An early and quick post this week, as the missus and I are away to celebrate her birthday for the next few days. Rest assured though, we will be wending our way to Wigan on Saturday morning!

I am not 100% sure why but despite Orient showing some encouraging signs, especially in the first half, I felt a little bit despondent after the match against Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday. It wasn’t that I thought we played badly per se, it just felt that we had been our own worst enemies with the sloppy nature of the goals that we conceded. Just as we had on far too many occasions last season. 

As we touched upon in the season preview a couple of weeks back (The Orient Nerd Season Preview 2026-27), it has been another summer of significant change at Orient. In fact, of the starting eleven named by Richie Wellens on Saturday, only three had been with us last season. Out of that trio only Idris El Mizouni could be deemed to be an experienced player, as Zech Obiero and Phil Chinedu are still very much young players looking to establish themselves. Both of course having had spells out on loan last season. 

Rather surprisingly we opted not to have a substitute goalkeeper on the bench. According to the gaffer this was by deliberate choice, although he did bemoan the limited number of subs that can be named in league matches compared to the League Cup in which we played the previous weekend. Theo Archibald was also ruled out, apparently with a slight hamstring issue.

Despite the unfamiliarity of the line-up, we actually started the match positively and fashioned a couple of decent chances. The first, El Miz lofted over the bar after being set up by an excellent driving run by Yusuf Akhamrich. For the second, the Spurs’ loanee forced a decent save from Joe Lumley in the visitors’ goal. 

Disaster struck just before the midway point of the first half (I WILL not refer to it as a “quarter” after the World Cup this summer!), when Big Phil underhit a back pass aimed at Nathan Baxter, our keeper panicked and succeeded only in thumping his attempted clearance into the back of the onrushing Callum Slattery, the ball then ricocheted off the Wednesday player and into the net. Unlucky? Perhaps, but these are the sort of errors that really hurt a team as we know only too well. 

We managed to get back on terms just before the half hour mark. A clash between Jaze Kabia and Sil Swinkels, saw the Owls’ defender having to leave the field under the new guidance to speed up the game. Play was restarted with a drop-ball which Fin Stevens played into the goalmouth before any defender could contest it, Kabia nodded it on and Joseph Olowu was on hand to slot it home. 

Early in the second half El Miz saw an effort from range come crashing back off the right-hand post. Then, on the hour the whole match changed. Somto Boniface went down injured and had to be taken off. It is fair to say that his replacement, James Morris, has impressed since joining us in January. However, this will be a match, a 12-minute spell in fact, that the former Watford man will want to forget as soon as possible.

Morris’ first involvement was to be played around too easily as Wednesday attacked down their right, Jamal Lowe headed the resultant cross past a helpless Baxter, but thankfully the linesman’s flag came to our rescue, and the “goal” was ruled out. 

Baxter then made a good stop to deny Lowe after Morris hadn’t been strong enough in trying to stop Slattery driving down the right and playing in a low cross. To cap off a miserable afternoon for our left back, he was then adjudged to have pulled Lowe down in the penalty area, and the Wednesday forward calmly sent Baxter the wrong way and tucked the spot-kick into the bottom left-hand corner. 

Things could have got even worse just minutes later when Morris’ weak header towards Baxter was seized upon by Barry Bannan, but inexplicably the experienced midfielder somehow contrived to drag his shot wide of an open net after rounding the keeper. In what seemed as much an act of mercy as a tactical switch, Morris was replaced by loanee forward Nick Oyekunle.  

There was a late chance for Armando Dobra from a long throw, but he couldn’t get his shot on target, and we were consigned to our fourth consecutive opening day loss. Having started the game so encouragingly, to lose it through our own sloppiness felt frustrating. We of course play AFC Wimbledon in the EFL Trophy tonight, but the important thing is to make sure we get something out of the trip to Wigan. A second successive league defeat would start to bring up bitter memories of last season when we seemed to take two steps back for every one forward. 

Up the O’s!