[Archived] Rovers V Citeh

[John]

I'm far from anti-Allardyce, but in my view the blame for the last 5 minutes must lie squarely with him. The decsion to bring on Derbyshire as part of a 5 man midfield only aided City, and they were allowed to increase the pressure with wave after wave of attacks. With them only having Roberts to worry about up front, it also enabled them to forsake a defender and lump Richards up front. Surely with 2 strikers this wouldn't have happened?

Sam explains the tactical changes in his Rovers World interview. Said Man City went 6 up front and we had to counter act that, so leaving too many people up the park was not an option.

[chris]

I agree with that having seen it again. They had 3 men in the middle and Ooijer was one of our 3 men marking them. The big mystery for me is where was Emerton in this move? Why isn't he where he should be and over in that space?

Look at the clips, Nelsen goes mental at Oojier on both goals, I think Oojier should be responsible for his position, the first goal was almost the perfect assist too

like i said it could not happen at a better time, weak links needed to be identified in that game.

we will be a better team because of it

[brfcs5359]

My ratings:

3 - Diabolical! Sub ASAP!

4 - Bad game.

5 - Disappointing.

6 - Alright.

7 - Solid.

8 - Good game.

9 - Excellent

10 - World class.

________________

Added mine in red

Robinson 6 +6 could have taken a couple of crosses, nearly got to Robinho's goal.

Ooijer 6 6 Gave everything. Made a mistake but WAS THERE NO SHOUT FROM ANYONE??? That's the defensive question.

Samba 7+7 Usual - spectacular lunges, 110% effort.

Nelsen 7+6 Not as steady as Sunderland against more mobile attack - Did he shout MINE on the Ouijar header?

Warnock 7+7 Solid - didn't get forward as much as last game.

Emerton 8 +8 MoM for workrate - the only midfielder to HOLD possesion. Without him we would have lost, simple.

Andrews 6+6 After Sunderland the old Andrews returned. Did a disciplined job but 2nd half game passed him by as it opened up. Failed to get forward.

Tugay 6 - +6 Looked off the pace. Hung too deep. Some good touches. Blowing by half time.

Pedersen 7+5 PRO-ZONE would make him MoM for his workrate but his ability in possession is poor. BFS's No1. PRIORITY POSITION.

Roberts 8+7 Worked hard but should have made mince meat of an awful Citeh defence with the honey monster.

McCarthy 7+8 Worked hard and held a lot of good possession. Chronically lacked midfield support.

1. Citeh were rubbish. Worst Citeh team in 20 years. Only individual talents of Robinho, Wright Phillips, Kompany carried them through to a draw. At one stage when they were arguing I thought they had stopped playing for Hughes. They were not chasing back or tracking Rovers player. Only our own weaknesses stopped us winning.

2. Dunn & Bentley made Rovers last season a better team than we were. With either or both we would have won. Dunn would have run rings through that shambles. Their back four and defensive formation is a shocker. Emerton and Warnock are the only two players (at the mo) who can play CM. BFS has said rightly consistent selection of experienced players will get us out. However CM midfield 'lost' us the game yesterday. It led to all the other problems. Fatigue, individual errors.

3. City fans I speak with agree with Rovers fans - Hughes is great at signing bargains. Hughes has NO tactical nouse at all. Hughes cannot handle big players. They were awful given the £millions on the pitch. He needs sacking, he's not up to the job.

4. 3 games under BFS and enormous improvements (and I liked Ince). Undefeated. 265 minutes without conceding a goal. A team with purpose. Offer that to the fans of Pompey (1 win in 7, 5 £trillion in debt, bonzo for Manager), Boro (6 bad results?), Hull (no wins in 9), Stoke (simply crap), WBA (toothless), Spuds (5 consecutive poor results), Barcodes (no decent players cept Guthieries), Sunderland (same as us), West Ham (first team to start a game with only 9 players - seriously Bellamy, Upson gone, more to follow), Citeh (clueless on and off pitch, players revolting)

5. 5 players needed to go in the summer. From; Mokeoana (£1m), Derbyshire (£2m), Treacy (£1m), Reid (£3m), Nelsen (£2m), Pederson (£4m), Roberts (£3m), Vogel (FREE). NOTHING HAS CHANGED. A couple of youngsters brought on plus 5 in.

