[Archived] West Ham United 2-1 Our beloved rovers

[grizfoot]

First half was quite equal I suppose. We didn't make the most of the free-kicks we got today, shame MGP or Sav weren't playing we might have capitalised on thoose situations. We never really looked like conceding until they scored. What was Mokoena doing, i'll never know. Flippin' Sheringham again always sees to score against us.

Second half was much better we just lacked the final ball. Then West Ham go and score against the run of play from the 'corner that should never have been'. Grapped a goal late on which is something to take from the game I guess.

Roberts out for a while it looks like.

I'd be tempted to push Bentley upfront the goal-scoring form he's in and put Gally on the right.

[rover6]

I'd prefer to see Gally on the wing with Bentley central midfield rather than up front. Peter deserves more playing time after showing more promise.

[tchocky]

Sky just showed we had close to 60% of the ball second half. Why is it that we dominate possesion EVERY game and never back this up with good chances that the possesion should provide?

We had a lot of possession because wham lay low for long periods of the second half, defending their lead, just like the script suggests. In other words it isn't impressive for us to have more possession. In any game where both teams are chasing the game we would never have that much possession. It's not a sign of quality like some people seem to think.

[key76]

i'm sorry but for all the people clamoring for peter to have a run. what a joke. the guy did NOTHING! he hit the first defender with every cross and did not take on anyone!

[JAL]

I'd prefer to see Gally on the wing with Bentley central midfield rather than up front. Peter deserves more playing time after showing more promise.

Gally is dire - simple as, no exuses interesting to see some of the players looking for other options when Gally was the pass to make to.

Fanny Hammers second goal came from what should have been a Rovers goal kick not a corner kick - ah well these things happen Mark Hu8ghes needs to invest in a quality midfielder and not your average DAVID DUNN, then Rovers can progress.

[Ozz]

Not too many Rovers fans made the trip today, and were pretty quiet I hear.

[Mike Graham]

Not too many Rovers fans made the trip today, and were pretty quiet I hear.

looked about only 150ish on the telly.

we were garbage, why would people pay good bucks to watch that c**p?

I would rate Peter as MOTM, otherwise Benni and Roberts (until injured) had their backs to goal nearly all game. Gray was a joker and even Toogs took to passing to the opposition more than usual.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

Anyone else catch the sky footage of our 2-1 win back in the mid 90's with Pearce scoring the winner,our fans must have filled the lower tier of that stand(4,000)....how times change eh!

Hammers fans making a big thing about our lack of support on KUMB

Edited October 29, 2006 by SIMON GARNERS 194

[broadsword]

Crud first half, but West Ham were worse.

But no way should we have walked away from that with a loss.

Jesus, what a choker. It was like the bad old days of playing Man Utd and losing. What a choker. Outrageous.

[grizfoot]

Gally is dire - simple as, no exuses interesting to see some of the players looking for other options when Gally was the pass to make to.

Was it just a coincidence we looked twice the team once Gally was introduced then.

[Ewood Spark]

Anyone else catch the sky footage of our 2-1 win back in the mid 90's with Pearce scoring the winner,our fans must have filled the lower tier of that stand(4,000)....how times change eh!

Hammers fans making a big thing about our lack of support on KUMB

I was there that night (Berg scored as well) and believe me there was no were near 4,000 there.

[Kremmin]

We could be Champions of Europe and West Ham could be battling relegation in the Conference ... and they'd still beat us at Upton Park.

Playing in Europe is starting to take its toll though ... suspect Hughes had an eye to the Basel game and with a few regulars out, we lacked the cutting edge.

Peter tried hard on the left but lacked the quality of an in-form Gamst .. which we don't have at the moment either.

[Jan]

We could be Champions of Europe and West Ham could be battling relegation in the Conference ... and they'd still beat us at Upton Park.

Playing in Europe is starting to take its toll though ... suspect Hughes had an eye to the Basel game and with a few regulars out, we lacked the cutting edge.

Peter tried hard on the left but lacked the quality of an in-form Gamst .. which we don't have at the moment either.

How many of you were actually THERE???? From the tosh on here, not many.

We weren't good, we weren't bad. Gray was no worse than a lot of the others. ALL of the good passing came from us. Sergio Peter is MILES better than Gamst. By the end we hadn't a formation, we were just battering them. I was a little concerned that I'd been dreaming throughout the game, but the stats show we were the more attacking team (again).

This was a game we hadn't a HOPE of winning. ALL of the odds were stacked against us. Hey ho- on to the next one.

[Kremmin]

Wasn't there Jan ... but saw it on TV.

Agree that we had most of the possession but we've made a nice little history of that without taking the points before.

But disagree about Sergio ... I like him but he has a way to go before he's as good as Gamst in form .. time and again he got stuck in the corner with no clue how to beat the last man and get a decent cross in.

[Anti Euro Smiths Fan]

That first half has left me furious.

