[Archived] Rovers 2 Sunderland 0

[gazsimm]

Mortgage rates gone up - as has fuel prices, both domestic and vehicular - it all takes a bite out of disposable income.

And Gaz, I do not deny that Sparky has got us fitter, Im just saying that our Football in the season we got promoted, our 1st season up and the 6th finish season was at times sublime. Due to the players we had, who are no longer with us. Our football this season under Hughes has been good, but not anywhere near the heights we reached at times with Duff, Dunn, Jansen, Cole and Tugay (sometimes Yorke - honest) all in the team.

384605[/snapback]

the only problem was though Mr Souness fell out with Cole Dunn and Yorke

i would love to have Cole at the club now he knows were the back of the net is unlike Kuqi

[Exiled_Rover]

Kuqi knows, he just struggles to put it there very often. He has scored 6 times this season though, unless I'm mistaken.

[gazsimm]

Kuqi knows, he just struggles to put it there very often. He has scored 6 times this season though, unless I'm mistaken.

384613[/snapback]

yes, but u have to admit he is not up to Premier League Standard

[Flopsy]

sorry - im being an utter pedant now, but you don't get penalised for using the letters y or o when typing you. Text speak is frowned upon by us fuddy duddies who dont get it.

[stuwilky]

1700 from Sundyland

384535[/snapback]

1700? why on earth were THREE areas open when only one would be necessary.

[gazsimm]

if only we could take 1700 plus to Sunderland on Wednesday night :

[stuwilky]

I didnt want to get into this, but I would like to congratulate the three numpties with drums on halting every chant we started last night. I gave up in the second half, the drummers struggled to keep in time with each other never mind the sodding crowd.

Learn to drum or bog off you irritating fools.

[gazsimm]

them drummers need banning they just get on your nerves and are spoiling the chants

[Flopsy]

funnily enough thats exactly what stu said.

The drummers arent great - but I dont think we should Ban them, I think we should put 30,000 volts through them when ever they cock up. Watch that drumroll then

[waggy]

WELL at work i said if you turned up at ewood last night and did not know who was bottom off the league and who was tenth,you would be no clearer at 10pm.it was like watching accy stanley under 11's last night,miss placed passes,bad contol and up and under footie[they were the good points].

bellamy 2nd goal did not belong in this game,absolutley brilliant,worth the entrance fee £13 with st.pater will be awesome,lets hope spurs are in for mgp in the summer 5 mill and routledge

[CAPT KAYOS]

My worry is are the flaming things breeding!!!

We now have x4 FFS.

We need to get rid not get in to em....................

[gazsimm]

do they have to pay for 2 seats with them drums because they are huge thank god i am not next to them

[yorkblues]

it was a very poor game but who gives a toss we got the 3 pts

[Jan]

Finally, someone said it!!!

We played teams like Arsenal,Man Yoo,Celtic and Chelsea off the park in certain games against them. We also used to create so many chances every game(even in his last full season) now we are lucky to create 2 a game.

384602[/snapback]

He left you, get over it

And as for playing Celtic off the park. Remind me -firstly- what was the score in each game and secondly- how DO you win games?- if you want artistic impression, watch ice skating.

It's completely irrelevant if we play wonderful football and lose. I'd far rather grind out 1-0 wins. The Championship winning season often wasn't pretty, but it was effective. With Sourpuss at the helm, we were sometimes pretty, but nearly always lacked the end result. I've not forgotten the moves which had 20-odd passes strung together (not forgetting that Brad had to get at least 3 touches or it wasn't an attack, but which still somehow never progressed beyond the halfway line. After Dunn and Duff, that was the reality. Even with them it was still sometimes the reality, and it bored me to tears. It also frustrated Cole to death. I have terrible memories of the look of horror on his face in his first game with us (Spurs away) when he kept putting his hand up wanting a pass, only for it to go across the midfield a couple of times before it was feebly pushed forward to the nearest defender. NO wonder he had his hands on his hips sooften, we were no-hopers compared to the bunch he'd just left.

