Walsall 1-0 Orient

A dull game was won by a tremendous strike by ex-O Adam Chambers at the Banks's Stadium. The midfielder, who spent 5 years at Orient, struck from thirty yards to condemn Orient to defeat in an otherwise dull encounter.

Both teams spent the early stages sizing each other up before Walsall started to dominate with the ball. Passing by Orient never seemed to have any purpose but Walsall's dominance with the ball in the early stages never threatened Lee Butcher in the Orient goal. 20 minutes in and Leon McSweeney charged down a Saddlers shot and it fell to ex-O Chambers and the inevitable happened. The Orient midfield stood off Chambers as he had time to pick his strike and smash it into Butcher's top corner from 30 yards. The rest of the half offered little in way of chances for either side, especially Orient who failed to have a shot in the first stanza. Orient passing was poor and had no real purpose before Jock Waugh blew the half-time whistle. The goal apart, neither goalkeeper was forced to make a save in the first half.

The second half was slightly more open then the first as both teams had settled and Orient had come to terms with the long grass on the pitch. It took Orient 60 minutes before we had a shot on goal, however, when we did, we tested Jimmy Walker in the Walsall goal. Two headers by Jimmy Smith forced Walker to tip one over and the other away from danger in a short space of time. Russell Slade gave Jonathan Tehoue 20 minutes to make a mark and the big Frenchmen won more headers in that short period then Cureton and Revell made in the seventy minutes previous.

The game had 0-0 written all over it but a piece of magic from a great servent to the O's gave Walsall the points. Its games like yesterday's that Orient can't afford to have many times this season. Walsall are favourites to be in a relegation dog fight and Orient struggled against these sort of teams last campaign and if we want to have a season similar to that of last seasons then we really need to be winning these games, full credit to Walsall and Dean Smith though.

Adam Chambers. A name that will have filled this box before, however, he was in the red of Walsall yesterday and not the red of Orient. For Orient, nobody springs to mind.
Wasn't tested very much by Walsall, there was no fault of Butcher's for the Walsall goal, no one was stopping that. Restricted. He has no natural winger ahead of him so when he was getting into these decent positions, he had no one ahead of him to pass to. Had a lot of the ball and was the man who started the few positive moves we had. Steady debut, did very little wrong. Looks a good signing. Was barely noticable in the first half but was a lot more active in the second and was making runs and crosses to put Walsall in danger. A few good runs and good balls in the second half. Didn't know he was on the pitch in the first half, very unlucky not have the equaliser after the break. Horrendous. His passing was dire and negative, he bottled tackles countless times and overall had an afternoon to forget. Did very little and was subsequently subbed. Dragged out wide a lot and struggled to offer much up front. Looked off the pace after missing most of pre-season. The Ginger Geordie looked useful and comfortable on the ball. Was the nuisance we needed, maybe earlier but he offered us something. Looked pacey and lively but only had 7 minutes to make a mark.

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