roversfan99

The answer of promotion is not valid to the question asked. Promoted was in the bank, secured, and was celebrated with Mowbray rightfully given plenty of praise. The comparison to Sunderland isnt correct because they have been festering for more than a year and crucially they havent already secured promotion. You can be grateful and happy about promotion whilst also criticising the manager for publically dismissing and thus acting upon the potential of winning a league title. The 2 are not mutually exclusive. We do not regularly win titles or even compete for them, so to dismiss it as irrelevant is bizarre. Mowbray did well overall to achieve the minimum expectation, and was rightly celebrated. That doesnt mean that he was justified for not going 100% for the title once promotion had been secured. The bug bear is not even that we didnt win the league, its that it wasnt seen as important.

We already have Lenihan, Nyambe and Travis for that purpose who are very competent players who improve us. Fair play to Buckley for that crucial goal but it had a huge slice of luck to it and otherwise he is totally ineffective. Get him playing regularly to see if he can regularly impact games at a lower level.

Are you not allowed to continue once your initial aim has been achieved? Its ok to forfeit the chance of a title because that wasnt part of the minimum expectation? I didnt even bring it up.

It was not brought up by myself, but the argument still stands that we should have given it our best shot to win a league title. If it is nit picking to question surrendering a potential league title, when promotion was guaranteed regardless, then yes I am nit picking. I have never argued that it we are not a better team or have a better manager than them, all of which is irrelevant to an 18 month old debate about the importance of league titles which I feel my point is still valid on.

The thing is, you are claiming insider knowledge which is all well and good but everyone else is judging based on what theyve seen for the first team, and sadly everytime that he has featured, he has looked well off the pace and too lightweight. I think from memory he has started twice, once v Oldham when he was totally ineffective, and once v Millwall when he was taken off at half time. He is a young lad with his career ahead of him, at a time when we are supposedly pushing for play offs and need every point, we can not afford passengers, It is not writing a player off to suggest that he is nowhere near ready for the first time and needs loaning out. If he can impact games at a lower level then of course re-evaluate in the summer.

To be honest, its not about stifling flair and creativity, rabona-ing that shot to create an easy save was an unnecessary waste of a very good attacking position.

Nit picking to not try and win a league title? We arent a club that wins league titles enough to dismiss the chance of winning them at any level. Where we are a year and a half in advance is pretty irrelevant to whether I wanted to win that title.

It isnt because trying our best to win the league has had no bearing on the situation that has unfolded since. Its not either win the league and falter or dont win it but do better afterwards. Even though Mowbray has us on the right track now that was a mistake, dismissing the importance of a league title was not the right thing to do. I would have enjoyed being there and seeing us lift a league title, but Mowbray wasnt arsed.

Never mind start games, hes nowhere near ready to be a sub for us to be honest. Your Tomlinson comparison seemed more to do with falling between the cracks of the subs bench and as a result no reserve football and I agree hence why I feel that he should spend the second half of the season in the lower leagues.

I dont think you can ever make a valid case for essentially dismissing a potential league title. Maybe it would dilute the feeling not being there to see it, I dunno. There was nothing to lose pushing for a very rare league title We are a better team now and id much prefer our manager but that is irrelevant.

My opinion is that he should go further down the leagues because he can prove without harming us that he can impact games in spite of his frail stature. At this time, him playing for us causes us more problems than our opponents.

He got his highest total in his first season, and as you said he played mainly with either Kazim Richards, Rochina or Gomes who all played behind him, like Dack would.

To be honest I have seen nothing from him to suggest that hes anywhere near being able to make a breakthrough. Which part of the post did you disagree with? He definitely needs to toughen up in a lower league but I can see the paralells of the risk of falling between the cracks of regularly just making the 18 (often his appearances seem to be from the sake of it) so as a result not even playing reserve football against kids.

Williams certainly shouldnt be starting but hes our next best bet if a centre back gets injured. Hes our only alternative.

He needs to get kicked about and learn how to put himself about in return. If he cant hack the physicality then he wont get far. Look at Dack, similarly small and slight but knows how to handle himself. Hes not good enough either to have an impact at Championship level, when he comes on he looks out of place, even on the ball he doesnt ever anything bar that one heavily deflected goal. The choices are continue to give him cameos when he looks out of place which could cost us, let him play under 23s and risk stagnation playing against kids or give him the tough education of the lower leagues where he can learn how to impact games against men.

In his first season here he rarely played with another striker, usually with a 10 or towards the end in just a 451/433 and he got nearly 30 goals.

Hasnt Buckley only started the one game when he was taken off at half time? He has been really off the pace and has stood out a mile as being out of place whenever he has appeared. You say Brereton can have a run at it but that wont happen with Graham, Dack and Gallagher about, plus again he is another who looks like hes not up to the standard. Go into League 1 and score a few and then reassess in the summer as hes not up to it at the moment. Not only are both not up to it at this present moment, so cant maintain the standard set by everyone else, but their development will be hindered by limited playing time. Would Buckley go straight into the team for Wycombe? Suspect he would need to look further down the food chain.