[chris]

who is going to pay 3 million for reid, how many games has he played in three years

well maybe Newcastle will then

[Pugg]

1. Citeh were rubbish. Worst Citeh team in 20 years.

Weren't City in the third div about 10 years ago? Surely can't be as bad as then!

[modes98]

As for the ref, the luckiest player was probably Tugay.

I would say Ireland was by far and away the luckiest. His 2 footed lunge on MGP was worthy of a red itself, never mind a second yellow, which should have followed.

I would agree that Tugay was winding up the ref but didn't deserve a second yellow for his tactics. Classic Tugay!

[broadsword]

Still can't get over yesterday but compared to a few games ago at least we have hope now.

It does hurt, but we have to move on now.

Having said that, I'm still extremely peed off!

Hopefully we can take it out on Newcastle and Bolton!

[joey_big_nose]

1. Citeh were rubbish. Worst Citeh team in 20 years. Only individual talents of Robinho, Wright Phillips, Kompany carried them through to a draw. At one stage when they were arguing I thought they had stopped playing for Hughes. They were not chasing back or tracking Rovers player. Only our own weaknesses stopped us winning.

2. Dunn & Bentley made Rovers last season a better team than we were. With either or both we would have won. Dunn would have run rings through that shambles. Their back four and defensive formation is a shocker. Emerton and Warnock are the only two players (at the mo) who can play CM. BFS has said rightly consistent selection of experienced players will get us out. However CM midfield 'lost' us the game yesterday. It led to all the other problems. Fatigue, individual errors.

5. 5 players needed to go in the summer. From; Mokeoana (£1m), Derbyshire (£2m), Treacy (£1m), Reid (£3m), Nelsen (£2m), Pederson (£4m), Roberts (£3m), Vogel (FREE). NOTHING HAS CHANGED. A couple of youngsters brought on plus 5 in.

I havt take issue with the points above:

1) Citeh were rubbish because we made them play rubbish. Tw days previously they were sensational against Hull. If we had given them space they would have similarly murdered us. BFS got his tactics right and inspired an almost unprecedented (in the last three or four years anyway) level of workrate and organisation from the troops. You cannot take that away from the Rovers.

2) Dunn was a non entity last year. Same injury problems as this year. I thought the central palyers did okay yesterday, not a major problem. Dunn would of helped but I am not absolutely sure it would have made that much of a difference. Bentley on the other hand would clearly have given us a new outet - but then would he have worked as hard as Emerton in the right wing role?

5) I think you are being a bit silly. We cannot sell eight first team players, especially since one of them is long term injured, one is out captain, and one is our first choice left winger. We cannot shift that amount of bodies in and out without utterly destroying the team ethic mid season, plus being a completely unviable course of action in the Jan window due to a lack of time and money. Also it is highly pertinant that the only clubs that have those kinds of daft turnovers od players are sides who are, unsurprisingly, terminally rubbish despite the large amount of quality talent they aquire - Spurs, Newcastle and increacingly Man City. The only team that I can think of who have pulled off that short termist approach are Chelsea. But then they spent 200m quid and just appointed the European Cup winning manager so it was a slightly different kettle of fish.

The team yesterday worked for each other. We need a couple of additions, but lets not froth at the mouth. A central midfielder, a right winger and a striker would see us going well. Any more than that and we are asking for trouble imo. You need to change things with purpose but also moderation.

[only2garners]

The big mystery for me is where was Emerton in this move? Why isn't he where he should be and over in that space?

