roversfan99

Im sure I read the other day that they signed him on the back of a very successful loan spell last season, but the reason for him falling down the pecking order was the unexpected summer arrival of Jason Shackell.

You dont get the number of goals and assists that he gets without being a very, very good player, even with top class team mates. He is a player who has developed his game under Pep from the raw player that joined City to be one of the best of his type of player around, and trusted more by Guardiola even than the excellent Leroy Sane.

Absolutely no suggestion that he will get rid of 3 of his favourites (Evans, Smallwood and Williams) any time soon. He has a striker to directly challenge Graham, a very expensive one who in his last 2 cameos has shown promise. Centre back has to be prioritised.

I am not aware of any fan club, nor was my genuine question an attempt to provoke you to play the victim again. Please can you repeat the answer as I have not seen it.

Stop being so soft, it was a genuine question. Surely wanting to sign a centre back somewhat contradicts your assertion that we are well covered there with Williams and Rodwell? Have to look into who we loan our players too in future, if Platt was only ever going to a back up then surely try and loan him to a League 2 club where he would be more likely to get the playing time he needs.

You mention Baeur again but arent you of the opinion that we are fine at centre back with Williams and Rodwell "able" to play there?

I dont understand the desire to want very average players back that have had previous spells here. I presume its just familiarity. Sam Gallaghers name always crops up, but Mowbray played him wide once Graham was back. Hes very weak, cant hold the ball up and his goal record in the last 2 years has been average to say the least. If he came in on loan, would people select him over Danny Graham or a striker weve invested 7m in whose just started to show glimmers of being able to make an impact? Same with Joao. Hes a bit of a donkey and seemed to totally fall out of favour last time. If we do go for a striker, and lets be honest, Nixon talks out of his arse, hopefully our recruitment will be slightly more imaginative.

Rothwell cost a fee too.

Allardyce got an indian summer out of him to be fair, giving him a free role led to him scoring 10 goals in a season that he did suffer a few injuries in.

I see youve reverted back to the phrase "regardless of cost." If ever 3 words came across as ignorant and out of touch... One thing you need to grasp is that we arent dealing with hard core fans. That said, the fact that they arent doesnt mean that you can turn your nose up at them. The club can either go, right people arent interested enough, what more can we do, or they can actively look at making it attractive as possible to get more people in. The fact that the team is committed is not enough to provoke a surge in ticket sales and it is naive to suggest otherwise.

I think its unfair to blame Ferguson specifically for the culture that definitely existed of club rivalries overriding any attempts at fostering a healthy national team spirit. I remember watching Ferdinand, Lampard and Gerrard all air similar views on how they were unable to see past their club rivalries. I believe the Spanish team have had similar problems in the past. Ferguson also wasnt alone in being very reluctant to allow his players to go on international duty for friendlies. Thats a club managee mindset that still exists prominently now. Definitely agree on so many big egos clashing but thats one of many factors id argue that held us back. Tactical insufficiences, ie famously sticking to a 4-4-2 and trying to cram too many similar players into the same team. The psychological block that seemed to grow as the years without a major tournament victory went by, and the subsuquent media pressure. Weve often been lacking in depth, for example even when we had that brilliant team around 2004, we lacked pace and had players like Darius Vassell as important subs, plus weve had a couple of famous injuries at bad times. Southgate has done very well to foster such excitement and enthusiasm I must say.

I suspect the main reason for his inability to reach the incredible heights that he reaches at Man City is presumably psychological based on the disgusting way that he is treat by the English media and public towards a top, top young player. He is still effective as an England player but he appears at times to have the world on his shoulders in an England shirt.

"It seems" is hardly proof but you seem totally unable to grasp that no one is saying that the majority of potential walk ons are put off by the surcharge, in fact ive even given numbers of roughly how many people it would take to financially override any additional revenue caused by the surcharge. It is obviously a minority, but there are examples within this thread of people offput by the surcharge, and if that is happening to anyone then it has to be of concern and worthy of investigation. Your second platitude is meaningless. And as other people have said, these potential additional fans are not the hard core. They are those who arent as interested/emotionally invested as us, those who have fallen out of love with the club, those who have yet to get attached, those who have other things to do should they not find value in buying Rovers tickets. Your comment is ignorant and desperate, urging people to "support the team" rather than offer a constructive point about tickets/attendances/surcharges.

