v Preston North End (h) - 10/12/2022

[simongarnerisgod]

1 minute ago, TheRoversReturn said:

JDT was given an absolute schooling today by his opposite number. Burnley and PNE have shown the way to neutralise our Plan A...do we have a Plan B? Hard to believe we started the game in third place. 

we`ll most likely start to fall away now,everyone has us sussed out,

[Gav]

Bad day at the office, dodgy on the roads travelling back home be careful everyone.

Beer already in the fridge ready for England game, roaring fire in pub on way back and Josh Warrington boxing after the football, its a great day of sport ahead - Did I mentioned Ebanie Bridges is also fighting - Google her. 

Come on England, Josh and of course Ebanie. 

[superniko]

Well I’ve not read past page 6 since being at the ground but a few thoughts on what was one of the most pathetic 90 minutes I’ve seen from us. 

First, the referee, worst performance I’ve seen since last night. All joking aside he was awful, the standard is so bad at this level and we say it every week. 
3 minutes added on in each half just baffling. 2nd half we had 3 goals, multiple subs, a minute where PNE fans had the ball etc. I’m really disappointed the league isn’t taking the approach of the World Cup in terms of added time, it’s so detrimental to the sport. That said, it was cold and we were shit so maybe it’s was a blessing.

Onto the match/team…I was going to make a Whiteman v Travis joke before the game (I can only assume Sparks has had a few since and rightly so)….no signal so couldn’t, but wow, I’ve said it for a long time now he just isn’t at this level, let alone our captain, if his telling attribute is passion / aggression etc then I’m baffled as he is so weak and slow. He summed up the whole team today - 2nd to every ball and out muscled on every occasion. Jason Lowe ended up at Salford after racking up an insane amount of appearances…we’re not far off that.
 

Hedges shocking, Morton the worst I’ve ever seen him, Mola not at this level at all, Szmodics didn’t even touch the ball in the first half. Is Adam Wharton injured? How is he not even making the bench?

The defence were absolutely owned by Ched Evans, he embarrassed them. 

Johnson - looks like Messi every time we play them. Bossed it for them.

Dack is the only one to come out and hold his head high, to think JDT was about to sub him too. Some of you lot wrote him off after about 100 cumulative minutes across 15 or so games, also shows you just would agree with the manager blindly as you had no evidence at all to suggest ‘he’d lost it’

I’ve said for weeks we’re in a false position, xG and every stat suggests we’re a bottom half team and we’ll start the drop to 14th soon. 
We’ve regressed as a team since last season and play far far far worse football on top of that. 

We’re about 6 months into JDTs reign and I’m still yet to see this ‘style’ or ‘high press’. Preston high pressed us and we do as we do and fail to pass it through them from the back. We did not high press them at all. We have no style, no passion and no identity. 7-1 back to back Burnley and Preston. Embarrassing.

Let’s hope England cheer up the mood tonight. 

Edited December 10, 2022 by superniko

[arbitro]

5 minutes ago, Sparks Rover said:

Travis is so limited as a player.  No pace, can't tackle, no goals....his passing is shit if its further than 10 yards.

Men v Boys in that midfield today. Tough lads in there, no fucking about.

He needs too many touches and slows the play right down. Our best performance of the season was at Blackpool when he played at full back and the midfield contained Wharton and Morton. They created, played with pace and intensity and kept the ball moving with two touches. I don't think we have seen them two together in a full game since. Jake Garrett is already better than Travis.

[DeeCee]

Embarrassing, worse, pathetic actually.

[cesus]

If this is modern progressive football then I'm checking out. Our opposition, in the last two games (our bitter piss taking rivals) from coaching staff to fans to players must be in a slight state of shock that we would continue to play a way (that we can't!) and not try to change it when its going horrificly wrong! 

 

We as fans have to sit there being laughed at by our buck tooth friends who cannot believe their luck that we would continue to keep handing them the game. All the while our players are just getting smaller and smaller.

 

I'm struggling to go two footed on Travis as he has shown in my opinion he has an effective game in the last few seasons, a rough scrappy game but he is very efficient at that game and we have liked him for it. Something is massively a miss at what he is trying or being asked to do as a player, I currently see a player before me who would be struggling to get in Clitheroe team.

