[Archived] Match Preview: Manchester United (october 4, Ewood Park, 17:30)

[tonyoz]

Not saying he didn't Tony, in fact I was of the opinion that Hughes's shelf life as Rovers manager was at it's end.

The only point I'm trying to make is that we have competed before despite the gap in investment.

OK I can agree with that.........very definitely..............but I think if we want a manager who will be bloody minded enough to say "stuff your reputations"................."take some of this!"...................I think Ince has as much chance as anyone of being successful.

[CrazyIvan]

To read the comments that the performance on Saturday is a result of Man Utd moving onto a new untouchable level, is unbelievable.

C'mon guys, get real. What happened during the Arsenal home drubbing, - is that down to Arsenals' improvement as well?

Yeah, Arsenal are on their day quite brilliant. Look what they did to Bolton a week later. They are utterly inconsistent though.

I never said Man U were untouchable but they were at their best on Saturday, even you must admit that. For us to beat United on the day they play that well would take some inhuman level of performance from members of this team, you know like Brad last season?

[den]

I never said Man U were untouchable but they were at their best on Saturday, even you must admit that.

EVEN YOU! What's that mean?

Utd played well. Even you must admit though, that they were never put under any pressure.

TBH, there have been better Man Utd sides at Ewood than the one they fielded on Saturday. Look back at the sides they had with youngsters like Giggs, Scholes, Beckham. Add Keane, Cantona, Schmeichel, Van Nistelroy etc, etc.

[LeChuck]

TBH, there have been better Man Utd sides at Ewood than the one they fielded on Saturday.

I have to agree.

Fletcher and Anderson must rank amongst the worst central midfield partnerships to turn up at Ewood for them...imagine what Scholes and Keane in their prime would have done to us. Giggs is a pale shadow of his former self as well.

[den]

I have to agree.

Fletcher and Anderson must rank amongst the worst central midfield partnerships to turn up at Ewood for them...imagine what Scholes and Keane in their prime would have done to us. Giggs is a pale shadow of his former self as well.

Thank you Mr Chuck. It's nice to have someone agree for a change.

[Blue blood]

Am I reading this wrong or are supporters actually agreeing with the manager that we can't beat or even compete with teams such as United?

I buy my season ticket every year with this fixture in mind, I look forward to it like no other. I want to see passion, commitment and fire. I want to see the big boys get roughed up I want to see them under pressure, forced into mistakes and I want to see us impose our game on them.

What I saw Saturday, apart from the opening 15 mins or so did not even come close but the most disappointing thing for me bar none was the resigned attitude of Paul Ince after the game.

I go to Rovers glorifying in our 'us against the world' mentality. I love the fact that we've won the league and the Carling Cup. I love the fact that we're a small town club that's done it on the big stage. I love it that so called big clubs hate us and envy us in the same measure, yet post match all I hear is that we can't compete, sorry guys that's the way it is.

It's defeatist, it's short sighted and (if you look at our previous successes against the so called big 4) it's plain wrong.

Football fans of any club need to be allowed to dream, comments of the like heard after the game on Saturday only serve to kill that dream, and if the dream is dead then so is the game.

Bang on. Agree with Abbey, Den and the rest. The vision/mentality of the club seems wrong these days - where's the ambition? All this can't compete with the big boys is rubbish is not what anyone want to here. I'm fine with it'll be hard but we'll give them a damn good game and we'll give it our best shot but this clearly wasn't the case in effort or the attitude. Try telling Hull you can't give it a go against the big teams.

When bank balance/club size alone is the only deciding factor for results (I'll admit it's a big part but it's not solely it by a long shot) football will have lost it's magic. In fact, that fans aren't seething and focussing on another injustice by the ref shows how poor a display and attitude rovers had in the game.

As for the game, the 1st 20 minutes or so suggested the Arsenal game was a blip and that we'd sorted our problems out. After that however all my worst fears were confirmed - we haven't learned a thing about playing against more talented sides than us. The remaining 70 mins were dire, and as soon as we lost rocque to injury our chances of scoring went from very slim to utterly nil.

Yes the ref screwed us over - but that happens every time we play utd and is why you have to raise your game even more.

As for team selection - my only gripe was Derbyshire. He is NOT a winger, and far too lightweight for having any kind of defensive duties other than being an offensive threat. Ince would've been much better sticking the Axe in the middle and Emerton on the right. Don't blame Ince for playing Pedersen or Tugs, thought Pedersen's work rate and defensive duties used to be very good even when not doing the business offensively. Sadly that wasn't the case. As for Tugs, in a 5 man midfield I thought his killer pass could well have made the difference, but an inept display with no one venturing forwards bar rocque, plus the conditions made the guy redundant. Roberts should not be even in the squad for games against the top 6 clubs as he offers nothing against quality defenders. His hustle and bustle should be reserved for the weaker teams in the league. He's a glorified Kuqi really. If/when we loose Santa Cruz, we'll be left very weak up front, with only Matty to be relied upon.

