[Archived] Rovers 5-0 New Zealand

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

Anywhere near half way line just infront of the stanchions and you'll be laughing Paul,I've sat there once or twice for cup games and never got wet.......... Ewood looks much better from the Riverside.

Nice to see the cameraderie between our players is developing nicely, the whole team seemed to be enjoying themselves with smiles aplenty

P.S.

New Zealands No5 make Kuqi look like a dwarf!!

[pleasure]

P.S.

New Zealands No5 make Kuqi look like a dwarf!!

danny hay, ex of leeds.

NZ were embarassing at times. their touch and technique was awful. as for their big centre forward, they might as well as played an elephant up front.

i say this with confidence..... NZ wont make a world cup, in my lifetime (unless they host 1).

[thenodrog]

Sat in the Riverside this afternoon and really enjoyed it. Any regulars got remarks about this stand as I'm now considering moving there for the season. Does it get a lot of wind and rain? We're very well protected in the Family Stand.

1. Rain? Get about 10 rows back and it's OK.

2. Try not to go too far back that your view is interrupted with a stanchion.

3. Apart from Nov-Mar you need a baseball cap if the sun is shining. Funny how so many sit with their hands shading their eyes when a simple baseball cap will do the job. Maybe the fear of looking like a chavvy / nobhead dissuades most.

4. No concourse with tellies.

5. Take your own refreshments. Despite only having a 15 min half time window the dumbo's that run the refreshments insist on selling only time consuming foods and using low paid dollopers to do it who inevitably cannot use the tills. It frequently appears that only about 30-40 peope get lucky each week. If it were my business Pies and Bovril/coffee and crisps would be the only foods on offer. Quick sale items only and if anybody wants anything else then tuff! Also there is no orderly queuing. Without barriers the counters simple resemble a log-jam. Do as I do and dont even go there.

6. Don't leave before the end cos it disrupts the views of hundreds of paying customers and it looks sh1t on telly.

Apart from that and having that unecessarilly wide gap at the front it is OK and it is 'real'.

benni was impressive. his movement was excellent. he's a lot cleverer technically than i had realised.

roberts also put in a good shift and linked up well with benni.

both players can hold the ball up and also look a threat when the ball is played over the top.

overall,

Well I for one am going to struggle with those two. One of em should grow a bit of hair and dye it blonde!

Must say Benny played the deeper role as expected and yesterday just oozed class. His style reminded me of Dwight Yorke ........... but at his absolute best that is.

Benny's goal was an absolute belter too. A screamer from his left foot. Anyone know if he is left footed btw? If that was his weaker foot then his right must be something else.

[pleasure]

4. No concourse with tellies.

i noticed yesterday, that there's been a couple of plasmas installed at the back of the riverside.

however,it might only be one now, there was an almighty crash at the beginning of the 2nd half!

[thenodrog]

reidy's passing and crossing were abysmal. he wouldnt of looked out of place in the NZ side.

My opinion exactly. BUT I was speaking to a prominent member of this mboard (no name no pack drill) last night in the pub who disagreed stongly and thought that Reids crossing yesterday was excellent!

[pleasure]

My opinion exactly. BUT I was speaking to a prominent member of this mboard (no name no pack drill) last night in the pub who disagreed stongly and thought that Reids crossing yesterday was excellent!

how is reidy ?

[Uddersfelt Blue]

My opinion exactly. BUT I was speaking to a prominent member of this mboard (no name no pack drill) last night in the pub who disagreed stongly and thought that Reids crossing yesterday was excellent!

I think the problem is that the wide men are under instructions to get crosses in early. Thats fine but inevitably more margin for error.

On the evidence of yesterdays performance the Roberts/MCarthy partnership is going to be awesome this season. Shame we don't still have Bellamy too!

Good peformance too from Gallagher who played a little bit wider and deeper. A couple of excellent balls into the channels for the other strikers.

Feeling very positive after yesterday but much will depend on whether Neill stays or not. Lets hope MH can just persuade him to stay for another season. He's then a potentially very rich free agent.

Agree with other comments about team spirit and morale. Seems that they enjoy playing together and the communication (which was easy to hear in an empty stadium) was clearly evident.

Fingers crossed for a good start against Pompey, Everton and Chelski

[den]

Well I for one am going to struggle with those two. One of em should grow a bit of hair and dye it blonde!

Must say Benny played the deeper role as expected and yesterday just oozed class. His style reminded me of Dwight Yorke ........... but at his absolute best that is.

Benny's goal was an absolute belter too. A screamer from his left foot. Anyone know if he is left footed btw? If that was his weaker foot then his right must be something else.

No, that's two of us. McCarthy's gold boots was a clue, but having said that, I asked Baz if one of the rovers shots was from Benni or Roberts. He replied "Mokoena"

Benni and Roberts seemed to be doing quite a bit of cuddling, even when there was nothing to cuddle about.

[Scotty]

My opinion exactly. BUT I was speaking to a prominent member of this mboard (no name no pack drill) last night in the pub who disagreed stongly and thought that Reids crossing yesterday was excellent!

Nice to see he's still as objective as ever. Bet he thought Neill had a stinker as well didn't he?

[blue phil]

Benni and Roberts seemed to be doing quite a bit of cuddling, even when there was nothing to cuddle about.