At least now people shoot, and as I've often said, if you're shooting at the opposition's goal, they're not shooting at yours. And there's always the hope that one or two will be on target and if they're saved Bellers can net the rebound.

[Paul]

Finally, someone said it!!!

Everyone seems to have forgotten how good we were under Souness for a couple of years! We are no where near reaching that level under Hughes(not his fault, we just have average players). We played teams like Arsenal,Man Yoo,Celtic and Chelsea off the park in certain games against them. We also used to create so many chances every game(even in his last full season) now we are lucky to create 2 a game.

The only reason why we are 7th is because the Premier League is so poor this season.

384602[/snapback]

Agreed we played very well against those sides and as far as I can recall lost on nearly every occassion. I went to Celtic and left the ground very, very proud of the team but we lost.....twice.

Of those you mention I think we beat Arsenal once in the league, 2-1 at Highbury? Anybody? and 4-1 in the Worthy Cup, but that was their reserves.

This season we've beaten Utd twice, drawn one, lost one. Which would you rather have?

The major reason for dropping crowds, and you can dress it up anyway you want with every other reason under the sun, is two seasons of "disappointing" results under Souness. Whatever else GS did for us in the last two seasons we won five games each at home and that had a massive impact on the club and attendances. Hughesy is doing great things but it will take a lot, lot more to win back those who have stopped coming. Beating Utd was two steps forward, losing at Everton and WBA was two steps back.

[Eddie]

We did the double over Arsenal one season, but our record against United wasn't great. I also remember against Arsenal where Dunn scored twice. Chelsea weren't the force they are now and we didn't do too well against Liverpool.

[Manchester Blue]

if only we could take 1700 plus to Sunderland on Wednesday night :

384628[/snapback]

If it truly bothers you that much I don't understand why you follow rovers. We will never take the numbers that the likes of Man U, Newcastle etc take apart from one-offs. I'm all for people trying to increase the crowds but the constant whinging about our crowds doesn't have become tiresome. We are Blackburn accept it.

[thenodrog]

Talking in the pub after the match and we all agreed how refreshing it was to watch a match without play acting cheats spoiling it. The general opinion was that it was linked linked to the preponderance of players from more northerly climes!

btw I said after the MU trilogy that we would have won em all if we could have swapped strikers with them before the games...... well its a good job we didn't swap Bellamy with the the Black Cats before the game!

[1864roverite]

Dear members, may I apologise unreservedly for making my opinion on Tugays performance and then uprooting such an outrage in his defence.

"Tugay was marvellous","Tugay was this and that", "Tugay was superb and was the midfield general etc etc".

let me get my point across, and YES I consumed a couple of pints pre match.

I love Tugay to bits, he has been CLASS. IMO He no longer possesses the skill and energy to run a midfield battle.

Lets not forget, he was a midfield battle with a NON EXISTANT Sunderland midfield yet he still contrived to play backwards or sideways. THAT is NOT the sign of a classy midfielder. Its okay passing that way but compare that to his forward passes and it pales into insignificance. Going forward, which is what he was surely there to do, he was a non existant midfielder, although I bow down when I failed to mention his pass to SP to cross for Bellamy.

Moving onto bigger and far better equipped teams.

Tugay has failed miserabley this season against big clubs like WBA, Everton, Wham,Newcastle and so on. He has cost us games and goals.

lets see how Tugs will compare when the arse visit Ewood Saturday week.

Does anyone see him winning a battle with the lies of Pires, Lyngberg, Flamini, Fabregas and the Brazilian Gilberto, not to mention Bergkamp ? I cant and dont see anyway he can even compete with that little lot.

Often he loses the ball and puts us in dire positions, it is evidenced throughout this season. He plays too casually when he is strolling around the pitch, he gives the easy ball away, he cant chase back and he fouls far too many times when the opposition has the ball away from him. Quite simply, agaisnt the big clubs he is becoming a liability. If we had visitors other than SAFC last night, we would have been swamped through the middle.