Edited December 10, 2022 by cesus

[Miller11]

36 minutes ago, den said:

TBH building from the back is good, it’s how most international teams play now. JDT’s problem is that he doesn’t have the players to play that game. He can try week after week to get them to do it but doesn’t know what to do when it’s not working. He came into this with no experience of championship football and it shows. I don’t believe he’ll turn this around.

Personally I don’t see anything good about it. I think everyone playing that way is killing the game and making it incredibly boring. Purely from a Rovers point of view it is costing us more goals than it creates.

I don’t think he will ever ditch the idea of wanting to play this way and will persist with it to the teams detriment. Luckily we got more points on the board than I expected before he has truly put his stamp on the team.

[Claytons Left Boot]

1 hour ago, Mashed Potatoes said:

If Venkys are never in the town, how do you run them out ?

They were in town, sporadically, until the snowball incident, so not quite true.

It was a figure of speech, though, but you knew that. 

[Mashed Potatoes]

1 minute ago, Claytons Left Boot said:

They were in town, sporadically, until the snowball incident, so not quite true.

It was a figure of speech, though, but you knew that. 

You seemed to be advocating some kind of physical action by the "youth" so what did you mean ?

[bigbrandjohn]

Watching Morocco score this isn’t complicated. Just pass forward,  move off the ball and attack ffs. A side pass should warrant a booking. 

The warm weather training was the worst preparation. They should have had a week in the Lake District. 

[arbitro]

65% possession for Rovers according to the BBC. We lost 4-1, we second best all over the pitch and should have lost by more. Most of our players were shockingly poor and cowardly in possession.

What a nonsense stats like that are and weak managers hide behind them.

[LDRover]

I see the forum's number 1 contrarian is in full flow.

[Mashed Potatoes]

3 minutes ago, LDRover said:

I see the forum's number 1 contrarian is in full flow.

It's a forum, not an echo chamber - so whoever it is you are referring to can have their say.

Edited December 10, 2022 by Mashed Potatoes

[Sparks Rover]

16 minutes ago, bigbrandjohn said:

The warm weather training was the worst preparation. They should have had a week in the Lake District. 

I think this has been a significant cock up.  Ok, in summer you come back and play matches in sunshine for a while.....straight into the bleak mid winter has not been to our little boys likings....they like doing step overs in sunshine v Ajax.

I know for a fact nobbers played 2 behind closed doors games v St Johnstone and someone else, full pelt games in the cold.

Manager has some learning to do.  January is crucial

[bradford rover]

A month off to prepare for that !!! Just got home and had time to calm down but that was utterly s**t and embarrassing. We cannot play out from the back and the midfield was none existant, Dack the only one who seemed to care!! Oh and the ref was the usual standard how long you letting them have to celebrate a goal and then stroll back to there own half . Not been so annoyed in a long long time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cherry Blue]

jdt is still learning his trade and Rovers are his current learning patch. He probably doesn't understand what getting beat with Burnley & then Preston means. Then again he probably doesn't give any thought to it.

 

 

[broadsword]

1 hour ago, Dan said:

I know you all think I’m a yob now, but I’m 29 miles away, so I still think it’s an impressive feat. 
 

ps. Is that message Broadsword calling Danny Boy? 😉 😂

Father Mccree, you have it in one.

 

"Security? The word's become a bloody joke!"

[Paul Mani]

Absolutely horrific performance from start to finish. The game was lost in midfield for me. Travis is broken and Morton wants too many touches on the ball. Neither of them are clever enough to take the ball properly off the cb’s which is why we’re constantly getting caught out. If you’re a midfielder like Buckley, Wharton or Garrett you should be banging the managers door down tomorrow….if JDT doesn’t think any of them can do any better than Travis right now then they need to find new clubs. Whiteman and and Ledson, two middle of the road Championship midfielders were made to look like world beaters.

Hyam, Carter and Wharton all had stinkers too.

Our best player was Dack. I said it before his goal, he was the only one to come out of it with any credit.

The managers subs were bewildering. They had to refresh the midfield not the front line. Take your talisman off 2 mins after pulling the game back to 2-1 🙈😩

 

[Sparks Rover]

4 minutes ago, Paul Mani said:

 Whiteman and and Ledson, two middle of the road Championship midfielders were made to look like world beaters.