As for the fans it was quiet. I loath manure with a passion, but found it hard to get worked up. A combination of being wet, coupled with rovers offering nothing, meant it was hard to find anything to get passionate about. In the second half we never looked remotely like scoring, and I think everyone in the ground knew it.

I'm not saying Ince out yet, but there is a massive ammount of work to be done. Signings like Andrews and Fowler are worrying, as is not getting a right mid, but most alarming of all is the mentality we seemed to have adopted. Hull are showing that smaller clubs need to fight, and rovers seem not to have that any more.

Oh, and the last club who tried to get all their points from the weaker teams, and didn't put much focus on the bigger games was Sheffield Utd and they got relegated.

[AggyBlue]

Utd played well.

Even though you thought they never got out of first gear. You must think they're a hell of team in top gear

[den]

Even though you thought they never got out of first gear. You must think they're a hell of team in top gear

You've got to be careful what you say around here, because every word will be recorded and used in evidence against you, - wont it Aggy?

[AggyBlue]

[modes98]

is that down to Arsenals' improvement as well?

It depends how you setup to play den.

We tried to play football against arsenal which imo is the worst thing you can do. You have to play a rougher game and take your chances. Also we pushed on with 20mins to go trying to get a goal back and suffered 2 breakaway goals.

I think the Man Utd game would have had a similar outcome had it not been for the weather not allowing us to push for a goal in the closing stages.

You can't argue that Man Utd or Arsenal on their day can beat pretty much any team in the world, the slightly annoying factor is that neither had to play their top football to beat us. Then again Berbatov cost more than our entire team.

[1864roverite]

0-4 v the arse

0-2 versus manure

with the way Chelski are playing versus an inept Rovers formation we can expect them to double the scores of the above games as they are playing top notch football. Chelsea are formidable and unrelenting in midfield and thats is why they will murder us.

with the way Liverpoo are playing attacaking football, again, based on yesterdays game, we as Rovers can expect yet another tubbing at home in the against goals column.

Doesnt look too healthy a thing to look forward to.

[imy9]

Our central midfield has been desimated with injuries, with Dunn, Grella, The Axe, Reid all out, 2 would start for us, so that is a big loss. Also RSC going off was a big blow for us.

I dont know what to make of the game in reflection as if we had gone in for the tackles in those conditions it would have resulting in at least one sending off for us, Man Utd played some excellent stuff but I do agree we were not at the races.

[92er]

Our central midfield has been desimated with injuries, with Dunn, Grella, The Axe, Reid all out, 2 would start for us, so that is a big loss. Also RSC going off was a big blow for us.

I'm pretty sure the Axe was a sub.

[RevidgeBlue]

OK I can agree with that.........very definitely..............but I think if we want a manager who will be bloody minded enough to say "stuff your reputations"................."take some of this!"...................I think Ince has as much chance as anyone of being successful.

One thing that's struck me about Paul Ince since he took over is how nicey nicey and shy and unassuming he sounds in his interviews. He seems to be bending over backwards to get away from his old "Guvnor" image.

I presume he comes over very differently to the players face to face but I agree with the comments made by philip and LD Rover in that the last thing I want to hear is our manager kowtowing to the red scum that are Manchester United and conceding we can't compete with them. This fixture is the highlight of the season and it simply isn't acceptable to just roll over before we start because the "big 4" have more money than us and we think we can't compete.

It would be quite nice if we got a little bit of the old "Guvnor" back.

[Exiled in Toronto]

Mabye be it was just me, but I interpreted his can't compete comment as meaning 'when they are on top form' or something similar.

It is interesting that, according to many posters, he was a tongue-tied idiot who couldnt string a coherent sentence together; now everyone pores over his comments and interprets them literally, reading all kinds of defeatism which I find impossible to reconcile with the Paul Ince of the last 20 years.

Having said that, we really were crap on the day. He picked the wrong team to get up and at anyone, let alone the European and league champions.

[brfcs5359]

Villa got stuffed at Chelskie. City, 2-0 up with that great manager (whose far better than Paul Ince will ever be!!!) lost 3-2 AT HOME to the another top 4 team.

Man Utd are European Champions. With that in mind we played well at the back and in parts midfield (Warnock Emerton). Derbyshire and Pederson were crap and RSC went off injured. I keep saying it but watch the clip leading up to RSC angled shot. When Rovers had there best players on the ball, we were able to compete. Ince will take us to a level higher than Hughes could ever dream of!

And lets have some singing and atmosphere.