Walton Nyambe Lenihan Adarabioyo Downing Travis Johnson Armstrong Dack Holtby Graham Subs: Leutwiler, Williams, Bennett, Evans, Gallagher, Rothwell, Brereton Some very difficult choices to make. Whilst I dont rate Bell, he was very good on Saturday but Downing has been excellent too recently, the only reason Bell didnt subsequently make the bench was because we need Williams to cover centre back. Central midfield, Johnson was the stand out player on Saturday but I would not complain if Evans gets the nod. Graham is still our best striker and obviously scored last week v Swansea. That was an easier pick. Last conundrum was in the wide areas. Holtby was very good on Saturday and obviously Armstrong got an assist midweek and a goal off the bench on Saturday. Rothwell has been ineffective and Bennett did a good job for the team but against a side that will need breaking down we need more guile.

Everytime Buckley comes on he looks like a little boy lost. We have plenty of alternatives plus he needs it as he isnt up to it at this level yet, by a long shot.

Hasnt really been the case barring yesterdays performance but I hope he improves on the back of it. He has the quality to do so.

I wonder why Derby said that about a first team regular. Seemed very strange.

Why when neither are good enough at this present time, are behind quite a few better players and could do with regular game time at a lower level. Goalkeeper wise, we could do with an immediate upgrade, theres no point thinking about next season when we want to get into the top 6 this season. We need to not get into the habit of just adding squad players or ones foe the future who wont play.

It was strange that they did let him leave, considering he has become a regular staple of a side that got to the play off final. I am not sure whether it was their new manager having new ideas, whether we offered a bigger contract, length wise or wages wise, there were mentions of consistency issues following his hefty price tag. I suppose their failings this year dont really suggest that their decisions in general have been justified.

I think it is fair to say that his transfer record, even this season, has been mixed if you was to judge now. Only Downing and Adarabioyo for me at this moment could be judged as a success, both have undoubtedly improved the quality of our starting 11. Cunningham would have definitely been a success but for his unfortunate injury which means his impact was sadly very short lived. Johnson culminating in the Birmingham game has been a big disappointment. He was a signing of proven quality but up until yesterday his performance level had been pretty poor, repeatedly loose in possession and giving the ball away in dangerous areas, far from the all action midfielder he has shown that he is before he joined and of course yesterday. Mowbray said that he felt that Johnson commuting every day and at times living out of hotels (including a mention of eating hotel food) may have been sapping his energy levels and he explained that it was a big factor in him being dropped for the last 6 weeks. The quality is there, he showed that yesterday, so maybe once hes come to speed and maybe sorted his living arrangements out, he will go from the jury being very much still out to the successful signing we had hoped. Holtby was a very exciting signing in terms of his calibre but again he cant be deemed a success because he is yet to find a home in our team. I think his quality is higher than most of our other players but with his best position being the same as Dacks, we have to find another position to get him in affecting games on a regular basis before we can call him a success. Walton has made a number of costly mistakes and has not been the upgrade on the eccentric Raya that we were hoping for, I wouldnt say that he is a success or a failure really, and his errors have reduced in the last 2 or 3 weeks. Gallagher for me is the most questionable of the 7 signings, and the jury still being out would be a very generous conclusion at this moment in time. For 5m, only 2 goals after starting the majority of games has been a really disappointing start to his second spell at the club. Last season, he made the signings of Reed, who was a success, Armstrong, who has started contributing more consistently lately so maybe he can just about be considered a success, Davenport who has played about an hour of football in 1 and a half years, Rothwell who has not impacted the team (perhaps due to a mixture of Mowbray and himself) enough to be a success for all of his ability, jury out there, Rodwell who was mixed (had talent but questionable attitude and certainly not fit for purpose having been signed as a CB) and obviously the unequivocal failure that has been Ben Brereton. So a very mixed transfer record. The squad is better than the one he inherited, but hes spent a fair bit of money on fees and wages and like you said, like every manager, there is a mix of successes, failures and quite a lot of players who clearly have ability but have yet to prove that they are a success.

Buckley is miles away from being in a position to add value to our team at the moment, barring his deflected winner v Sheffield Wednesday, he comes on and doesnt add anything, he looks like a little boy lost. He is only a young and incredibly slight young lad who would probably benefit from regular football in a lower league where he could toughen up without costing us in the process. We have Dack, Rothwell, Holtby, Armstrong, Downing and Bennett so he wont be missed. Chapman and Rankin Costello, or at least one of them, would also benefit from this if they arent going to get a game for the first team, Brereton did ok yesterday but he never looked like scoring and he probably contributed the least out of the 11 starters. He hasnt been missed during his absence and he often doesnt look up to standard. Again, some regular game time could do him the world of good.