So Hirst actually gets beyond his man, beats him again to kill a bit of time… still nobody can be arsed getting in the box

5-2-3 is shit. It was shit under Mowbray, and it’s shit under Tomasson. Leaves us light in midfield and nothing in the box.

Why has Brereton switched over to the right? He’s literally the only forward we have who suits this formation, and that’s because he’s effective when he’s cutting in off the left.

23 minutes and Brereton had only had 6 touches. 5 of them being in our half. Sums the performance up so far.

Perhaps Nyambe saw the writing on the wall regarding game time when he met with JDT. If the manager made it clear he’d regularly use attacking players at right back, and if we were already in for Brittain, it would make sense he’d feel it was time to move on.

It’s a really difficult case to make when you look at the managers who have got promoted out of the Championship in recent years. The majority have done it in their first season. Very few have taken more than 2 full seasons in charge and those that are the exception tend to have yo-yo’d, or in the case of Wilder, brought the team up from league one. ”Patience” and “slow build” might sound nice and rational, but there’s very little evidence to suggest that it leads to promotion. Mowbray is a prime example - he was never going to take us up.

Family weekend away so I didn’t make the game today. Just caught the highlights and it looks as they they made more of a game of it than the score lines suggests. The second goal was great. More of the same from Szmodics please! We can be good when we want. It really shouldn’t be that difficult to get a playoff spot, if things click and we can find a modicum of consistency there’s every chance.

It’s just occurred to me that Dolan must look an absolute world beater in training playing as a number 9, false or otherwise. Obviously he’s best deployed on the wing, but he’s pretty good at harassing centre backs when they are on the ball and pinching it off them. Judging by what we see on the pitch it’s what he wants our defenders working on. They are all so bad at it Dolan will have a field day every time.

Anthony Williams - young goalkeeper who I genuinely thought was going to be the next big thing but never managed an appearance for us. Saw him perform well many times for the youth and reserve teams, but what really stands out was watching him play for Wales U21s on a visit to see my family there. He made 2 penalty saves against Italy, the taker - a then unheard of Andrea Pirlo! I was convinced he would be challenging for the number one spot by the end of that season (he’d have done better than Fettis!), but he ended up at Hartlepool then Wrexham amongst others.

Totally agree with @roversfan99 on Morton. The only way he should be playing is if he is good enough to make the difference between us finishing top 6 or not… and he isn’t. We would absolutely be better off trying to get Buckley to play himself back into form, or to get Adam Wharton integrated quicker. It would also make more sense playing Jake Garrett who is the same age as him. As mentioned, it’s particularly nonsensical to pick Morton in what is being described as a season of transition. It’s still early days for JDT, but you can tell he’s starting to settle into it now. He’s got his favourites (Hyam, Pickering, Travis, Hedges and Brereton) who will play every game, and he’s clearly not a fan of others. The big concern is he seems absolutely married to this idea of pissing about with it at the back, and this “philosophy” being more important than results. He needs to address this pretty quickly, whether he’ll persist and hope things click or change his approach remains to be seen. The Burnley game will be something of a watershed. He could earn himself a lot of goodwill, but a bad result will fester all throughout the stupid World Cup break. That could be the point at where patience really starts to wear thin amongst the fanbase.

I kind of see the logic. Players at our current level these days are either worth a massive transfer fee or absolutely nothing. The players worth money are the ones that according to the standardised statistical analysis can pass a ball. Nobody cares about good headers of the ball at centre half or strong, quick fullbacks who can tackle, or skilful players with a bit of individuality… it’s all about boring ball retention. Goalscorers aren’t even at a premium anymore judging by the fact nobody would splash out on Brereton and the relatively modest fee City paid for Haaland. Unfortunately all our players are shit at it and rather than creating value it’s only currently highlighting their weaknesses. It’s probably reducing their market value.

I think it’s easy to forget just how good Shearer was that first half season, I’ve never seen anything like it. He and Rovers had our barren spell after the famous Norwich victory and I think he’d have scored another 20 in the second half of the season. There were a couple of other factors. Results weren’t great between Alan Wright getting injured and Le Saux coming in, and Tony Dobson didn’t last long. The other was Patrik Anderson. I’m not sure we utilised him effectively while Cowans was out and maybe he came to England a few years early. But the short answer is yes, we’d have done it.

Travis is becoming an utter disaster when facing towards our goal.

I agree with most of this Chaddy. There were a couple of occasions last night where Brittain got into good crossing positions. Unfortunately a combination of really poor movement and the cross being overhit meant they came to nothing. I’m a little bit confused as to what JDT actually wants from his fullbacks and that goes for whether we are playing 4 or 3/5 at the back. Whenever a fullback gets forward, the winger/wide forward in front of them seems to be there to give an easy out ball. When this happens we generally play it safe rather than cross it. We try and work an opening, but quite often end up going back to the centre backs - this happened plenty of times last season too. It continues to be ponderous, and worryingly we are seeing less overlapping by the fullbacks than we did last year. Dolan or Hedges or whoever is playing false 9 tends to get dragged out to get involved with the short passing too. You’d expect the opposite wide forward to be cutting in and screaming for a cross, particularly Gallagher and Brereton, but they never get in between the posts. I can see your logic with Hirst but I’m not sure he’s the man for the job. Pickering (whose game has picked up markedly from the first few games) tends to come inside a hell of a lot more now, and he’s usually got an early ball over the top for Brereton to chase as an option. Nyambe got a lot of criticism for his supposed reluctance to cross… but who was he supposed to cross to? I was hoping this would be addressed by JDT, particularly considering Brittain is meant to have a really good delivery. This wide striker set up doesn’t lend itself to getting balls in the box at all. I found it interesting that our best passage of play last night involved an actual winger (Dolan) doing actual winger things.