[Grabbi Graeme]

For anyone who is online now and is in the depressed stage check out ESPN who are showing our 4-3 win over Man Utd, it might help or it might prompt people to say how good we were that night and we had Kuqi and Michael Gray on the pitch.

[RevidgeBlue]

There seems to be the danger of an ethos developing around the club of "We won't bother turning up against the big 4 because we can't compete with them anyway. We'll save our energy for the next game."

That contrasts completely with the Hughes and Souness regimes when our best performances came in difficult looking fixtures and we tended to cock up in "easier" looking games.

Neither is acceptable really. It's hard enough trying to get a decent points tally over 38 games without writing off nearly a quarter of the season.

[thenodrog]

To be perfectly honest the tactics were wrong anyway.

Derbyshire looked like a lost boy against men.

Tugay isnt the type of terrier midfielder we needed in this game

We shouldnt of played 1 upfront.

Nothing wrong with 1 up front as long as the others in midfield get up in support and to be honest that didn't happen on Sat.

btw One might suggest that Utd only had Berbatov up front on his own.

[thenodrog]

Villa got stuffed at Chelskie. City, 2-0 up with that great manager (whose far better than Paul Ince will ever be!!!) lost 3-2 AT HOME to the another top 4 team.

Man Utd are European Champions. With that in mind we played well at the back and in parts midfield (Warnock Emerton). Derbyshire and Pederson were crap and RSC went off injured. I keep saying it but watch the clip leading up to RSC angled shot. When Rovers had there best players on the ball, we were able to compete. Ince will take us to a level higher than Hughes could ever dream of!

And lets have some singing and atmosphere.

Your second name has to be Ince...... right?

[tonyoz]

There seems to be the danger of an ethos developing around the club of "We won't bother turning up against the big 4 because we can't compete with them anyway. We'll save our energy for the next game."

I don't think that Souness, Hughes or Ince would ever let that happen. They all have that special personal characteristic which made them hated as players (unless they were in your team of course). They never knew when to give in and they would never accept that they were second best to anyone!

They could all fell trees with a well timed tackle. I can't see any of them surrendering to some perception of top 4 invulnerability. Finishing in the top 4 is one thing but giving them a hell of a game on a regular basis is not beyond us. It's still early days.

[tonyoz]

And (maybe to put Ince's comments in perspective), here's a manager who has proved himself at the top level eulogising about the performance of the top 4 side which had just outclassed his own:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/foo...icle4892168.ece

[Paul]

There seems to be the danger of an ethos developing around the club of "We won't bother turning up against the big 4 because we can't compete with them anyway. We'll save our energy for the next game."

That contrasts completely with the Hughes and Souness regimes when our best performances came in difficult looking fixtures and we tended to cock up in "easier" looking games.

Neither is acceptable really. It's hard enough trying to get a decent points tally over 38 games without writing off nearly a quarter of the season.

I didn't listen closely to Ince's words but the general view I formed of his Sky post-match interview was "What do you expect? We were playing Utd." I felt Ince was accepting of the defeat, almost shrugging it off as just something we have to put up with when we play the top teams. I thought Ince's reaction, even if it was the public face, totally unacceptable. For 20 minutes on Saturday I had a nervy, excited feeling in the pit of my stomach. The way the PL is these days only 4 games give you that. If our manager doesn't care about the results against the top four he needs to think again, these games make the season plus stuffing the turkeys at Christmas - Ince better make damn sure we give City a thorough spanking. There isn't much else to look forward to, so Mr Ince please think about what the support want to see.

The post-match interviews implied Ince found the result acceptable. I accept the result but not the performance.

[Rover4ever]

For some reason, clubs like Newcastle, Villa, Spurs, Everton have had really poor results against the Big 4 in recent years.

On the other hand, Blackburn along with maybe Wham and Boro have had the best results against them if you take the last 5-6 seasons into consideration. So, a few defeats shouldnt be too worrying........

What would be worrying is slacking off, which seemed to be the case a number of times during our games against Arsenal and Manu Utd.....

We should be 100 % commited, but then again our 6-2 and 3-0 (twice) against Arsenal came in the days of us being "bully-boys" and playing "in your face" football

[tonyoz]

The post-match interviews implied Ince found the result acceptable. I accept the result but not the performance.

I went back to his interview after I read what you said. I don't know if this is the one you saw but if it is, I think you are reading too much into it:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/m...day/7653044.stm

Nowhere does he imply that the result was acceptable. He merely praises the United performance. Some people have suggested that it was a poor United team/performance. SAF does not agree:

"[saturday] was a really emphatic performance. The confidence of the team was outstanding and everyone was on song."

Link - http://www.sport.co.uk/news/Football/7880/...Ewood_Park.aspx