Reaction to Rob Burch's 2008/9

Rob Burch was the replacement for Alan Marriott and made 49 appearances for the club during his debut season, only missing the other due to injury. Much like Marriott, he is certainly capable of some howlers, but can also be the difference between heavy defeats and draws and potential defeats.

The one thing you'll always remember about Burch is those goals he conceded from long range during the season, but the thing you also have to remember about those is that the defence never seemed to be in a hurry to get to the scorer. The defence allowed the scorer that much space without trying to close down and the goals such as Rochdale and Accrington were unstoppable from Burch. Then again, there were the efforts of Chester and Bournemouth when Burch's positioning was terrible.

However, the stats show that he has been our best goalkeeper in recent years. Comparing his stats to Alan Marriott's last year, he conceded fewer goals in more games, had a considerable longer time between conceding and kept over double the amount of clean sheets that Marriott did.

Let's not also forget the decent saves that he provided and we would have been far worse off if we didn't have Burch in the starting line-up. This goalkeeper has a bright future ahead of him and can only improve as time goes on, who knows what he'll achieve with a half decent defence in front of him.