What a difference a week makes! After reflecting in last week’s post on a frustrating week for O’s fans (Orient Nerd Weekly Ramblings- Orient are stuck in a rut and can’t seem to get out.), this week after a dramatic (and lucky!) win against Oldham in the FA Cup and a much better team performance and result against an admittedly poor Bristol Rovers side in the league, things feel a bit rosier.

Oldham FA Cup

Sometimes in our football watching lives, we need a reminder of why we fell in love with the game in the first place, as well as what keeps us going back to watch our team week in and week out. Saturday afternoon’s FA Cup 2^nd round match at home to Oldham certainly did that.

While the game itself was undeniably short of any real quality, there was enough of a sprinkling of unexpected and quite frankly crazy moments to make sure that it is a match that will be remembered by Orient fans long into the future. The fact that Dan Agyei’s winner in added time of extra time isn’t the most talked about moment of the match, tells you just how bonkers this cup tie was.

It all started in a fairly uneventful manner, the crowd seemed somewhat subdued, the atmosphere was lacking, and it felt very much a case of whether Orient would be able to find the breakthrough against a stubbornly resilient Oldham side. Although veteran striker James Norwood should have put the visitors into the lead but ballooned a glorious opportunity over the bar.  At the half-time break there was little hint of what was going to come later in the match.

Early in the second half, a long throw by Reagan Ogle seemed to avoid everyone congregated in the penalty area and somehow found its way into the back of the net. Watching on from the East Stand I didn’t realise at the time and thought it was just down to sloppy defending, but the ball didn’t seem to touch anyone at all on its way through and should most likely have been ruled out.

From there things started to feel more and more desperate as we searched for a way back into the match. In the final minute Ollie O’Neill very nearly repeated his trick from last season of scoring straight from a corner but saw his effort clatter off the far post. Then just as we were all starting to give up hope and beginning to resign ourselves to having witnessed the O’s being giantkilled again, up stepped our on loan goalkeeper Josh Keeley.

As we entered the final minute of the 8 added on we won a free kick out on the left wing. Initially Keeley seemed somewhat reluctant to go up to make himself a nuisance in the area, seeking permission from our bench. Eventually gaffer Richie Wellens nodded his approval. With an impeccable sense of timing, just as Keeley arrived in the box he was in the perfect spot to head (or shoulder even!) Tom James’ delivery past Matt Hudson in the Oldham goal to keep us in the cup again. Cue complete and utter pandemonium around Brisbane Road. In all the many many matches I have been to in my life, I have never seen a keeper score live.

However the drama wasn’t finished there, as we approached the end of the first period of extra time, Dom Ball was upended as he drove into the penalty box and the referee rightly pointed to the spot. Dan Agyei tried one of those stuttering, stop-start run-ups but succeeded only in firing his effort wide.

For the remainder of extra time there was an increasing feeling of inevitability that this would be the second tie in a row that would be settled via penalties. However right at the death Agyei was on hand to bundle home after Sonny Perkins had headed a deep corner back into the goalmouth. With that we were through to the third round. How we got away with it I still can’t put my finger on, but as I was reminded by someone in the Supporters Club after the game: in cup competitions it really doesn’t matter how you progress as long as you do.

Our reward is of course a slightly underwhelming home tie against Derby County. While I think it is fair to say that the majority of us wanted an away tie at one of the Premier League big boys, it should boost the coffers, and the Rams may see their priorities as lying elsewhere.

Bristol Rovers in the League

On Tuesday night we were back in league action at home to Bristol Rovers and for the first time in what feels like a long time the O’s very much put on a show. Right from the start of the match there seemed a crispness and intensity to our play, both in and out of possession, with much more fluidity and intent to our attack.

Deprived of their manager, Matt Taylor, due to a family emergency which has required him to take a leave of absence, Bristol Rovers didn’t seem up to much, but at the same time I think we did a very effective job of both taking the game to them and nullifying any threat they could muster. I might be slightly biased here, but I really don’t remember former Orient forwards Ruel Sotiriou and Shaq Forde doing very much at all in the game.

The first real noteworthy incident of the match was when skipper Darren Pratley came off worst from a clash of heads with Rovers’ Jamie Lindsay and had to leave the field. The one consolation was that Prats was able to walk off the pitch and hopefully it is just a case of him following the concussion protocol.

It was three first half goals that pretty much settled the match as a contest before the break. The first came on 17 minutes when Dan Happe was able to reach an in-swinging Tom James free kick and head home via the post. Just before the half hour mark Ollie O’Neill finally rediscovered his form from the back end of last season and notched a brilliant, almost trademark, strike, cutting in from the left and curling a vicious right footed effort just inside the far post.

A seemingly rejuvenated Dan Agyei made it 3-0 in added time at the end of the first half when he won the ball on the bye-line, dribbled towards goal and then unleashed a rocket that left Rovers’ keeper Josh Griffiths with little chance of stopping it.

For the first time in a long time our front three looked much more like the threat that we always knew/ hoped they could be. It wasn’t just Agyei and O’Neill, Sonny Perkins looks like he is growing in confidence and instead of drifting around the periphery of the game as he has tended to do, he was very much in the midst of the action. There was one moment just before Agyei’s goal where he tenaciously won possession deep in Rovers’ territory and quickly released Agyei, which struck me as being exactly what we want to see from the young wide forward.

It wasn’t just the front three though, Jamie Donley operating just behind Agyei in the number 10 role as Ethan Galbraith is still ill, looked comfortable on the ball and provided an effective link between the midfield and forwards.

In midfield Dom Ball looked very much as if he is getting closer and closer to full fitness. Not only was he a calming influence in the centre of the park, but the way he was so disciplined as the holding midfielder allowed both Tom James and Jack Currie to come inside at times to provide an overload in midfield and also support the attack.

While cup hero Josh Keeley and the back four weren’t put under very much pressure and in truth had little to do, they stayed composed and organised and didn’t really give the Rovers forwards much of a sniff.

All in all it was a very encouraging performance and a much-needed victory as we look to get ourselves going in the league. Next up of course is a trip to Wigan who after beating Northampton on Tuesday night sit 2 points above us in the table. Another solid performance and hopefully another 3 points would really help us to build on the momentum that we have generated this week. After that is a short trip to Charlton in the EFL Trophy and then a home game against bottom of the table Burton.  

Up The O’s!