Saunders unsurprisingly went with the same starting eleven as on Tuesday night, except for Sam Hird coming in at CB to replace the suspended Evatt. Our real first chance came when Sam Morsy played Blake through after a good solo run, only for the striker to try, and fail, to chip the Scunthorpe keeper from around 18 yards out. Thinking about it, i'm not really sure why he tried to chip him when he was stood on his goal line. Dan Gardner was the next player to have a go for us, with a powerful shot from outside the box, which was goal bound before being blocked away by a Scunthorpe defender. Towards the end of the first half, United started building the pressure and forced a fantastic double save from Tommy Lee, and we were more than happy to go in at half time level after a very even first half. At the start of the second half, the gap in the defence left by Evatt's suspension was beginning to show as we were struggling to cope with the attacking prowess of Scunthorpe's Paddy Madden, Gary McSheffrey and Tom Hopper. This took it's toll when McSheffrey was put through in the 55th minute, and brought down in the box by Jones. Definite penalty, but not a red card. There was at least three more players around the Scunthorpe forward. Paddy Madden took the penalty and sent Lee the wrong way with a cool finish to the centre of the goal. Five minutes later, Talbot was studded in the head by a high foot from Scunthorpe's Jordan Clarke, definite red card you'd think wouldn't you? However, god knows why, the ref only saw it as a yellow, just minutes after sending off Jones. After that it all fell apart really, and in the 63rd minute McSheffrey who was a pain in the arse all game, fired a beautiful right footed shot in to the top corner to put the Iron 2 up. Annoyingly, the goal was assisted by Clarke, who shouldn't have even been on the pitch at that point. The games was wrapped up in the 78th minute when Paddy Madden hit a shot from 8 yards which went in via a few deflections. Very frustrating stuff for the spireites, the sending off changed the game really.
My man of the match: Sam Morsy
The increasingly vital midfielder had another good game today, no surprise really though. He was at the centre of everything on Tuesday and he protected the defence, and he did exactly the same today. If it hadn't of been for Morsy today, we probably wouldn't have made nearly as many chances as we did. His recently formed partnership with Chris Herd is probably, in my opinion, just as good as his midfield partnership with Jimmy Ryan last season. Other good performances came from Tommy Lee and Novak, who along with Morsy, are both starting to look a level above the rest of the team.
Player ratings:
Tommy Lee: 7
Drew Talbot: 6
Charlie Raglan: 6
Sam Hird: 6
Dan Jones: 6
Sam Morsy: 7
Chris Herd: 7
Dan Gardner: 6
Jay O'Shea: 6
Lee Novak: 7
Sylvan Ebanks-Blake: 6
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