Lancaster Rover

I’ve taken the brave decision to stay at home in Lancaster, with the fire on and watch it on telly. Can’t be arsed getting soaking wet for another calamitous call off.

Half of Millars throws were big looping ones midweek, that takes a lot of the threat away IMO. If it’s arrowed in like a driven corner they’re murder to deal with, otherwise the effort to get him over there isn’t worth the outcome

Even by the usual standards of being contrary this is surely talking the piss. A loan signing whose only contribution so far is using our medical facilities and looks he will be doing into November at the earliest. We’ve got a self imposed 10k wage cap but are happy to pay the wages of another teams player while he undergoes treatment with seemingly no timescale on when he will actually play for us. As batshit mental signings go, and there has been a few under Venky’s this one is right up there.

I remember the first game at home against Norwich, passive press, possession without any real intent too much space between players, too much space through the middle when opposition attack. I sat through that first half where we made Duffy look like Beckenbaur and to be honest not a lot has changed since. VI is crap, his record is crap.

@chaddyrovers the reaction isn't after 2 defeats, it's after 5 defeats in 7 games in the league, with a terrifying amount at home. Including last season it's 10 losses, 6 wins and 3 draws.

Good player and the pick of (a very poor) the summer, that said he isn't an upgrade on Brittain.

Same on FbRef

A whole load of ex-pro's graduated from the PFA's leaders in football business course last month, as they do every year. If we were so desperate for an ex-pro to fulfil the role invented for Rudy then there are lots of qualified players out there. Rudy (shock horror) isn't one of them.

I still don't think the Cantwell one was a penalty. I'm also sick to the back teeth of the lack of ownership of our problems and fans washing it away. Ref's don't score goals, neither do they concede them. They don't set the tactics, or the team up and they don't make transfers. Over the course of a season the worst teams are near the bottom, it's nothing to do with luck. It's to do with performing in a manner that results in an inability to gather points. We are where we are because we've been crap for the majority of the games we've played this season, the result against Hull and the performance against Ipswich have been the exception not the norm. This is nothing new, we were also crap for the vast majority of the season from November onward last year. I can't be arsed doing it but I bet if we put together a league table from December 2024 to now it would make for pretty grim reading.

There will be though, loads of excuses. EFL hates is, bad luck etc. all bollocks, good teams win games, not turn leads into losses. Zero ownership of the issues. I didn’t think it was a pen, he was looking for it too obviously

Pay peanuts, you get players like Kargbo. Bereft of any quality

Ribeiros’ passing has been so loose tonight

Can’t wait for Tavares to come on and give them a winner

McLoufhlin is proper thick, what on earth was he thinking there

Cantwell is such a knob

The issue we have at the moment is teams poorly replicating parts of a system used by the best team ever (2012 Barcelona). The first mistake they make is that Barcelona were able to play that way due to their personnel and over 20’yeara of honing their style. As an interesting aside, Barcelona scored over 70% of their goals through counter attacks which flys in the face of the notion they played around the back endlessly. In reality they won the ball back made a few combinations in midfield to draw the press and then created overloads. Secondly and a point of heard discussed a lot recently in podcasts and coaching articles is within football theory the aim is to simply score 1 more goal than the other team. The chances if Themis are highest when you are closest to their goal, the chances of conceding are when you’re closest to your goal so possession without intent means that at some stage you will lose the ball and risk conceding. Johan Cruyff said “always look the furthest pass and work your way backward”, he wanted forward passes as quickly as possible, we’re suffering a huge misrepresentation of the great man’s way of playing at the moment with the endless backward passing. Going forward is positive, sideways is neither good or bad, backwards is the opposite of the basics of football theory

Performance wise I was very pleasantly surprised, albeit I thought Ipswich were well below what I was expecting. Tronstad and Hickman had a relatively easy day IMO. Pitch wise the minute the ball stuck giving Kargbo change to pounce it was game over, they can’t allow the weather to impact the result in such an obvious way. It’ll no doubt be replayed in full with 11 v 11, the player will serve his ban starting tomorrow and we’ll get no benefit from the man advantage in the replay. It’ll likely be played during our post Jan injury slump and we’ll get beat. Sods bloody law

It has been forwarded on to Yasir, I wait with baited breath

I'd say on viewings so far we are weaker. The only player we've signed that I believe would get in last years starting 11 would be Gudjohnssen, and that is based purely on his Iceland games and the fact that we're so light at centre froward. From a lively cameo (in a dreadful game) and a start you'd maybe say Morisihito would interchange with Dolan. Other than that I don't think of the new players get in ahead of what we had last season. Alebiosu looks like he will be a solid and athletic right back, but he doesn't possess Britain's technical quality. Tavares, less said about him the better IMO, I've seen milk turn quicker. I'm 40 and would still be able to play sideways and backward 3 yard passes and jog alongside my opposing CM. De Neve, doesnt seem to be anywhere near the team. Baradji, there is a lot of hype about him being the man to galvanise midfield. When will he be ready, November? Miller, not a starter by the looks of it, as said before looks a walking red card to me. McLoughlin, solid enough but turned like an oil tanker for the sending off against Norwich. TGH - Stinks of being an extra body to cover the cracks of letting Travis go, can cover a few positions which could be a blessing. Although you know what they say about a jack of all trades.

My lad won the spin the wheel thing from the fanzone where you go on the pitch at half time and pass into the target. I gave all my details, etc and was told I'd receive an email the following week. 2 weeks later and still nothing. I'm going to call tomorrow but wondered if anyone had experience of the match day team who run these things and who I'd contact. Saves me wading through the switchboard

Tavares in midfield giving them license to do whatever they like through the middle of the pitch.

I think the lack of reacting to pressing triggers are the main reason Gueye is out in the cold with VI, Ohashi is incredibly diligent when it comes to his off the ball duties which is one of the main reasons I think he's been preferred thus far, that and Gueye couldn't hit a barn door

If we had kept Travis I thought 3 - box - 3 would work quite well, getting 2 10's on the pitch and using the full backs for width as we've not got much quality out wide. With the sales we've made and the personnel we have 4-2-3-1 is the most obvious choice to persevere with, although with Cantwell often dropping deep it's more of a 4-2-1-2-1

Wharton's injury problems look very similar to the problems Pedri had after playing so many games whilst his body was still maturing. It's taken Pedri several years to have a consistent season form and injury wise.

Biggest shock in all of this is the realistation we paid 1.5 million for Gueye. In my head we'd got him for 500k or something