I agree with many of your points but I just think that in spite of our pre World Cup failings, we sometimes exaggerare the gap between the calibre of our individual players v the rest of the world. I think Belgium are obviously better but have a fairly similar pool, in that you look around their main 11 and its very weak. Nacer Chadli fairly regularly starting, and players like Boyata, Januzaj and Batshauiy amidst the squad. Its very weak once you go past the 8 or 9 top, top players they have. Brazil have a bit more depth but they have players like Paulinho last time I checked playing important roles, France I think look excellent almost everywhere but Giroud as their main number 9 lets them down somewhat. Stones has developed into a top quality centre back. Sterlings numbers eclipse even the likes of Sane. Kane is an obvious one as is Walker I agree. After them 4 you have a series of very good players performing to a top level in the Prem and for many, the CL. I think Pickford and Chilwell are fine where they are in terms of development. I appreciate the success of Sancho but he appears to be a special talent. Nelson is also doing well at Hoffenheim so I dont discourage it mind you. Im not convinced that he was ever looking at Dack. Mount is very much a Chelsea player and an exceptional young talent who ticks every box in terms of the vision Southgate seemingly has, and the fact that he didnt play him suggests to me that he was just giving Mount a taste of the standards.

I would always prefer to have a first choice defence in terms of gaining an understanding personally. There is a bit of a myth IMO that Williams is worse than Bell going forward, he gets his fair share of assists even if he hardly Roberto Carlos in style! And hes far more obliged to get in decent deliveries than Bell is.

No I dont think he will play Palmer (or Rothwell) but I personally would to look to exploit a very poor defence that has conceded a lot of goals this season. I suspect that Mowbray will have a decision to make though, in that I suspect that there are 6 in his mind to choose 5 from. Evans, Smallwood, Bennett, Reed, Dack and Armstrong. With Bennett now not needed at right back and Evans back from suspension, he has a decision on his hands. Dack is obviously a given. I would personally have Smallwood as the odd man out if it is from them 6, but if I had to guess, Reed will be given an extra few days to recover from his knock. Armstrong has to start after his performance v Rotherham. I would personally have Palmer, Rodwell and even Rothwell amidst that selection conundrum as well but I suspect all 3 of them will be subs.

The one aspect of your posts which perhaps makes them seem more defensive of the clubs pricing strategies etc is the constant urge to criticise fans who dont attend. Anyone choosing not to attend for example based on the surcharge are likely to be not doing so out of principle more so than affordability, but as weve seen on this thread, that is through some people who genuinely are unable to commit to attending prior to match day, who feel like they are being punished for being in such a position, even though it is out of their control. The 2 reasons that the club have used to justify it but dont hold water, and to be fair you have even said yourself that you dont agree with the surcharge. I still dont get why you are viewing going to watch Rovers almost as some sort of obligation though.

That is a reason that makes a little more sense but if it is offset by anyone choosing not to go because of the principle of it, then it is having a negative effect. If fans come knowing they wont be penalised for being unable to buy a ticket prior to the day of the game then id suggest they are more likely to get into the habit of doing that more often if possible.

Excellent post, further proof that people are put off by the additional, needless barriers that the club are putting up that have the potential to curb attendances. 2 loyal fans, in 2 totally different situations, but both equally affected and either put off/almost put off attending home games by the club that professes to be desperate to get attendances as high as possible.

Surely the fact that there are ways around the surcharge suggests that the reasoning that Cheston gave (to aid predictability in terms of knowing roughly the attendance in advance) is somewhat compromised?

He has done a job I never anticipated he would ever be able to, and there were no signs prior in his managerial career. He has done excellently and I again enjoyed watching us I still think that theres a bit of an underestimation in regards to the calibre of our players mind you. Look at the side today, we had in the starting 11, 3 regular top performers at City (Stones, Walker and Sterling) with one who has played quite a lot himself in the last 18 months (Delph), 2 regulars at Spurs (regular 30 goal a season striker Kane and Dier), a regular at Liverpool (Gomez) a regular at Everton (Pickford) a regular at Leicester (Chilwell) and 2 players who arent necessarily regulars but who regularly feature at United and Chelsea (Rashford and Barkley). Beyond that, you have a series of regulars at big clubs (Henderson, Shaw, Sancho, Alli, Arnold, Trippier) some who get plenty of game time at big clubs (Winks, Lingard, Loftus-Cheek) and big players for good Prem clubs beyond that (Maguire, Maddison, Keane, Dunk, Wilson, McCarthy, Cook) so there is some decent calibre there.

