The U's-letter: Issue #5
The U's-letter: Issue #5
Still winless, still keeping the faith: your weekly Cambridge United updates all in one place
Life with Garry Monk’s U’s in the 2024/25 season has so far felt distinctly unfair. We really look like we’re trying to do things the ‘right way’ - by that I mean a team that tries to actually play some decent football by keeping the ball on the deck and playing attacking and exciting football. What fans have been crying out for for a long time. But it’s just not reaping the rewards it probably deserves.
We go into Issue #5 of the U’s-letter still winless. Maybe this newly introduced newsletter is at fault. Or maybe it’s just the quality of Lee Gregory’s finishing. Most probably the latter. But we soldier on, looking ahead as much as one can to a trip to Adams Park to try and surprise Wycombe by nicking all three points and finally getting those underlying numbers to wake up and smell the bacon. The season is well underway and we can’t let it get away from us.
This week’s newsletter features the usual match report and view from the opposition from Mansfield, alongside some good stats and some especially good links to some great stuff that’s been doing the rounds on football Twitter (or X, there’s some great content on there etc…)
Make sure you’re also following the podcast wherever you get your pods so you’re not missing any episodes: remember there’s a new show every Monday and Friday, along with some bonus Mailbag episodes once a month:
📰 News From The U’s 📰
Really sad to hear that Adam Webb, minority shareholder at United and St Johnstone owner, is being treated for cancer. You can read his full open letter here. We wish him all the very best in his recovery.
Shayne Lavery is injured. For “at least six weeks”. It’s really not great news.
That really not good news was followed up with the news that Josh Stokes is also injured, for four to six weeks. When it rains, it pours.
On the 19th of October, before Wigan at home, there is a memorial walk planned for former CFU chairman and lifelong United fan, Robert Osborn. It’s a chance to honour the memory of U's fans that have recently passed away and raise some vital funds for the British Heart Foundation and the brilliant work they do, so it’s a great thing to join if you are able.
The Premier League and the National League have announced a new competition, featuring both top tier non-league sides and PL 2 sides. Something for us to boycott if we slide all the way down there.
✍️ At The Match ✍️
Mansfield 2-1 U’s
Written by Owen Kiernan. Subscribe to The Antler to read the report in full and receive regular match reports in your inbox.
Do you know the most frustrating thing about this season so far? We’re not playing bad football. Some of it’s been pretty damn good at times, a far cry from what we were seeing at the end of Bonner’s tenure and what Harris dished up in his few weeks in charge.
We’ve been crying out for this kind of football for years, and now we’ve got it, and it’s not working out for whatever reason. Perhaps it is that we’ve just been unlucky so far, but the bald facts read that Monk has had 19 games with this side and only two wins to show for it. After five games this season we are rooted to the bottom of the table with just one point to our name. If you play like Brazil but lose every week, eventually something has to give.
So what’s our problem then? For forty minutes on Saturday we looked like a good side, better than Mansfield that’s for sure. But again we failed to finish our chances, Lavery in particular not taking his, once again. Longelo looked busy down the wing, creating lots of opportunities, and Barton and Stokes were in the thick of things too.
But then came the customary error from Connor O’Riordan (a first half substitute for the injured Danny Andrew), and the experienced Lee Gregory pounced to put Mansfield ahead. Here we go again. There’s a player in O’Riordan for sure, but he’s been responsible for a good number of the goals we’ve conceded already this season. He wasn’t picked to start on Saturday, with Rossi and Digby the preferred CB duo even though Michael Morrison was also sitting on the bench. Morro isn’t perfect, and you might even argue he’s past it now, but he possesses a calmness and football brain that Rossi, O’Riordan and even Digby (playing out of position) seemingly don’t right now.
Longelo got us back on level terms shortly after the break but Mansfield looked much fitter and stronger in the second half, and a second goal came after a long delay for Lavery to unfortunately go off injured, having been clattered in what looked like a penalty from the away end. Of course it came from Lee Gregory, with a worldie of an effort that gave Reyes no chance. Not for the first time Korey Smith was involved, ball watching instead of keeping an eye on Gregory who evaded Smith with ease. Two goals for Gregory, two simple errors for United. Again.
🧐 View From The Away End 🧐
Mansfield Town
From Mansfield Matters
To be honest, I felt unfortunate for you at full time. You were no doubt the better side on the day but two moments of real quality were the difference for us, despite again making simple errors in the build up to your goal.
There were moments I thought we’d thrown it away, especially late on with that goal line clearance, but that demonstrated a really good amount of spirit from our point of view, which at this stage is needed!
I felt the game gave a good reflection of where we want to be as a club and what we need to do to survive.
I think you’ll be ok once you click, but how long that takes is another question.