 

I see what you did there....🤣🤣

Where's the 10m man?  

[simongarnerisgod]

1 minute ago, Paul Mani said:

Absolutely horrific performance from start to finish. The game was lost in midfield for me. Travis is broken and Morton wants too many touches on the ball. Neither of them are clever enough to take the ball properly off the cb’s which is why we’re constantly getting caught out. If you’re a midfielder like Buckley, Wharton or Garrett you should be banging the managers door down tomorrow….if JDT doesn’t think any of them can do any better than Travis right now then they need to find new clubs. Whiteman and and Ledson, two middle of the road Championship midfielders were made to look like world beaters.

Hyam, Carter and Wharton all had stinkers too.

Our best player was Dack. I said it before his goal, he was the only one to come out of it with any credit.

The managers subs were bewildering. They had to refresh the midfield not the front line. Take your talisman off 2 mins after pulling the game back to 2-1 🙈😩

 

can`t really blame the three at the back,they were constantley under pressure from us losing the ball in midfield,this system makes travis and morton look terrible tbh,both of them are limited so expecting them to take the ball from so deep and pass it through any team like xavi and iniesta did is`nt ever going to work,we need to play our football in the others team box not in or near our own

[LDRover]

15 minutes ago, Mashed Potatoes said:

It's a forum, not an echo chamber - so whoever it is you are referring to can have their say.

Agreed.

It would also be good if said poster referred to the thread title when 'having their say' as I'm yet to see any appraisal of the game from them

[Alan75]

Haven't posted for some time. The last two games have been an shocking. I can and have put up with a number of defeats over the years, but I have to say this team has no commitment or ability to play this tip tap football, that JDT favours. Sadly I believe that JDT is too set in his ways and doesn't have a plan B.  If he cant change tactic or the players then his days are numbered. 

[garnersfags]

When we saw that Dack was starting ahead of Gally, none of us could believe it.

6 home wins in a row, since September. JDT was the only person on earth that thought changing the personnel and formation was the way to keep that run going.

These changes were the reason that there wasn't a single Rovers player that was comfortable with the new formation, and we deservedly didn't have a sniff in the 1st half.

Then when we scored and developed a tiny bit of momentum, he decided to arrest that momentum by making the substitutions (taking off our only goalscorer), and sure enough, although Gally played well, that was our miniscule chance gone. 

I've said before that it is not JDTs objective and priority to get the ball to Brereton, or to score, or to win. The priority is to play the ball out from the back, pass it slowly through the phases, and eventually involve our front players. 

It is of no concern to him whether we win or lose, regardless of the opponent, as long as we perpetuate the experiment, and stick to the project plan. 

I'm not saying JDT out, or anything of the sort, but to change the players and system that has produced 6 consecutive victories, over 3 months, shows where his priorities lie. 

I do not agree that the players were to blame today,  any more than they were to blame for our disastrous run of midweek away performances.

The players do not buy in to these experimental tactics, and they sent a subconscious but clear message to JDT today. 

Pathetic doesn't even touch the surface. 

Defend away, project fans. 

[Sparks Rover]

2 minutes ago, Alan75 said:

Haven't posted for some time. The last two games have been an shocking. I can and have put up with a number of defeats over the years, but I have to say this team has no commitment or ability to play this tip tap football, that JDT favours. Sadly I believe that JDT is too set in his ways and doesn't have a plan B.  If he cant change tactic or the players then his days are numbered. 

Been saying it for years, we haven't got the players to play a 3 at back.  You need pace and natural talent on the ball....ours haven't got that.....Hyam is a good 442 centre half, Carthorse is shite, Scott I think it only suited to a back 4....even I can see that and I don't work with them.

 

[alcd]

55 minutes ago, arbitro said:

He needs too many touches and slows the play right down. Our best performance of the season was at Blackpool when he played at full back and the midfield contained Wharton and Morton. They created, played with pace and intensity and kept the ball moving with two touches. I don't think we have seen them two together in a full game since. Jake Garrett is already better than Travis.

That's a very low bar. Based on his showing at Burnley, Garrett is miles off it as well.