Oxford United (h) - 09/12/25

[cesus]

15 minutes ago, StHelensRover said:

You could have easily fit everyone who was in the entire stadium into the Blackburn End or Darwen End. There is no way it was one third full. 

Don't be shouting that too loudly, that would be a dream for Pasha. Although I think they would opt for it to be the Jack Walker stand open.

[Herbie6590]

 

[Armchair supporter supremo]

9 hours ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Playing Alebiosu in a back four would negate a lot of his attacking opportunities. Not to mention the point that non of the centre halves are good enough to play in a two.

Play him on the right wing with miller at rb

[philipl]

de Keersmaker was the perfect shithouse midfielder for them but our play was too tentative and slow allowing him to be so disruptive.

Tavares probably needs a sports psychologist - there is a player there if he can build his confidence.

Baradji looks the real deal now if we can get more than ten minutes a game from him. 

Cantwell easily best player on the park when he came on. The rest of the team needs to learn howe to play with him again. 

Ryan's final balls were poor all night but he was constantly getting into position to deliver which is more than can be said for the others.

10,255 the official crowd so estimates of 7k or less actually being there not far wrong.

 

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

Feels like the Club is dying,Ewood is a morgue,an air of doom hangs over the place.

The squad is of poor quality bar one or two,the results and our league position tells all we need to know.There is nowt to look forward to.

Thats how I feel this morning folks,Its hard to swallow and its all self inflicted by those in charge...really sad times.

Edited 2 hours ago by SIMON GARNERS 194

[davulsukur]

31 minutes ago, SIMON GARNERS 194 said:

Feels like the Club is dying,Ewood is a morgue,an air of doom hangs over the place.

The squad is of poor quality bar one or two,the results and our league position tells all we need to know.There is nowt to look forward to.

Thats how I feel this morning folks,Its hard to swallow and its all self inflicted by those in charge...really sad times.

Really sad times indeed. Difficult to look at Rovers in pretty much any capacity and not think that the club is dying/nearly dead.

[OsloRover]

3 hours ago, sharpysharps86 said:

The alarming thing for me is that although they may be sitting outside the bottom 3 at the moment, Rovers have failed to beat any of the teams from 15th place down, excluding Portsmouth and Sheffield Wednesday of course who they are yet to complete a 90 minutes against.

That’s totally normal for rovers though.

[Penwortham Blue]

1 hour ago, Armchair supporter supremo said:

Play him on the right wing with miller at rb

The Nigerian AFCON squad is due to be announced today, my guess is that he will be included. Would be great for the lad but terrible for Rovers.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

7 minutes ago, OsloRover said:

That’s totally normal for rovers though.

This train of thought is what we have been reduced to and personally Im so tired of it all.

This is not the proud Club I grew up supporting,I barely recognise it in its current form.

Edited 2 hours ago by SIMON GARNERS 194

[Exiled_Rover]

1 hour ago, Armchair supporter supremo said:

Play him on the right wing with miller at rb

Similar player to Emerton.

Incredibly athletic, so a dynamic WB, but if you played him solely at RW he'd be stood up by the better LBs.

[Exiled_Rover]

10 hours ago, simongarnerisgod said:

certainly no more than 8 thousand ,we are down to the hardcore supporters now imo,thousands of fans are making their protest ,they ar`nt going to ewood anymore

You'll have lost several thousand from the gate after Saturday. It was raining again and there are clearly no guarantees a game will be finished at Ewood when it rains.

I was absolutely livid walking up the hill back to the car on Saturday - I made the decision not to go last night for the above reason.

[Exiled_Rover]

10 hours ago, Cherry Blue said:

Baradji is class and brought that needed quality and strength when he came on. 

Early days, but he looks promising that's for sure.

[rossyste]

Last night summed up for me the sad decline of our club over the last 15 years. With no investment in the Stadium infrastructure, playing squad or fan base Venkys "generated" the lowest league "attendance" at Ewood in many a year. Where does this all end with no creative thinking and fan engagement at an all time low ? I genuinely think the only option left is a match boycott to attract some media attention but would the happy clappers simply tut and attend ? It's hard to even press the Red button these days so kudos to those that attend but some people need to open there eyes to what is going on.

[Exiled_Rover]

10 hours ago, Ghost7 said:

Cost us a good few goals this season has McLoughlin. He must be stunned he's starting every game at the club given he was in and out the side for most of his Hull career at the same level and for the most finished below us.

We've been downgraded majorly in the air at the back and unsurprisingly it's costing us against even the poorest teams...

The neglected facilities and a defence that looks worse than Oxford's is all on the owners, Suhail Pasha and Rudy Gestede. We are fumbling our way to the January transfer window just about, a window in which you could sell half their summer recruits.

Not good enough, and we can't even criticise the manager for poor results since he hasn't been given the basic tools to do his job.

The season's been a farce and has scared away another 2,000 or 3,000 more fans. As I said after the Wednesday game, they don't deserve any fans in the ground, not at the prices they're charging to watch a mess of a team that hasn't received enough investment. It's sad to see.

QPR, Sheffield Wednesday and Oxford at home have been truly horrendous to attend. Shame on the club.

I'm not enjoying going to games and expect this to be my last season.

Did they have a shot on goal, besides the blatant foul the ref ignored?

[Exiled_Rover]

10 hours ago, RoversTilliDie said:

Why wasn't Baradji on from the start, hes better than half of these fairies.

Because he's clearly not fit.

[Comfortably numb]

5 hours ago, ... said:

 

Tell you what Baradji can hit a ball where on earth did that come from??