I just cant fathom how you are incapable of realising that people queuing up on matchday or the stat of 800 walk-ons a game is NOT proof that it hasnt put anyone off. Your argument is that MOST people will not be put off by the surcharge and you seemingly have a valid point. But no one is saying otherwise. The fact that 800 are clearly unaffected by paying the surcharge as an isolated statistic is a moot, useless one. Its the people that arent there, and more so the quantity of them, partially or solely because of the surcharge that we are interested in. Obviously there are different stands/age categories etc so its not a 100% true calculation. But if a ticket is say £24 for a game, 100 additional fans would be needed to offset the additional revenue of the surcharge. If the ticket is £27, then 89 additional fans would be needed. (Obviously with that example, there is the added psychological aspect of paying £30, we saw the reaction when Bolton revealed their ticket prices) Then there obviously is the additional benefit of having these fans in the ground, for the boost in atmosphere, for potential increases in additional items (food, drink, club shop etc) and also the hope that they may attend again more often in the future. The justification for the surcharge is also subject to mockery because it does not go hand in hand with an attitude of hoping for as many people to turn up wanting a ticket to boost the attendance on a match day. There is an example below of someone who has not bought a ticket specifically because of the surcharge. In my opinion, I would suggest that he almost certainly isnt the only one to either have decided solely or partially not to attend a game because of the added £3 surcharge. The effect of it is two pronged, it obviously increases the ticket price, and there is also the principle of paying more than other people for the same product. Considering these people arent season ticket holders, they clearly dont see attending as the be all and end all. Franky has hit the nail on the head regarding the surcharge. If there is anyone that is put off by it, then it certainly should be something that at least warrants further discussion and research as to its effectiveness. If Franky is the only person to have been partially or totally persuaded not to buy a ticket because of the surcharge, then I would suggest that the surcharge has been vindicated somewhat, It is if there are more than just Franky, which based on the length of the discussion on here alone, I would suggest there is, then it becomes a point of contention.

Even if you think Bennett/Reed are capable there, would it not bother you to potentially be without either in midfield for a significant period of time should Nyambe get injured again?

With Bennett, my attitude when we were in League 1 with him wide was that defensive contribution alone is not enough to justify selection in a wide role, it was the same with Conway. I felt he was really poor in the first half of the season in which he played almost exclusively as a winger if I recall, he had yet to score going into the new year (obviously post Shrewsbury he tended to play elsewhere and was much improved) and had a few assists (similar amount to Derrick Williams) which for a player who is proven at the level above, was below par. I know he has the capability, he got the assist at Hull, the one v Brentford and impressed at Stoke, so he was coupling his obvious work rate/defensive play with something going forward. I also look back to that second half of the season when we went down, he scored I think 4 goals in half a season and was a big part of our attacking play. I know he can contribute considerably to our attacking play even if his selection is often a more conservative one, and I feel its only fair that I point it out when I dont feel he is doing, as he wasnt last season in the first half of the season. Especially when you look at last week, he had I think at least 5 shots which in the main were speculative at best and not the correct decisions. Hes also often culpable for hopeful/hopeless crosses in. Sometimes perhaps his popularity and his undoubted brilliant attitude and character paper over the cracks when hes not doing enough in attack, in my opinion. It says a lot that our wins have all been by one goal. Whilst I feel that I somewhat empathise with Mowbrays reluctance to stray from what he knows best, we have much more in the way of options compared to last season, in terms of adding technical ability/more forward thinking players in midfield without compromising on organisation too much. Rodwell has a better passing range than Evans and in particular Smallwood, and Reed is also more forward thinking. One of Reed/Rodwell with one of Evans/Smallwood, or even Reed and Rodwell on occasion, is hardly a massive risk. Likewise, in games like Rotherham at home, playing 2 more attacking wide players. I think Rotherham is a bit of an anomaly, I actually felt that we did create quite a few good chances to justify the less conservative selection, unlike against both Millwall and Reading where we didnt deserve anything more than a point. I recall in terms of good chances created, the goal obviously, Bell being put through on goal, Grahams header from Bennetts excellent cross (!) and Grahams chance from Dacks lay off the most obvious. Also, worth noting that the counter attack v Forest was with Smallwood and Evans central and Reed and Bennett wide! Our league position suggests Mowbray is winning the argument though at the moment. If we went for it more we might get undone more. - Theres an element of truth to that statement, but its a questionable "might." Don't get me wrong, Mowbrays obviously getting so much right, but I think that he could look at being slightly braver in SOME games, especially at home, and he can do that without going gung ho. Theres obviously a balance to get, but in terms of the smaller teams at home, and our goals tally from open play, hes not getting that quite right at the moment.

Stop being pedantic and winding people up. The point is not that Bennett is necessarily at fault. Its that he is not a right back in the first place, and hes only playing there because we only have 1, who was injured, which will happen at times. Oli Burke, the player who cost West Brom £15m? Whose being unrealistic again?