Athletic came unstuck at Edgeley Park as they succomed to a disappointing 3-1 loss. Andy Liddell got them off to a flyer with a corner kick which went straight in after 24 minutes but County fought back to secure all three points with a second half performance which produced three goals. Athletic had a major share of the play but achieved nothing due to poor finishing.A furious John Sheridan confessed, "I'm angry, very angry and I'm disappointed for the fans. I'm angry with the manner in which the goals were conceded and with certain people who know who they are. I'll keep that within the dressing room, but I'm not happy at all. Stockport had five attempts on goal, two of the goals have come from throw-ins and the third especially was a joke. The players need to look at themselves. The goals were very disappointing and we weren't ruthless enough at the other end. At the end of the day we didn't have a leader without Sean Gregan on the pitch - we had no-one getting a grip of our players and bossing them around."
"Everyone could see we were in control of the game in the first half. We caused them a lot of problems, but the good teams know how to take the game by the scruff of the neck and we just didn't do that. We had good players in the first half and bad ones in the second half. There's my magic word again - consistency."
To sum up, Athletic suffered their first defeat of the season and excuses like "Gregan was missing" cannot be tolerated any more. The Latics faithful have been led to believe that this is 'our season' and that we have the strength and depth of squad to cover any frailties. The truth of the matter is that the Latics defence looked fragile at times. This could be a turning point in the season and time will tell whether we have what it takes for promotion. This result will be a judge of the Latics character and only they can prove their worth with a positive result after the disappointment. Next up is Hereford United and then it's the big clash with Leicester City. If we can beat those two teams, the result at Stockport will pale into insignificance.