By this time Emerton was playing in central midfield - it was Derbyshire who should have been covering at right back and he was caught moving forward leaving space for Sturridge to play the ball through to Robinho. So it was Derbyshire at fault twice, once for this and once for not heading into the corner just before to run down the clock when he had the chance.

I would say Ireland was by far and away the luckiest. His 2 footed lunge on MGP was worthy of a red itself, never mind a second yellow, which should have followed.

Don't forget his handball on the early free kick as well. It was ball to hand but if you are breaking from a free kick wall with your arms in the air it's handball for me and a penalty. He must have been 8/9 yards from the kick as well so had time to move his arms. If he was nearer then he broke from the wall illegally.

[Majiball]

I agree with that having seen it again. They had 3 men in the middle and Ooijer was one of our 3 men marking them. The big mystery for me is where was Emerton in this move? Why isn't he where he should be and over in that space?

EDIT: beat me too it 2 Garners.

Sam brought on Derb's for Benni, moved Emo into the middle and stuck Derb's out wide right. Retrospectively perhaps Vogel should have come on instead.

Derb's does the right thing in covering the pass its just his choice to guess where the ball was going was wrong and cost us the points. I'm not convinced Emo would have done this he was solid defensively yesterday.

I no longer want to see Derb's out wide ever he's a striker. It just shows how weak our right flank is teams will exploit it until its sorted.

Don't forget his handball on the early free kick as well. It was ball to hand but if you are breaking from a free kick wall with your arms in the air it's handball for me and a penalty. He must have been 8/9 yards from the kick as well so had time to move his arms. If he was nearer then he broke from the wall illegally.

Cancelled out by Ooijers on Robinho in the end, but he should have blown for it, raise your arms and its handball.

[joey_big_nose]

EDIT: beat me too it 2 Garners.

Sam brought on Derb's for Benni, moved Emo into the middle and stuck Derb's out wide right. Retrospectively perhaps Vogel should have come on instead.

Derb's does the right thing in covering the pass its just his choice to guess where the ball was going was wrong and cost us the points. I'm not convinced Emo would have done this he was solid defensively yesterday.

I no longer want to see Derb's out wide ever he's a striker. It just shows how weak our right flank is teams will exploit it until its sorted.

I agree with this. It was a a major tactical error bringing Derbyshire on, and I think it was a product of Allardyce already thinking we had won the game. Hopefully it will never be repeated.

I like Derbyshire as a player but I just don't really see what he offers us as we have better options up front and he is not a right winger. Of the three or four players we can afford to sell he would be one, not least because we could expect a reasonable fee.

[grizfoot]

You can track the point of when we lost grip on the game from the moment Tugay left the field and was replaced with Mokoena. Don't blame Big Sam for bringing him off he looked knackered and was running the risk of getting sent off.

We saw very little of the ball after that because Andrews nor Mokoena are capable of having composure on the ball in central midfield. It was all City pressure after that point. Yes we scored the second whilst Mokoena was on the pitch but that was one of our rare attacks.

Then after our second goal we switched to 4-5-1 and brought on Derbyshire and played him right-wing, where he's been played numerous times in the past to little success. Ooijer has got to be at fault for the first Citeh goal, poor header but a good finish from Sturridge. Then with only a minute left Derbyshire had the ball running down the right flank but instead of running the ball into the corner he tries a through ball, which I might add was quite a simple one, and gave the ball away. Then as we know Citeh get the ball back with Sturridge just outside of the area there's two Rovers players infront of him and he can't possibly go anywhere, so Mokoena charitable tries a slide tackle allowing him to skip past which then allows the ball to be played to a certain unmarked £30million+ player in the box. You could argue that Ooijer should have been marking him but I think he got drawn across to the middle of the area because Citeh had that many players forward. Derbyshire being an attacking-minded striker and not a defensively aware right midfield didn't see the danger either. Had Bert still been on the right he might well have at least made the pass harder or even stopped the ball getting there.

