner had a lot of goodwill, even after an abject derby performance, Monk has none of that in the bank.
🧐 View From The Away End 🧐
I’ll be honest with you, I couldn’t face asking them for their thoughts on this one.
FANCY BEATING US AT EFL FANTASY? LINK BELOW 👇
🔢 Stats Corner 🔢
Posh became the first EFL team to see over 50 goals in their league games so far this season: scored 31, conceded 27. About an 1/8th of them came against us on Saturday (if you trust my maths).
🔮 Opposition Preview 🔮
Barnsley (H) - Saturday 16th November
Last 5 (all comps): WWLWD - The Tykes picking up some good form of late, climbing up to 4th in the table.
Last time out: Barnsley 0-2 U’s, 29th March 2024 - One of two huge wins over Easter weekend for Monk.
Our H2H: P25, W6, L12, D7.
Manager: Darrell Clarke. Fresh from nearly doing the impossible at Cheltenham, he’s taken to life well in South Yorkshire.
One to watch: Adam Phillips. Once a U’s loanee making four appearances in 2018, Phillips is now Barnsley’s top scorer this season on 5 goals from central midfield.
Former U’s players: Just the aforementioned Phillips from what I can see.
🏟️ Under The Other Stands 🏟️
Shrewsbury have made their decision on a permanent manager, with Gareth Ainsworth taking the hot seat. After where he took Wycombe, it’s hard not to think this is a brilliant appointment and gives them the best chance of staying up.
That same Shrews side had lost 2-0 at Burton, giving the Brewers their first win of the season and becoming the last team in the EFL to record a win.
Orient dispatched Blackpool 3-0, who after a bounce when Bruce took over are back to looking a bit like a team that might get dragged into a battle down the bottom if they’re not careful.
Northampton snatched a huge point away at Birmingham City. With only 14 first team players available, that is simply massive for them and will do wonders for their confidence you’d think.
💻 On The Web 💻
Some quite remarkable Out Of Context Mark Bonner here.
🕺 What’s Spinning? 🕺
After a week like that, it has to be this doesn’t it?
Thanks for reading this week’s U’s-letter. Send us any comments or suggestions to include in next week’s issue to: hello@undertheabbeystand.com