 

 

He's got a good leap on him as well. I think we saw glimpses last night of why we were prepared to sign him with his injury. Short term pain for long term gain hopefully.

It's also why I find it baffling that people write players off after seeing them play for 10 mins.

[Wheelton Blue]

8 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

You'll have lost several thousand from the gate after Saturday. It was raining again and there are clearly no guarantees a game will be finished at Ewood when it rains.

I was absolutely livid walking up the hill back to the car on Saturday - I made the decision not to go last night for the above reason.

Quite a few regular ST holders who sit near me weren't there last night, I suspect that they had the same view as you.

I pretty much had the whole row to myself.

8k tops on Ewood last night I reckon, and it'll only get worse.

[Dreams of 1995]

I could see this being a disappointing night. Everything pointed that way

We have the basics of a competitive squad but it is too imbalanced. Not enough competition in the right places, combined with injuries, has meant that we lack options from the bench to change our style and the game. I think we did well to get back into it and get a point where in times gone by we may have collapsed.

Ribeiro had a poor game but has not played much. Tended to move backwards instead of forwards. We miss Hedges down that left-hand side for sure.

I'm guessing that Gardner-Hickman got injured but he was a big miss in the 2nd half. Tavares just hasn't got it has he? I quite like it when a player looks relaxed but as I said last night, it isn't relaxation with him it is being lackadaisical. He gives the ball away too often and there were times he played these short passes with absolutely no purpose other than to move the ball on. I don't think he has it cut out to be a player in the Championship

We were unfortunate not to finish the Gardner Hickman chance. He couldn't do much more and the keeper made a fine save. It was a lovely knock down by Gudjohnson.

The Yuki chance was another which should have gone in. Except this time it was poor finishing instead of good goalkeeping. I think if Gudjohnson was there, it becomes 1-1.

I am not overly enamoured by our defensive options either. McLoughlin is a bit slow off the mark and a couple of occasions him being turned back to his goal nearly brought problems.

There's still glimpses of hope. We aren't as bad of a squad as I thought going into the season. We need to defend our box better and we need to be better and more ambitious when in possession. For sure in January we need a centre half but we also need a central midfielder who is prepared to take this game by the scruff of the neck. Take Tronstad out of the team and we don't half look like a pushover in midfield

Edited 1 hour ago by Dreams of 1995

[MarkBRFC]

McLoughlin is nowhere near good enough to be in the middle of a back 3.

That header for there goal summed him up.

You might get away with him on the left side of a 3.

[RevidgeBlue]

2 minutes ago, Dreams of 1995 said:

we also need a central midfielder who is prepared to take this game by the scruff of the neck. Take Tronstad out of the team and we don't half look like a pushover in midfield

That's somewhat of an indictment on the recruitment when you signed 3 central midfielders in the summer.

[RevidgeBlue]

2 minutes ago, RevidgeBlue said:

That's somewhat of an indictment on the recruitment when you signed 3 central midfielders in the summer.

Sorry, 4!

[Penwortham Blue]

13 minutes ago, Wheelton Blue said:

Quite a few regular ST holders who sit near me weren't there last night, I suspect that they had the same view as you.

I pretty much had the whole row to myself.

8k tops on Ewood last night I reckon, and it'll only get worse.

Same around me in the JWL, a lot of ST holders taking the comfortable option of watching from home.

[Uddersfelt Blue]

13 minutes ago, Wheelton Blue said:

Quite a few regular ST holders who sit near me weren't there last night, I suspect that they had the same view as you.

I pretty much had the whole row to myself.

8k tops on Ewood last night I reckon, and it'll only get worse.

I also made the decision not to go last night after Saturday’s fiasco and getting so pissed wet through that I was still drying out yesterday! 

Part of that decision was mitigated by the fact that I could watch on TV and suspect there are thousands of others doing the same each game. Whilst the club are benefitting from the increased TV money it does have a negative impact on attendances. Probably the worst that could have happened to a club like Rovers but good for those who don’t attend. 

The fans who want to be at Ewood supporting the team (and there are a lot on the evidence if the Derby attendance) desperately need something positive to make it worthwhile their effort. 

I’ll be there for the Millwall game (pitch permitting) 
 

 

[TimmyJimmy]

Hate the club under this Gestede/Pasha stewardship but strangely encouraged by some of the new players.

A team with Cantwell, Baradji, Gudjohnsen, Mori, Ohashi and Tronstad is a team should be exciting - yet it's not ('ish).

The problem as I see it is that we have made a wall of good bricks but no cement, we're far too easy to push over. Yet getting these guys on the ball fills me with more optimism than say the Gallaghers and Dolans of this world that we had in previous seasons (yes I know Dolans doing OK this year). Things clearly haven't clicked and I'm getting tired of "mañana, mañana, always mañana".

The cement was thrown out in the close season (now doing its work in Derby and Wrexham) to be replaced by flour and water paste. Stupid, hubristic, amateurish arrogance by you know who.

Keeping the likes of Travis, Baath and Hyam and ADDING the new guys - I think we'd be in a totally different place by now.

After 15 years I shouldn't be surprised by the arrogant incompetence but I still am.

What could have been. We're going to be lucky to stay up.

[RevidgeBlue]

5 minutes ago, Uddersfelt Blue said:

I’ll be there for the Millwall game (pitch permitting) 

For me last night was an absolute "must win" game which yet again we failed to convert.

The only positive thing was that (on TV at least) the pitch looked absolutely fine. If it's true what Mike Graham said on here yesterday that we hired some machinery from Lancs Cricket Club then it did it's job admirably and it's what we should have done after the Ipswich game.

Should keep us going until we can sort it permanently.