Into the second half, and as per usual, it was a different game entirely. In my opinion, we edged the first half (four shots, two on target, compared to four and one for them, xG also better), but the second half absolutely belonged to the hosts, even if they only had a single shot on target.

I’m not sure why we went off the boil. There’s a chance Matty Virtue, on a journey to fitness, faded a bit. Sean Roughan definitely struggled with his confidence, and Exeter perhaps had their hackles up as well. It was a game between two teams who are neither up, nor down, and whilst you’ll hear the difference was Sam Nombe, which according to the goals scored column it was, Exeter didn’t actually create a huge amount either. I think both teams are quite functional, middling teams with foundations to build on, but work to do. I did like Demetri Mitchell for them, I remember him coming soon and scoring against us for Blackpool the day we won 3-2 there, and he’s always been eye-catching. However, I did the My New Football Club podcast this morning, and they like the look of Jack Diamond, so the perception of other team’s players can be a funny thing.

A word on Jack – I thought he was excellent for the first 35 minutes or so yesterday, but he drifted in the second half. Danny Mandroiu disappeared in the second period as well, and with Virtue flagging, it did seem to leave Ben House and Ethan Erhahon as the only performers outside the back five. With Sean struggling for confidence, there’s no real surprise that the second half went as it did. That said we had three efforts in the second period, and two came from Mandroiu, making it four for the game. Both were from free kicks in good positions, and both were completely wasteful. It wasn’t a good afternoon for the former Shamrock Rovers man.

After one of those free kicks, Exeter added their second. They perhaps could have taken the lead through Jay Stansfield on 61 minutes, after Mitchell caused us problems down the left, but Roughan excellently blocked the effort. That was their only chance of note, until once again, down the left, we were outmuscled. This was a tough moment for me and Chris watching on – he hadn’t turned notifications off on his watch, so it buzzed as Mandroiu was lining up a free kick to say there had been a goal. He smirked, thinking it was the free kick, but we both cursed moments later. Nombe easily nudged Montsma off the ball, and from an angle, he slotted past Rushworth. It was all so easy.

On 89 minutes we created our first shot on target in a poor second half. Another long throw, this time from Sorensen, was flicked on by the dependable O’Connor and again by Erhahon, only for Ben House to struggle to get any purchase on the third header. Much of the sting had been taken out of the ball and sub-keeper Blackman was able to drop on it relatively calmly. By that point, Exeter had been rightly reduced to ten men for a silly second booking, but it made little difference to us. In fact, we didn’t lay siege as you’d expect when you’re a man to the good, but much of that was due to the hosts. They managed the game really well – Blackman picking up a booking after making a hash of a clearance and getting into a bit of afters with Ben House, who was also booked. Nombe then suffered an ‘injury’ and took the sting out of the game, and far from complaining, I’m going to have to say fair play. They got their goal, a winner that neither side truly deserved, and they did what was needed to hold onto it.

Referee Sunny Gill has barely got a mention, so he’s getting one now. He’s a curse for us – that’s two matches against promoted teams that we’ve lost with him in control. It has nothing to do with him though, as he was impeccable throughout. I didn’t think he got many decisions wrong, bar one in the first half where there was either a foul on our forward (can’t remember who) or it was a goal kick, but he gave a corner, then as soon as the ball was delivered blew for a foul. If that’s the only thing to moan about, you know the referee has had a good game. Here’s my prediction for you – Sunny Gill will be a Premier League referee sometime in the next five or ten years.

So we lost an even game, whereas a week ago we won a game we perhaps should have lost. Like the last eight or ten weeks, we didn’t show a huge amount of attacking intent. One or two of our players did not play well (Mandroiu, Diamond in the second half), one or two did (Erhahon was solid, O’Connor excellent) and for once, we didn’t get the point we probably deserved. It doesn’t mean we should worry about the future any more or less than we did a week ago. The game told us nothing at all. Like Chris said on the podcast, a large number of goals in football are due to something random – an error, an errant bounce, or a stumble. Yesterday, one of those goals, a random error, stopped us from having forward momentum and changed the game. We lost it, it’s over, we fell a single place in the table and we’re settling into the level we probably deserved.

That’s football, and we still love it, even if you wouldn’t be able to tell by checking social media after a game. Which is why I don’t.

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