Kaminski - can’t kick but is constantly encouraged to Brittain - not convinced Pickering - best player again Hyam - not his best performance Ayala - some great tackles to cover after his own horrendous mistakes Travis - rubbish, rash and brainless Buckley - dreadful Szmodics - pointless Brereton - looked disinterested Dolan - one good cross, frustrating, at least he moves, should play wide Hedges - not at it today Dack - the one player to get on the end of chances Gallagher - Gallagher Hirst - finished here now I’d have thought Morton - poor man’s Wharton The one time a ref blows for a foul in a timely manner it costs us. We got what we deserved in the end though. The honeymoon period will be over for 99% of fans come November 13th.

Kipre has looked absolutely class for them by the way.

Excellent by Dolan. Shite by Szmodics.

Three subs at half time please. Only Pickering could feel hard done to being hauled off. Wharton needed so we can revert to a back 5. Dack needed because he’s good at football.

“Whoever is the manager, they seem to not want to play him centre forward. They see him as some weird right winger. He’s absolutely not.” Cardiff ifollow commentator on Sam Gallagher. Only bit of the game that’s had me smiling.

Always rated him when he was at Millwall and was surprised to see him fall out of favour. Fun fact, his Dad is Responsible for some absolute club-classics as the founder of Soul II Soul.

No idea what to expect here. Not sure we will get away with any points if we play poorly this time, so I’d drop Morton for Wharton as he ran the show in our best performance of the season. Brittain back in for Gallagher. I’d like to see Dack get a decent amount of game time but won’t hold my breath.

Delighted with the points, particularly considering how badly we played. The first half was particularly dreadful. We have to be one of the luckiest teams about in terms of not being punished for kamikaze play in our own box. How we’ve never really been punished for it in the last couple of years I don’t know, but we were extremely fortunate not to gift them an early lead. The Dutch, or should it be Danish disease needs eradicating. Starting to see some patterns with JDT now. He clearly loves Hedges (who has been good on the whole this season) and is happy to accommodate him by playing him out of position. I watched the warm up down at the front of the Riverside today and Dack looked really sulky, and I expect he was at full time too after his 5 minute cameo. JDT clearly doesn’t fancy him for whatever reason. I don’t think anyone shone today. Gallagher grafted but his touch is abysmal. I like how he stayed on his feet for our first, but his ball in was dreadful and the goal was very fortunate. Very surprised not to see Brittain. Pickering is very limited but did ok again today. Most of the rest underwhelmed. I can’t see us getting away with playing that badly and taking maximum points many times this season. The sooner we transition Adam Wharton into the side on a regular basis the better.

We do know that there has been an issue for a number of years with academy graduates being underpaid compared to other players, Rich Sharpe again stated so this week. We also know negotiations were paused for a massive period during Covid and we activated year options - this tactic has become really problematic as we aren’t using it as an added layer of protection but a can kicking exercise. Players wouldn’t just be determined to run their contracts down for the sake of it, nor would they cut off their nose to spite their face. If we have offered the maximum terms we are prepared to, fine, but by all accounts we should’ve got there a damn sight quicker with Lenihan. Clearly there is a realisation we need to do better with regards to contracts. It will come too late for Brereton (year extension in our favour proving to be a double edged sword that enables complacency once again) but I’m just glad there seems to be an acknowledgement from the powers that be, even if not from some of our fans, and more importantly a strategy to prevent it happening going forward. Even if you absolve the club of all blame and it’s all on the players for running down their contracts, then the club are wrong for supposedly building a model around developing and selling on players. It fell at the first hurdle this summer.

You might be happy to shrug your shoulders about the whole situation and absolve anyone currently employed by Rovers of any responsibility for it, but Broughton doesn’t seem to share your view. That’s blindingly evident from his words and actions. They have acknowledged there is an issue with retaining our assets and I’m delighted to see they appear to be learning from their mistakes and prevent a similar situation happening again. You'd never have seen Waggott going back to offer Wharton a new deal less than 6 months after his initial one was signed. Broughton has an entirely different remit. Waggott’s priority is cost cutting, Broughton is concerned with what happens on the pitch. That’s the real positive about this new structure. I had some initial concerns about the whole set up but it looks as though Broughton has been given plenty of autonomy (thankfully!), which was essential to make it work. Another point which is very clear - EVERYONE KNOWS THAT THE PLAYERS REFUSED TO SIGN THE DEALS ON OFFER. ITS PRETTY OBVIOUS CONSIDERING THEY ALL LEFT. What people have an issue with is the manner of negotiations and offers that were made. You can add Tomasson to the list of people not happy with losing these players for nothing too, in case you haven’t listened to him.

Yeah, three years is the minimum allowed until he turns 18. Hopefully there’ll be a new 5 year deal on the table on his next birthday.