FANCY BEATING US AT EFL FANTASY? LINK BELOW 👇
🔢 Stats Corner 🔢
Burton Albion are winless in their first five league games (D4 L1) - for the third season in a row.
We are one of seven clubs in the EFL yet to register a win, the others being Portsmouth, Hull, Cardiff, Burton, Accrington and Morecambe.
Our resident statistician Ben G might go into more detail on this in his next instalment of Get Your Stats Right, but there are some reasons to be positive in our underlying numbers: per FotMob stats, our xG is 12th, Shots on target average per match 13th, ‘Big Chances’ 11th, touches in opposition box 12th, xG conceded 12th, and average possession 10th. By those numbers we look very much like a mid-table team, but… the most important stat: points 24th.
Wycombe have scored exactly twice in every league game this season: LLWDW. Who are we playing next again?
🔮 Opposition Preview 🔮
Wycombe Wanderers (A)
Last 5 (all comps): WWDWW - Wycombe have low-key had a really decent start to the campaign. They’re sitting seventh, but they’ve had a tough start, opening the campaign with Wrexham, Birmingham and Rotherham. They go into this in very decent nick, having also beaten Swansea away in the cup.
Last time out: U’s 1-1 Wycombe, 23rd April 2024. Another frustrating end of season fixture from last year, where a certain Lyle Taylor confirmed himself as enemy number 1 on a night we really should have secured safety for another season.
Our H2H: P26, W6, L16, D4. It’s fair to say we historically don’t often get that much out of this lot.
Manager: Matt Bloomfield. Bit of a legend down at Adams Park as a player, stepped up to try and fill the boots of the imposing figure of Gareth Ainsworth and after a tricky start it looks like it’s all clicking. There was a moment last season where Wycombe fans were wanting Bloomfield gone, but they’ve stuck with him and it’s paid off.
One to watch: Daniel Udoh. Signed from Shrewsbury in the summer, always looks a really good player whenever we’ve played him. He complements their impressive forward options with the commanding presence of Sam Vokes and the young Ivorian Richard Kone - whose story from competing in the Homeless World Cup, to scoring 88 in 109 for Athletic Newham in the Essex Senior League, to playing League One football, is amazing.
Former U’s players: None that I can see.
🏟️ Under The Other Stands 🏟️
A few standout results: Bristol Rovers managed to show their comfortable 2-0 win over us a few weeks ago was by no means the norm as they lost 4-0 at home to Wigan. Doesn’t reflect brilliantly on us. Stevenage beating Barnsley 3-0 is also a result that should worry us a bit, a great three points for a side tipped to be in and around us.
Elsewhere, Shrews lost 1-0 at home to Charlton who just do not concede goals, Crawley got a good point at home to the impressive Stockport (look out for another brilliant Louie Barry goal), and Burton got a good point away at Rotherham too.
Steve Bruce’s Blackpool (what a sentence that is) got their first win with a 94th minute winner from James Husband (who you’ll remember as the lad who scored two identical goals from corners against us a few weeks ago), having conceded an equaliser just six minutes before.
You’ll have heard about the sickeningly named ‘Hollywood derby’ enough by now for it to deserve a significant place in this newsletter, but on the pitch Birmingham beat Wrexham 3-1. For anyone who watched this on Monday night on the box, the high standard in this game was quite alarming.
Away from the pitch, Reading’s proposed takeover sounds like it’s collapsed, and the club’s future is in jeopardy again.
💻 On The Socials 💻
Barnet manager Dean Brennan’s post-match rant in this presser is unreal.
Whether it’s Google Translate gone wrong or just someone having a laugh, the names the Irish FAI printed in the matchday programme for the Latvia Under 21s is excellent.
Football heritage in the Championship at Hillsborough: one screamer, one all-timer of a goalmouth scramble.
Also in the Championship, Ebou Adams managed one of the worst misses you’ve ever seen.
Closer to home in League One, Bolton trying to play it out from the back against Huddersfield ended in hilarious calamity.
At least Bolton’s mascot wasn’t subjected to the sort of dressing-down that Cagliari’s flamingo was after their own 4-0 defeat.
Fulham and Preston’s never-ending shootout made the headlines, but the purists preferred the alternative, Stoke beating Fleetwood just 2-1 in their shootout.
📚 Read And Listen 🎧
We love Matt Gooding’s writing on the U’s over on his Substack Notes From The Habbin. His latest piece looking over Monk’s start is as usual a great read:
Episode 2 of The Row, a YouTube channel publishing conversations with interesting people in sport about mental health, features an interview with Callum Langley (the Wellbeing Manager at the U's academy):
🕺 What’s Spinning? 🕺
The debut single from Theo Moss, marking the beginning of her new project, is a breezy indie bop to see out the summer with:
Thanks for reading this week’s U’s-letter. Send us through any suggestions to include in next week’s issue, or general feedback to hello@undertheabbeystand.com