Thats my view. Rovers are desperate for a mobile midfield playmaker. My money is on Jason KOUMAS being a Rover in close season. He is the type of player Rovers need.

Finally... I just dont think Tugay had a bad one alone, there were other players who failed to put in the performance required and I include MGP, Nelsen and Todd in that lot. KIt was a tired looking team and I am just glad that we are off for a break and that Arsenal have a European match Pre Rovers.

[waggy]

i was more than unhappy with tugay being offered a new contract in the last couple off seasons,but this season he has returned to his best and has had some brilliant games as well as some very poor games.he SHOULD be playing like gordon cowans did for us the 1st season in the premier except cowans had a great player in sherwood alongside him not bloody lily [i can run for miles ]savage like toogs has to suffer.i am still waiting to know what savage brings to our team

[Blue blood]

Chuffed with a much needed win. After the performance against Everton I wasn't too sure we'd pull ourselves together in time but after I tore a muscle in my back this weekend scuppering my plans of going to the game my confidence that Rovers would get 3 points rose dramatically.

There seems to be a few plus points from what's been said, the most evident of which being Bellamy's much needed clinical finish in front of goal and the continuing emergence of Peter.

Regarding the Tugay debate, I feel he is still a class player but other teams do target him as they realise he is a danger. And as age is catching up with him from what I've seen of him this season it appears he has less athleticism and stamina to cope with this attention. The trick for Rovers is to provide enough other threats as to provide Tugs with the bit of space he needs to work his magic. For Tugay to play well Rovers need to play well.

As for Savage, I thought he was initially poor for us, but over the holiday period he was magnificent for us; he provides the disruptive influence to the opposition that all teams need and have really lacked in just one player since age caught up with Flitty. I'll acknowledge though at times he doesn't contribute attacking wise as much as I would like, but then that isn't his role.

[waggy]

THE most entertianing part off the night was the fight between 2 sunderland fans in the darren end,seeemed yo go on for ages

[mjs]

Finally... I just dont think Tugay had a bad one alone.

384700[/snapback]

But he didn't have a bad one.

[Whyoy]

384734[/snapback]

The post by Roverite just cannot go unchallenged.

Tugay was and indeed still is a class act. To mention Koumas as a replacement is a joke. My advice to anyone who has the least interest in BRFC is to get down to Ewood whenever you can for the rest of this season because if he dosen't sign a new deal, it will be a long time before you see a player of that high calibre playing in a blue and white halved shirt.

So Sunderland didn't have a midfield eh? Stange that their manager stated that he played the 4-5-1 formation for the first time this season.

No forward passes from Tugay eh? Just replay the timing of that pass he made to Reid in the first half.

Can you remeber any of our other midfielders playing a ball forward?

Who is the player who makes himself available for the ball in virtually every part of the field?

Who do the other players choose to pass the ball to when they are in tight situations?

OK so occasionally he will make a mistake but his mistake ratio will be far less than any of the other 10 players in the team. He just seems to make more mistakes because he given a far greater percentage of possession than anyone else in the team.

Stop complaining and start appreciating while you still can.

[1864roverite]

whyov

I have been appreciating ROVERS for over 35 years and believe me when I say it is MY OPINION and VIEW about Tugay.

I never said he was never class - he was "WAS" being the most appropriate word to use.

Sunderland did not have 1 that is ONE first class midfielder in their team, if they did, my football knowledge is obviously so very poor and my glasses need changing.

Rovers midfield were stretched simply because of the ball being given away. Yes I agree Tugay should have been the creative spark, but he simply didnt cut it last night apart from 1 pass, the more incisive passing came from Lucas Neill and he is the bloody right back.

Rovers were far more effective in the last 20 minutes in going forward, that is becasue they kept the ball and didnt give it away.

You have your view and that is mine. I stick by it.

And, if you think taht Koumas couldnt do a job for Rovers then pray tell me fella, just who do you think could provide the killer passes at the reasonable price of say no more than £2m ?