Review of season 2007-08

Barnet entered October in 9^th place, five matches unbeaten and two wins on the spin. Giuliano Grazioli had gone on loan to Ryman Premier League side, AFC Wimbledon and James Cole went on loan to Wingate and Finchley.

The Bees were looking good after a difficult start, the defence - Devera, Yakubu, Burton and Gillet - looked solid, the central midfield pairing of Bishop and Wright was gelling well and the midfield was not being overrun as had happened in the previous season. Jason Puncheon was in great form, attracting a lot of scouts and Adam Birchall was beginning to run into form after a rather flat start. Rather surprisingly, Liam Hatch, who almost went to Cambridge United in the summer, had not started a game yet, though he had made 7 substitute appearances.

Hatch was again on the bench for the visit of highly fancied, Wycombe who went 1-0 up in the first half. Barnet were giving a rather tired performance, until Hatch came on as a second half substitute and livened up the Bees' performance, firing home a fine Adam Birchall cross to put the scores level and then, Puncheon scored a late winner to make it 3 wins in 3 and 6 matches unbeaten.

The following Saturday saw the Bees travel to Stockport County, another side going quite well and the Bees made it 4 wins out of 4, with a stunning 4-2 win at Edgeley Park. Josh Wright and Ashley Carew scored their first goals for the Bees and Adam Birchall scored twice. Birchall was again on target at Brighten, but the Bees crashed out of the JPT at the 1^st round stage, going down 2-1. Birchall's goal gave him 5 for the season, just behind Jason Puncheon on 6.

Barnet went into the home match with bottom club, Mansfield Town, unbeaten in 7 games, in 6^th place and one of the form teams in the division. The Bees were expected t win, but gave a poor performance, but came back from a goal down to grab a point with a goal from substitute, Liam Hatch. They should have taken all three points, but Jason Puncheon's last minute penalty was saved. It was to be the first of a run of drawn matches that the Bees should have won.

Nevertheless, the draw had extended Barnet's unbeaten run to 8 matches and the following Saturday, they made it 9 with a fine 2-0 win at struggling Wrexham, both goals coming from Liam Hatch making his first start of the season and now with 4 goals to his name. Jason Norville had made way for Hatch. Graz returned from his loan spell at AFC Wimbledon, while Danny Hart went on loan to Northwood.

The last game of the month saw one of the best games of the season as Accrington Stanley came to Underhill, Barnet going into the match in 5^th place. After going a goal down, a wonderful Liam Hatch goal and a first Barnet goal for Sagi Burton looked to have won the game for Barnet, but a Lee Harrison blunder allowed Accrington to draw level and for the 2^nd consecutive home game, two points were lost unnecessarily.

The following Saturday, Barnet travelled to Bury on the back of a 10 match unbeaten run but crashed back down to earth losing 3-0. It was to be the beginning of a slump in Barnet's league form, though the following Tuesday, Barnet gave a fine performance at home to Notts County, but for the third home game in a row a match that should have been won ended up as a draw. A stunning Jason Puncheon goal put the Bees ahead, but a second half clanger by Lee Harrison meant that Barnet had thrown away 6 points in the last 3 matches. The match saw the return after injury of Michael Leary.

However, Barnet went into the 1^st round FA Cup match at home to Gillingham in a healthy 8^th place in the league, just 3 points off of a play off place. The cup match saw the return to Underhill of last season's player of the year, Simon King who had moved to the Kent club in the summer for £200,000 as well as Barry Cogan. Barnet came back from a 1-0 half time deficit with goals from Ismail Yakubu and a fine Liam Hatch goal from a superb Kenny Gillet cross. This time there were no slip ups and the Bees took the League One club's scalp to go into the 2^nd round draw, where Barnet were drawn to play Blue Square Premier club, Burton Albion away.

Barnet league form continued to slump though as a late goal at Shrewsbury brought about a 1-0 defeat. The month ended with the now almost compulsory defeat at home to jinx club, Grimsby Town, the Bees losing 3-0. After their 10 match unbeaten run, Barnet had now taken just 1 point from 4 games. Meanwhile, Josh Wright's loan period was due to due to run out meaning that following the next league match at Chester, Paul Fairclough would have to wait until the January transfer window opened to try and get him back to Underhill on loan. Stephane Seanla, who was rarely even making the bench, went on loan to St. Albans City.

MK Dons, Darlington and Rotherham were in the 3 automatic promotion places, while only 2 points separated the bottom 5 clubs; Wrexham, Lincoln, Grimsby, Dagenham & Redbridge and Mansfield. The Bees needed to get back to winning ways and reverse their recent slump. Nobody wanted to get caught up in the relegation struggle.