You're not the only one Martin. I felt deeply ashamed, embarrassed and angry with our performance today, particularly in the first half, when I thought Rovers were shambolic.

What went wrong ? Well I won't type a 2000-word essay - suffice to say we were lamentable in all areas of the field: defence, midfield and attack. Sloppy in possession, lacking any bite in midfield, toothless up front and guilty of giving acres of space to West Ham forwards.

There was a desperate lack of creativity in midfield and Benni McCarthy looked isolated up front. I didn't think McCarthy worked hard enough for the team today, but to be fair to the South African, the final ball in midfield was appalling.

Antiquated long-ball tactics to McCarthy simply doesn't work. It doesn't play to his strengths at all. I don't recall one single good chance that Rovers created in the opening half. Our first 45 minutes were absolutely abysmal. The second half offered an improvement in terms of possession, but we were still painfully lacking in creativity, width and a quality final ball.

For the third successive Premiership match we have conceded a goal from a corner. This just isn't good enough, following on from Craig Bellamy being completely umarked to head home at Anfield and Campo's free header to score for Bolton last week. Very serious questions need to be asked about our defence, which was once the strong point of Mark Hughes's management, but is now letting him down on an all-too regular basis.

Perhaps the warning signs were there in pre-season when we lost 5-0 to Olympiakos in a friendly. Against Man City at Ewood last month we could have easily been 5-2 down at half-time after a shocking display in the first half.

These are worrying times at the moment and there needs to be a massive improvement in all areas. The trouble is that with the injury problems we currently have, our problems are likely to continue for some time to come. Today's game illustrated the woeful lack of strength in depth to our squad. It's paper thin in vital areas and simply doesn't have anywhere near enough quality.

A few injuries to key players and suddenly the squad is exposed for the many weaknesses it contains. We've got a number of players in the squad who are frankly nothing more than mediocre journeymen. With Mark Hughes unable to strengthen his squad until January, it could be a very arduous couple of months ahead.

Even allowing for the lack of strength in depth to our squad, today's performance at Upton Park was in my view completely unacceptable.

[tcj_jones]

Pretty poor first half from Rovers, but credit has to be given to West Ham who were extremely successful in stiffling Tugay and not giving us a second on the ball. We barely created a thing.

Second half we were the vastly superior team and really took it to them. 2 - 1 was not a fair reflection of the game. We deserved a draw. For periods as long as 5 - 10 minutes West Ham were penned in their own half and barely crossed the half way line.

I think Peter is a much beter all round player than Gamst and I was really impressed with Gallagher's late appearance. I think he should play a larger role in the team considering our injury problems.

[den]

Subs: Brown, Henchoz, Jeffers, Gallagher, McEveley.

It could be argued that none of the subs are up to Prem football. That shows the lack of depth in the squad. It is a decision that a manager has to make though, especially at Blackburn where the funds don't allow for a large squad of prem quality players.

Does the manager spend the cash on a limited number of class players and hope for an injury free season, or does he go for a squad of greater depth without the real quality?

The ideal is to harness a group of players that can hack it with the best and bolster that with a stream of good youngsters. That second bit isn't working though and probably never will.

Personally, I reckon that a team must have quality in the prem even if it means having an alarmingly small squad. Without that initial quality, you will go down anyhow.

[joey_big_nose]

The ideal is to harness a group of players that can hack it with the best and bolster that with a stream of good youngsters. That second bit isn't working though and probably never will.

Personally, I reckon that a team must have quality in the prem even if it means having an alarmingly small squad. Without that initial quality, you will go down anyhow.

Den, thats a gross exaggeration. We finished sixth last year and we clearly have a lot of quality. Freidal, Neill, Nelsen, Emerton, Ooijer, Savage, Reid, Nonda, Tugay, McCarthy and Roberts are all clearly top half Premiership players. Zurab and Pedersen are decent.

And the youngsters are coming through. Bentley is quality, Gallagher has class, Peter looks good, Brown showed style in his cameo a few weeks back.

We have as good a set of players as any team outside the big four, Newcastle and Tottenham. We cannot win every game.

We were a long long way from being a bad side today. A long way. And we were missing five of our best players.

If we go down i will eat 50 hats. I will be amazed if we don't finish in the top half.

[Fife Rover]

Gally is dire - simple as, no exuses interesting to see some of the players looking for other options when Gally was the pass to make to.

It was only during the short time he was on that Rovers began to create some real threat on the WHam goal. He harried them from both wings and through the middle as well. There were plenty of Rovers players out there today that did not perform, but Gally certainly was NOT one of them.

[FourLaneBlue]

The ideal is to harness a group of players that can hack it with the best and bolster that with a stream of good youngsters. That second bit isn't working though and probably never will.

