Wycombe Wanderers have lacked attacking threat in most, if not all, of their games during the back-end of the 24/25 season, and the same issue has continued this season. So, many fans have been questioning the tactics used by head coach, Mike Dodds. The fact that Wanderers have allowed many attacking players to leave during this summers transfer window, and haven’t replaced them, has of course, been questioned too. With the window closing today at 7pm, has the ship sailed?
So, why do Wycombe seemingly ignore the issues that are clearly present? That’s the question that many are asking, but it may go unanswered, at least, that seems to be the case for the time being.
Saturday’s game away to Stevenage is where the questions seemed to be louder than ever, especially in regards to the lack of attacking threat that Wanderers have shown over the months in which Mike Dodds has been in charge. While they dominated the possession stats, having 61% in their most recent match, nothing was done with it, and the Blues did not manage to register a shot on target the entire game.
Defense hasn’t been up to the standard it was before, silly mistakes at the back leading to goals conceded far too easily. Playing the ball from the back is far too dangerous, especially when a press is enough to unsettle our defenders, and if the ball is taken from them, it leaves van Saas open.
Wycombe have conceded nine and scored five in the six that they have played so far, compared to seven conceded and ten scored at this stage last campaign, six of those being against the two teams that took automatic promotion (Birmingham and Wrexham)
The departures of Richard Kone, Sam Vokes, Brandon Hanlan, Beryly Lubala, Kieran Sadlier and Garath McCleary have definitely not helped things. Daniel Udoh, Bradley Fink, Junior Quitirna and Fred Onyedinma remain. When Kone was injured last season, Wycombe’s attack was nullified. Even when he did return, he only scored two under Mike Dodds.
After the loss to Stevenage on Saturday, Mike Dodds commented on the match, saying that the team had “No Plan B”, the club are “Too far down the line to change” and “We just need to make Plan A better.” How can it be made better when the players needed are not there? Plan A, as he calls it, clearly does not work.
This follows the interview after the loss at Exeter, where Mike Dodds spoke about how Wycombe dominated throughout most of the match, saying that “If you played the game ten times, we [Wycombe] would have won ten times.”
Wanderers have dominated the possession statistics in most of their matches, Stevenage wasn’t any different, but in three out of six of their games played so far, they only scored in the second half, also failing to score at all in two.
Mike Dodds is seemingly unwilling to change his style of play, even though it has not worked, and there are no signs that it is going to change anytime soon.
While there are still more than eight hours left of the summer transfer window remaining, it all seems very quiet in terms of incomings, but only time will tell what’s going to happen.
