Posh suffered their second successive defeat and the second time the winning team has gone top of League One!
After suffering an unfortunate defeat at Gillingham on Saturday which took them to the top of the League, Posh faced the side who had been knocked off the top, Burton Albion.
Sadly, the Brewers match also coincided with a Tuesday night?a night which rarely agrees with Posh!
It was to be a typical Tuesday night match which saw Posh lose but any neutral watching the match who didn`t know where the sides were in the League would`ve been gob-smacked to have found out that one is just outside the play-offs and one is top of the League.
Both sides were poor but in truth, Burton didn`t need to do anything apart from snuff out any threat from Posh, which was few and far between, after they had been gifted the winning goal in the opening minutes of the match.
Harry Toffolo was making his home debut and it was a debut he probably wants to forget?although after a very nasty clash of heads which resulted in the young left-back being carried from the pitch and taken to hospital, he probably remembers very little anyway.
It was Toffolo who inexplicably kept going inside from the left when in possession instead of attacking down the wing lost the ball very cheaply by doing this which resulted in the Brewers attacking quickly against a depleted defence (Toffolo was on the floor complaining he had been fouled but by the looks of it, he just lost the ball fairly). Jack Baldwin went across to cover the attacker, where Toffolo would normally have been, but slid to make a tackle and missed?it wasn`t Baldwin`s best match either! The attacker simply ran passed a sliding Baldwin and crossed the ball to the unmarked Naylor to blast the ball into the back of the net.
Posh never recovered from that and Burton didn`t make that much effort to extend their lead either.
Six shots on target all match by both sides tells a story. Burton knew how to defend and cause problems but Posh just didn`t have a clue.
They were blunt up front which saw Marcus Maddison start the match alongside Shaq Coulthirst before dropping back to left-back following Toffolo`s injury. Neither player looked any threat at all though.
Even the introduction of Lee Angol for Toffolo and the arrival of Souleymane Coulibaly didn`t change the (non-)threat of Posh!
We`ve seen times when three or four players are having an off-day, but to have all 13-out field players having a mare, it was utterly atrocious. Only Ben Alnwick came out of the match with any credit as he pulled off a few good saves.
Prior to the match, Posh had issued an interview with Darragh MacAnthony where he covered a number of things, one of which was a three-year plan Posh have. He came across as though we`ll be holding our own in the Championship by this point but after watching last nights match, I`d say we are many years away from not only competing in the Championship but competing with the top sides in League One!
MacAnthony enthused about all the young players we have and the youth players coming through (plus two 17/18 year olds Posh have got their eye on) but if whenever a player has a good run of form we look to sell, then how on earth are we going to move up the leagues?
The players we bring in all have potential but they are never going to realize their full potential at Posh because we`ll cash in as soon as we can.
Last night and at Gillingham showed that we have invested well the money that is coming in for Conor Washington but the quality of our squad has diminished as well. We are back to a team with massive potential but a team that will need time to show what potential they have and be a danger to other sides.
What will happen if five or six players (or more) have grown enough and are showing a true potential to play in the top two Leagues that other clubs come calling? We`ve said we won`t stop any player from making the jump up but then we`ll be back at square one again just as we seem to be now.
At some point, we need to start holding on to some of our players to get ourselves promoted. Promotion brings increased revenue from TV, increased away fans, and hopefully a bigger home following but until something changes, either we get more people off their backsides and into the ground on match day or we take a punt at keeping our players and trying for promotion, then year after year, Posh will be just another run of the mill League One side.
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