It certainly never will if they aren't going to being given a chance in the team despite the more established players under-performing. Peter had a decent game today and certainly no worse than Pedersen has been on occasion this season. Yet despite being thrown into the thick of it he is being written off forever by some idiots. Yet I also read on this board that some thought that Bentley had nothing about him and would never be much good...and that wasn't that long ago...

Rather than giving young players encouragement there are too many Rovers supporters who write them off if they don't make an impression like Wayne Rooney. Some board members on here are (rightly) derided by most others for their knee-jerk reactions to a solitary game. Yet when it comes to the younger players it seems that they are, however, fair game.

Edited October 30, 2006 by FourLaneBlue

[Scotty]

We missed key players today and our squad was shown up to lack strength in depth. Our 3 best outfield players this season have probably been Bentley, Emerton and Savage - two of them were missing today. Add that to two of our best players of last season out long-term injured and Roberts going off early on, well we simply weren't left with good enough players.

Saying that though, we just didn't try hard enough in the first half. I thought West Ham would come out all guns blazing but they didn't - they looked nervous and inhibited. Sadly though we allowed them into the game by being a yard off the pace and passing like a pi55ed-up pub team. Their first goal was a lesson in how not to defend. Zurab was weak as pi55 in attemting to clear the long ball, Gray was caught marking no-one, and Mokoena failed to keep tight enough to Sheringham. Good finish though.

We were much better in the second half. We got in their faces and started to pass the ball, but we lacked options and mobility up front and too often our wide men failed to get decent crosses over. It slowly became inevitable that West Ham would get the second and, sure enough, they did from a corner that shouldn't have been awarded.

Our consolation goal just made me more angry really as it showed what we could have done with better passing and ability. Too little too late.

Gray was shockingly bad, Mokoena was a pale shadow of Savage, Tugay's passiing was awful early on, and Peter, although clearly talented and a prospect, disappointed me. It maybe unfair but I expected him to beat his full-back more, or at least attempt to. Zurab was yet again too weak for a centre-half. We've also been unlucky with the injuries up front. The way I see it McCarthy and Jeffers are competing for one place and Nonda and Roberts are competing for the other. Unfortunately our two target men are injured and McCarthy and Jeffers just aren't a natural partnership. The only players to emerge with credit today were Bentley, Ooijer and McCarthy. The rest were either average or poor.

If we could play our best 11 every week I honestly believe we're a top six team - maybe even a top four team. After that we've got 4 or 5 players who can come in and not disrupt things too much, but then we're struggling. The likes of Peter and Gallagher are talented and promising - and still young enough to make it - but too inconsistent at the moment. The rest though are just not up to it. Gray's finished, Mokoena's a great defensive midfielder in a five but can't play in a 4-4-2, McEverly's never been good enough, and Jeffers needs a centre forward to play off.

Even the top teams would struggle if they had 6 of their first team out, but that dosen't excuse the general lack of effort and professionalism we showed in the first half today. We showed in the second half that we're a better team than West Ham but it was too late by then.

[philipl]

Good post Scotty- well balanced analysis. This is David Pleat's "Chalk board" which shows that Rovers really should have got something out of that game. We would have done had Mokoena made an effort to put a routine defensive header on a ball chipped towards him instead of buying Sherringham's feinted run which set-up the free header with plenty of momentum behind it for the first goal.

[rover6]

Mokoena's a great defensive midfielder in a five but can't play in a 4-4-2,

I whole-heartedly agreed with your assessment barring this. Claiming that Mokoena is a great defensive midfielder (albeit in a five man midfield) is like claiming that Jon Stead is a great Premiership striker (albeit alongside Andy Cole). Both did a job for part of a season to drag us out of a mire.

However, I cannot accept that there is anything great about Mokoena. There are skills required to be a good centre half that are transferable to defensive midfielders - eg positioning, anticipation, heading ability, organisation, concentration, tackling etc. etc.

Mokoena came woefully short as a central defender, displaying a lack of many of those aforementioned talents - so how is he meant to perform as a defensive midfielder when they are almost all equally important? His lack of technique will also be exposed in a midfield role. We've seen Ivan Campo making a hash of playing CB in the Prem only to flourish as a midfielder. However, I don't need to insult anyone's intelligence by describing the gulf between him and the Axe - and I'm not talking about hair.

If Mokoena had been signed by Souness, Hughes would've got rid by now, like he got rid of Tommo.

Edited October 30, 2006 by rover6

[Ozz]

I think we should give the ball to MCarthy as much as possible. Whenever he got the ball, we looked dangerous. Keep it simple, organise the play to focus on Benni.

[Eddie]

I feel sorry for Mokoena, I think he has all the makings for a good midfielder or a defender, but he needs games and he simply won't get that while in our squad, really he needs to go away on loan.

I wasn't too happy with how we played yesterday. We weren't really at the races in the first half and in the second we managed to dominate without creating chances, which isn't a good sign. Benni looked pretty good and it was also good to see Bentley getting another goal, they were two of the only players who impressed.