I often liken a football season to a Netflix series (note, I did not say a good Netflix series).
There are a selection of episodes that make up a full season, all with different cast members, antagonists and protagonists. The acting can be good or bad, and some episodes are instantly forgettable. If you’ve ever watched Breaking Bad, I’m talking about The Fly, and if you sat through our 2022/23 season, I’m talking about Cambridge United at home. The difference is that you can turn off a Netflix series, but you have no real affinity for it. With a football club, once you’ve picked your series, that is it, for as long as you shall live, etc.
The Orient game won’t live in mind as long as the Red Wedding episode of Game of Thrones, but it’s one that we can look back on fondly. I wondered what I’d call it if I were the writer of the Imps’ latest season, and in the end, I decided it would be something like ‘The One Where Jovon Made a Real Statement’. For me, despite Tendayi Darikwa being the Man of the Match (in my opinion), despite us scoring a stupendously good team goal to go 2-0 up, capped off by Freddie’s excellent finish, the headline actor has to be Jovon Makama.
Why? Because he was the subplot coming into this game, he has been for weeks. There’s a huge split in the fanbase when it comes to Jovon. In Gwynne’s pre-match, he was the talking point. There are so many fine players at the club, so many great actors waiting to be given their lines and perform, and, for some reason, the ones we have brought through ourselves often provide the biggest talking points. That’s Jovon Makama, 100%. For every fan that loves him, there’s one who can’t see what he brings. For everyone who loves his attributes (pace, power, strength), others point out his weaknesses (finishing). Even leaving the ground yesterday, some were focused on his performance (excellent), others on the one chance he missed (all his own making).
I find it utterly fascinating.
Me? I’m a Jovon Makama fan. Every time I see him this season, a different bit of me gets excited. Sure, he’s raw at times, but there’s something about his game that makes me wonder if the most precious youth product of all hasn’t been sitting here all along, waiting to be polished by the right man. Enter Michael Skubala, the director of this season of Lincoln City, The Series.
Of course, yesterday isn’t all about Jovon, who started up top alongside Freddie in one of three changes from Tuesday night. Adam Jackson sat this one out, as we know (by the way, there is no issue with Kyle Joseph; apparently, everyone has been asking him!) and Jack Moylan returned to the bench in favour of Tom Bayliss. We have so many options now, but as Michael Skubala told me before kick-off (yep, name drop), it’s not an 11-man game anymore, and those players on the bench can have just as much of an impact.
Being really honest, in the first half, we didn’t have much of an impact at all. It was 45 minutes of huffing and puffing, but with hardly anything to show for our endeavour. We had one shot, 0.06 xG and literally nothing else. Orient were much the better side, moving the ball around well, leaving us chasing shadows. There was no way of telling which side started the day in the top four and which started just outside the relegation zone, and that’s reflective of the whole division. There are perhaps 15 teams in the division who are all there or thereabouts, and the only difference will be decisions and squad depth. Don’t let their lowly position fool you – if Orient stick by Wellens, and find a way to make better decisions in the final third, they’ll finish well clear of the bottom four this season, as they’re a million miles away from being Cambridge United poor.
Still, they didn’t find a way to make their dominance pay. In the first half, they had nine shots, but Wickens didn’t have a save to make. One bounced off the bar, a heart-in-mouth moment all around me, but aside from that, it was just a damp squib of a contest, lit up by the warm autumnal sun. We worked hard in key areas – Tendayi looked head and shoulders above the rest of the Imps players, who Michael described as looking like they were still tired from the midweek excursion to the seaside.
When I messaged the SW group at half time, I was finally able to get onto the internet (did anyone else with Vodafone had terrible service yesterday?), I praised the former Forest man and said that ‘maybe Jovon’ came out of the half with some credit. Of course he did, he was a real handful and while the balls into him and Freddie didn’t give them a lot to feed off, he was a real menace. He was pulled more than a pork joint at a hipster sandwich shop, and was somehow the one that got punished on most occasions, but he clearly terrifies defenders. He’s a player that opponents probably see very differently to us, or should I say a player opponents see very differently to a section of our fans. That’s a shrinking section as well, because as I said, with each passing game, the big striker wins more fans.
He didn’t get many decisions, which leads me on to Ross Joyce. I didn’t rate the referee this weekend. On Tuesday, Luke Smith did what he had to do and did it well, but Joyce just seemed to lose it. His decisions were wildly inconsistent, and two moments on either side of halftime typified that. Firstly, there was a quick free kick for them on the edge of the area. You know the one I mean – they took it quickly, which he allowed, and I’m not actually sure whether that’s fair or not. I’ll let it slide, but they wasted the chance with a wayward cross, and suddenly their players got angry. The assistant referee, rightly, signalled for a goal kick, and Joyce gave a corner as if to offer some consolation. Then (and this might have been a different incident, but for dramatic effect, let’s assume it was the same) from the corner, Wickens is clearly impeded and goes to ground, and he gives nothing.
After half time, there’s a clear foul on Jovon, who is grappled tightly on a run, like he’s a cuddly toy and the defender is one of those grab machines at Skegness. He went down in the area, but the foul started outside. I say ‘foul’; it wasn’t given. Yet, just moments later, Jovon again is on the ball, a defender stumbles as the two jostle and the free kick goes Orient’s way. How can one not be a foul, and yet the second was? Madness. In fairness, their keeper went down later on after a corner and he didn’t give anything, but he worried me all game.
Still, come half time, it remained 0-0, and how we handle that interests me. I say ‘we’ not meaning the manager and players, but fans. Around me there’s a real assortment of different supporters and opinions, and how we all react to the game fascinates me. I get a bit insular if we’re not doing well; I’m fearful and apprehensive but quiet. Dad has this horrible habit of finding one of our rivals who are doing well, and going on about them. It’s like putting a lit match to a petrol pump, as I brood, and he goes ‘Mansfield are going bloody well’. I demanded to know why he suddenly backed our rivals when we were not doing well, and poor Nicky, who sat near us, refereed the exchange, which was still going on by the time the teams emerged for the second half.
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