The U's-letter: Issue 26

Will United ever find any consistency?

Oct 16, 2025

It was Mick Jagger who once sang “you can’t always get what you want”. He might well have been talking about romantic or emotional heartbreak, but he could just as easily have been talking about a middling League Two team. But is beating a team 23rd in the division, who seemingly hadn’t won at home since the birth of Christ and hadn’t even taken the lead since Cleopatra’s reign, too much to ask? It seems it is.

Being another fortnightly edition of the U’s-letter, this edition covers that Shrewsbury defeat, but also the home win against Crawley the week earlier, the confidence of which feels like a long time ago now.

As ever the podcast is out twice a week and it’s your first port of call for all U’s-related topics. If you fancy buying us a pint, Coconut Tier members get extra written content every week, a written data-led match preview of each league game, and a few extra pods a month too. As well as being complete legends.

What’s New? 📰

A brilliant fourth shirt design has been unveiled by the club, in partnership with Fitzwilliam Museum and Romsey Mill, all in celebration of Black History Month. There’s a great video with Sullay Kaikai that’s worth your time.
United have been drawn against Chester (who beat Morecambe in a replay) at home in the First Round of the FA Cup, on the weekend of the 1st of November.
George Hoddle has been recalled by United, after Harris confirmed McLoughlin will be out for a few months with a calf injury.

At The Match ✍️

U’s 3-1 Crawley: Job Done

For a moment, it looked like it might have all clicked. As James Brophy chopped back from the byline and drilled the ball across the box for Kouassi to tap home United’s third, it felt like that statement win was on the cards.
For those 15 minutes at the start of the second half, United had been rampant. Streaming forward multiple times with bodies, options, and opportunities aplenty. We were doing what so many fans had asked for: play a bottom half side and attack them from the off. We started 4-4-2, we made our dominance count early, and we put them to the sword at the start of the second half.
The last half an hour might have just been an understandable drop off. The game was, in all honesty, won, so it might have just been a case of consciously taking our foot off the gas. But it did feel like we left the door as slightly ajar as you can when you’re 3-0 up; after pulling one back, Crawley also hit the inside of the post, and for that last period of the game were the only team that looked like troubling the scorers. Maybe it’s just the natural pessimism of United fans speaking, but it wasn’t as comfortable a watch as it should have been.
In the end though it was job done, with both strikers bagging and a first in United colours for Pelly Ruddock. It also continues our excellent home form which now reads 6 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss in all competitions. Now to notch back-to-back wins for the first time this season up in Shropshire…

Shrewsbury 2-0 U’s: Abysmal.

You could sit here and write about the poor nature of both goals we conceded. And you could bemoan the fact it really felt like we went to Shrewsbury and lost, rather than them beating us. And you could reel off the endless statistics about their awful home form, the fact they hadn’t taken the lead at home since February, or at all at home under Appleton’s reign.
But the real summary of how poor United were in Shropshire on Saturday can be told fully in the second half numbers. 2-0 down at half-time and playing an uncharacteristically attacking 4-4-2, with options to bring on off the bench, against a team as fragile as Shrewsbury in disastrous form, you’d be forgiven for thinking it might not take much to turn the game around.
United’s second half numbers? 2 shots. 0 on target. 0 shots inside the box. 2 corners. 0.07 xG.
You can take losing a game – spoiler: we will lose games this season, and plenty disappointingly. Even promoted teams do that; cast your mind back to the 2020/21 promotion out of this division, and there are disappointing moments in that season too.
You can also understand that, despite Shrewsbury’s horrific form, they will win a game at some point. Variance is a real thing: take ourselves last season, how do you think Wigan felt when they came to the Abbey to play us having taken 1 point from our first 10 games? Even bad teams win sometimes because football can be a bit random.
But to post those second half numbers is something much worse. It ranges somewhere on a scale from concerning to embarrassing to pathetic to disgraceful, depending on your outlook. It’s another moment where the bounce back, or potential lack of it, will tell a lot of the story about the legacy of this pitiful afternoon. But how many more times do we need to wait for a bounce back before we see some kind of consistency?