I thought we'd signed Sol Campbell

[joey_big_nose]

Didn't see the game so was wondering if everybody would be happy if we started next season with the same lineup apart from the one obvious change of nelsen coming in at the back and neill moving out right with Axe on the bench?

Do people who saw the game really rekon Bentley can play the central midfield role?

[thenodrog]

Do people who saw the game really rekon Bentley can play the central midfield role?

Only at a push with Sav and Reid on either side playing 'minders' and ceretainly not with Tugay in the team. Bentley undobtedly has some nice touches but he is shrugged off the ball far too easily.

On the other hand and although he was not on long and basically 'did nowt' I was quite pleased with Jeffers showing. Nobodies mentioned him but he displayed good movement and pace and he looks to have a great first touch. It can surely only be his head that need improving. I predict he will be the new Egil for straying continually offside but if we can learn to free him quickly he could suprise a few of his detracters.

4th choice benchman Kuqi was awful on the ball again but will always bring hard running and disrupt defences for the last 20 mins of any match.

[AggyBlue]

Do people who saw the game really rekon Bentley can play the central midfield role?

In short, yes.

He has the skill, he has the class, all he lacks is the experience.

So has Gally (be it out wide or up front).

I think it's time for both to step up to the mark this season.

[philipl]

Interesting that both this site and the official one contain massively divergent opinions about Reid yesterday.

I am delighted that Benni showed some pure class. That was always the thing that separated Bellamy from any other speedster and it looks like we again have a forward who plays very inteligently and is going to need a couple of opponents to keep him from doing lots af damage.

[den]

Bentley played at least part of the game, in Tugay's position, just in front of the back four. The fetch me, carry me man.

Did it very well too.

Benni was completely different to what I had expected. I thought he was a strong fast player who played right on the back four. I couldn't have been more wrong. Real quality.

[Bobby G]

I am very excited about Bentley this season. He had it good last season in bits and pieces and in flashes was brilliant.

Obviously being moved around in many positions doesnt help but I feel if given the chance, he can do the Pirlo role for us, if he gets stuck in a bit too.

[Perth_Rover]

Good result, also i think bentley can do the job at cm

[RevidgeBlue]

i agree with your comments on NZ and we mustnt get carried away by pre-season performances. (emerton looked a world beater in his first pre-season).

reidy's passing and crossing were abysmal. he wouldnt of looked out of place in the NZ side.

Well I'm sorry but that's just absolute rubbish and people who weren't fortunate enough to go shouldn't think that was the case for a minute. In the first half he put over a quality ball from which Roberts netted but was harshly adjudged to have handled and a couple of minutes later put over another quality delivery which McCArthy missed by a fraction. I think it was also him who planted a great ball right onto MGP's head but he directed a free header wide. His overall play was fine and he scored a well struck goal.

In the second half he was moved to right back.

A very enjoyable game, but difficult to say how much can be read into it for the Premiership because NZ were so poor.

However you can only play what's in front of you and on the face of it Roberts and McCarthy were sensational.

Savage really put himself about chasing down numerous lost causes as if his life cdepended on it which, let's face it, he didn't really have to do in a friendly.

When Todd went off at half time, we didn't look as secure at the back and Brad had to pull off three really smart stops which he did with some aplomb.

Gallagher's contribution was mixed, but he slid a superb little pass through to Roberts for the fourth.

Once again Neill played well at centre back and looked infinitely more at home there than he ever has done at right back.

If you take the view that even if he's still here Nelsen isn't going to be match fit for next week then the starting line up looked I think quite similar to what next Saturday's will be. Everryone acquitted themselves pretty well with the exception I thought of Bentley who just doesn't look right in central midfield. I'd prefer to see Reid in the middle and Gallagher on the right flank.

One strange thing- I thought MGP was struggling with his fitness compared with the rest of the side. Anyone else think that?

This season's new technological innovation a little penalty circle instead of a spot!.

Overall though despite the poor opposition, grounds for cautious optimism, and in the case of the two front men considerably more than that!.

Edited August 13, 2006 by RevidgeBlue

[thenodrog]

This season's new technological innovation a little penalty circle instead of a spot!.

Technical innovations eh? Well nobody has mentioned the new ball yet so I will......... its crap! The pattern design is horrible and somehow it just doesn't 'sound' right. Anybody else notice this?

[RevidgeBlue]

Another thing I thought, probably a by product of the heat wave, was that there was very little grass on the pitch for the time of year, it seemed to be shaved right down to the limit.

Might cause problems if we have a bad winter.

[Fife Rover]

Technical innovations eh? Well nobody has mentioned the new ball yet so I will......... its crap! The pattern design is horrible and somehow it just doesn't 'sound' right. Anybody else notice this?

Theno: Is it the same ball as used in the WC this Summer?

[colin]

NZ's national football website on the game

here

[brfcshabba]

NZ's national football website on the game

here

New Zealand (4-4-3):

So 12 men and they still got stuffed.

[Eddie]

Either that or they were playing without a keeper, which means they did quite well.

[salothsar]

From those that were there what should our starting line up be on Saturday ? Neil as centre half seems popular, but right back ? Just about a majority seem to prefer Reid in the centre. Strikers are pretty obvious I think.