Barnet manager Dean Brennan cut a frustrated figure in his post-match interview despite his team beating Hartlepool 3-2 on the opening day of the National League season.
The first 81 minutes of the match went as well as anyone associated with Barnet could have imagined. A trio of headers from Adebola Oluwo (’22), Nicke Kabamba (’54) and Danny Collinge (’66) meant that the Bees were cruising heading into the 10 final minutes of normal time. But, goals from Jake Hastie in the 82nd minute and Josh Umerah in the 95th minute for Hartlepool meant that the game had a very nervy ending.
Defensive fragilities are something that has plagued Brennan’s Barnet sides for the past couple of seasons as last year the Bees conceded 77 goals in all competitions. Brennan would have hoped that his recruitment over the summer would stop Barnet from going on horrid runs where they conceded 20 goals across four games as they did from late September to early October last season. Do the goals conceded against Hartlepool indicate that these problems haven’t been solved? The key to answering this question is to look at the nature of the two Hartlepool goals.
For their first goal, there was a big defensive mismatch and a huge slice of luck involved. Desperate for a goal late in the game, Hartlepool left big centre forward Josh Umerah forward from a dead ball against Reece Hall-Johnson. This allowed the Hartlepool goalkeeper to fire the ball in at Umerah with his back to goal and he was able to bully the wing-back physically. Despite this, Hall-Johnson prevented Umerah from fully turning and running at the Barnet goal with a lunging challenge that fell at the feet of the onrushing Jake Hastie who cooly slotted the ball past Laurie Walker.
The second Hartlepool goal came after they were awarded a penalty which Hastie took and Laurie Walker saved. The Bees then failed to clear the ball as they all flocked towards the goal line to block any other attempts. This led to the ball falling to Umerah just to the right of the penalty spot who was able to powerfully finish the chance.
When looking at both of those goals, it is hard to find many patterns, which I believe is a good sign. It indicates that there isn’t a systemic flaw in Brennan’s system (at least not one that the opposition has found yet) which is an improvement on the early part of last season where the two centre-backs were often getting dragged wide as teams exploited the Bees’ high line with runs in behind. Of course, conceding what was essentially a rebound from a penalty isn’t great defending, but it is a small thing that the players will now be thinking about if they ever concede another penalty. As the new-look backline become more familiar with each other, goals like the two conceded against Hartlepool should become less prevalent.
As for the new defensive recruits, I thought they were three of the stand-out players. Whilst Hall-Johnson didn’t do perfectly against Umerah when Hartlepool scored their first goal, he did get the challenge in and was strong against an opponent much bigger than him. Furthermore, he was one of the Bees’ main attacking threats as he made one or two good runs into the box. Ben Coker was also excellent, winning many tackles and headers and showing good levels of fitness and tenacity which will be necessary to play Brennan’s aggressive style of football. He even took a shot straight to the face but recovered to block the subsequent shot. However, Adebola Oluwo was my pick of the new defenders. The 23-year-old had a hard task up against Umerah, who scored 12 goals in League Two last season and 17 in the National League the year before that, but he dealt with his opponent well as he won numerous aerial duels and used his pace to make numerous good recovery runs. His brilliant display was capped off as he scored the Bees’ first goal of the season and was voted as Man of the Match by the fans.
All in all, I think it is fair to say that conceding two late goals wasn’t ideal. But, these goals weren’t representative of the defensive performance of the team as a whole. Brennan being so frustrated post-match may be a positive as it shows the high standards he wants from his team and this first game should leave supporters excited about a promotion push and not worried about past issues reappearing.