View From The Away End 🧐

Crawley Town - By Simply Redz

It was shit.

A short but sweet review, encapsulating all there is to know.

Shrewsbury Town - By Salopcast

Salop 2-0 Cambridge is not a scoreline either fanbase would have expected before kick off, however that is the beauty of the game. Salop have started the season poorly, while Cambridge have adjusted to life in League 2 much better than the team in blue and amber.
Salop have been desperate for a home win having not won at home in the league all season and not since February last season. Salop had also failed to score first in a game in the league all season. But fortunately for Michael Appleton, Cambridge turned up and stank the place out. Cambridge’s performance was the worst I have seen all season, and that takes some doing given the performances I have seen from Barnet, Stanley and Barrow. I have no clue how Cambrdge like to play given how inept that performance was. I am sure Cambridge will be fine this season, but I would be surprised if they did anything more than finish mid table.

FANCY BEATING US AT EFL FANTASY? CLICK BELOW TO JOIN 👇

Join the UTAS league

Opposition Preview 🔮

Bromley (H) - 10th place - Saturday 18th October (12:30pm kick off)

Last 5 (all comps): WLDLD - Started well and by all accounts are a very decent side. Held Gills to a 2-2 draw, which should have been all three where it not for a controversial last minute equaliser from the spot, and also threw away a 3-1 lead against Tranmere – they should probably be in a better position than they actually are.
Last time out: Bromley 3-3 U’s (5-4 on pens), 3rd September 2024. Apparently our only ever fixture, a night in the Vertu Pizza Cup memorable for a Jack Stephens disasterclass to let the ball through his legs for a last minute equaliser. They then won on pens.
Our H2H: P1, W0, D1, L0. Just that one game ever, unless someone has time to go through the history books.
Manager: Andy Woodman. Taken them up through the leagues, and someone we’ve actually been rumoured to be interested in in the past.
One to watch: Michael Cheek. You’ll see in the stats section below, but this man is addicted to scoring goals.
Former U’s players: Not that I can see.

Subscribe to The Coconut Tier to get:

📚At least one article like this every week

🎧Bonus podcast content every month

👕First dibs on upcoming merch drops

And you can show off to your mates that you support UTAS and you’re not a round dodger.

Under The Other Stands 🏟️

None of the top six managed to win in the weekend just gone.
So the real story was at the other end. It was a huge weekend for the bottom of the division. Apart from Shrewsbury beating us, Newport also won in a six-pointer against Accrington (if it’s not too early to say that), and Cheltenham also got a good point at Gills, despite conceding a 95th minute equaliser.
MK Dons’ 4-0 win at Bristol Rovers is maybe an indication that they are starting to really click, which could be worrying for the rest of the division. Chesterfield also bounced back from a 6-2 loss at Colchester by comfortably dispatching Salford 2-0.
Barnet are the division’s form team, with 4 wins and 1 draw in their last 5. Colchester themselves backed up that aforementioned huge win against Chesterfield by beating Grimsby 2-1 on their own patch.

Stats Corner 🔢

Our league form so far this season: WLDWLWLDWDWL. Consistently inconsistent.
As per the NTT20 pod: Michael Cheek has played 282 games for Bromley, he’s scored 124 goals. Amazing record. And since the start of 2024/25, he’s also scored 31 league goals. No other player in all four divisions has more.
For the first time since the match against Bolton on 15th of February, Salop had scored the first goal in a home league game.
And to make it worse, Shrewsbury scored more than one first-half goal at home for the first time since November 2024. Well done United.
The love-in at Cheltenham with returning manager Steve Cotterill has been nice to see, from afar. Ex-United player Ben Stevenson is Steve Cotterill first permanent signing for Cheltenham Town since John Finnigan in March 2002. And also, 8,551 days after beating Rushden and Diamonds in Cardiff, Cotterill won his next game in charge of Cheltenham Town by beating Fleetwood 2-0 the weekend before last.