It appears the wheels have come off Exeter City's bid to mount a push towards the play-off and automatic promotion places.
Saturday's performance against Northampton Town was arguably the worst City fans have endured at home this season – even when the Grecians went seven games without a win at the start of the campaign they picked up credible draws against Portsmouth and York City at St James's Park.
Once they went behind against the Cobblers on Saturday the prospect of them getting anything out of the game seemed fairly remote.
And this is from a side that had been renowned for rousing comebacks this campaign – wins against Cambridge, Dagenham & Redbridge, Wycombe and Shrewsbury all happened despite City conceding the first goal.
So why were City so incapable of turning the Northampton game around when they were so brilliant at it earlier in the season?
I think a lot has to do with the fact that they managed just one shot on target after going behind – and a rather weak one at that. They seem to have lost a bit of their creative spark going forward.
The poor run of form has coincided with Matt Grimes' departure to Swansea City for £1.75m. The fact that he is no longer in the side goes some way to explaining why City aren't creating the amount of chances they were when the Grecians, lets say, recorded their best comeback of the season against Shrewsbury. It was of course Grimes who got the revival going with his ball into Tom Nichols for City's opening goal that day.
Manager Paul Tisdale does have other options available to him though in trying to get City creating more.
Firstly he could decide to bring Matt Oakley out of the centre of defence and play him in a more advanced, midfield role.
He did this recently, when City were searching for a winner against Burton Albion in Decemeber, and praised the 36-year-old's movement in and around the box.
If he did that again it would of course leave a space open in the centre of defence, but that is one that would be easily filled by Jordan Moore-Taylor.
And while, it was Danny Butterfield who failed to win the near post header for Northampton's opener on Saturday, you feel replacing Oakley for Moore-Taylor might give City a bit more presence in the air when defending balls into their box.
Tisdale could also switch back to the 3-5-2, or 5-3-2, formation that was employed so well as City won six from 10 league games in September and October.
This formation is suited to the players City currently have at their disposal and should see them create more going forward.
For me, with Grimes gone, Christian Ribeiro is City's most creative player.
The 3-5-2 system allows him to get forward more and that would provide more crosses for the City strikers to get on the end of.
Craig Woodman, on the left side, is also very good at delivering a telling ball into the box.
Changing to 3-5-2 would more than likely prevent Tisdale from moving Oakley out of the centre of defence – he is not overly blessed with options at centre-half with Pat Baldwin out for the rest of the campaign.
However, there is money available. Tisdale has said that he won't be signing lots and lots of players in the January transfer window, but if the right player became available they could change things.
You imagine that 'right player' might be a commanding centre-half. It would enable Tisdale to tweak things to give him more options going forward and also help sure things up defensively – because, let's face it, three clean sheets from 26 games isn't good enough either.