The overall performance was good though, Roberts and McCarthy were brilliant all game. I'd say McCarthy shaded MOTM for me. The midfield looked half-decent and passed it around well at times, till Tugay was subbed like I've already mentioned after that we prompty turned into hoof it as far away as possible mode. As for the defense we looked okay at times but sloppy at others, Robinho got a clear unmarked header in the first half that he should have put away. Overall a draw was probably a fair result but like Big Sam said it felt a bit like having all your christmas presents taken away from under your tree on christmas morning.

[Majiball]

Look at the clips, Nelsen goes mental at Oojier on both goals, I think Oojier should be responsible for his position, the first goal was almost the perfect assist too

like i said it could not happen at a better time, weak links needed to be identified in that game.

we will be a better team because of it

Sorry Nelsen cannot possible see what we can in the replay he's watching his man and the ball. He may have gone mental at him but that doesn't mean he was right to do so.

Ooijer is a centre half who on occasion can do a job at right back.

I could ask why since Nelsen was the last man and as such should have been marshalling the defence did he not push them up when Sturridge starts his run which intially goes away from goal we could have got 5 yards back then. Robinho would then have been as Sturridge said he thought he would be off-side? At the end of the day the situation is safe till derb's moves.

Did Nelsen call for the ball Ooijer headed??? Our defensive organistion and communication is not good enough. Why did Sturridge have so much space in our box? Ball watching I'd guess he's the only city player in a sea of Rovers shirts.

What I think we have to take from this is that our defence are not all on the same wavelenght we need a true right back None of Emo, Ooijer or Simpson are the answer we need to replace Neill, yet another sale that has aided in our squads weakening just like Savage.

Too many square pegs in round holes at Rovers and there all on our right side, Sell RSC and fix the gaps we'll be better for it, provided Benni keeps scoring.

Personally central midfield and right back are the two areas we must strenghten. Emerton can carry on at Right midfield for the foreseeable he's doing OK and is solid defensively and going forward and works his socks off.

[T4E]

You can track the point of when we lost grip on the game from the moment Tugay left the field and was replaced with Mokoena. Don't blame Big Sam for bringing him off he looked knackered and was running the risk of getting sent off.

Agreed - but surely it had to be Vogel didn't it? We lost our outlet when we needed it most.

[John]

Majiball, completely agree. We need a natural right back and have needed one for a while - Emerton is not the answer there.

[Mr. E]

Allardyce is right - if the players can mentally recover and continue playing like this, we'll start picking up wins. But that's the hard part - we're all a bit dizzy at the moment and not sure how to swallow it.

[j166429]

I think the biggest problem yesterday and in quite a few other games was Ooijer. I'm not convinced at all by his defending.

Also we should have tried keeping posession of the ball in the last 5-10 mins instead of hoofing it long or in to the corners. Every time we had the ball (in the last 10 mins) we gave it straight back to City.

[Exiled in Toronto]

Sorry Nelsen cannot possible see what we can in the replay he's watching his man and the ball. He may have gone mental at him but that doesn't mean he was right to do so.

Did Nelsen call for the ball Ooijer headed??? Our defensive organistion and communication is not good enough. Why did Sturridge have so much space in our box? Ball watching I'd guess he's the only city player in a sea of Rovers shirts.

Setanta Canada just showed the game in full again, so I had a good look at the last 10 mins.

There is no way Nelsen called for the ball for the 1st - which he clearly should have - he wasn't shaping up at all to go for the ball even though it should have been his.

As to my Emerton question, yes I see now that he went into central midfield and I can report that, following the switch, he touched the ball 4 times each time giving it straight to a City player, the first of which led directly to their first goal. If he is the answer to central midfield, I don't understand the question. He also stood around like a statue for the 2nd, neither challenging Sturridge or covering anyone.

Derbs and Ooijer were clearly the main culprits but I don't think too many other players can point fingers; it was a team failure to defend what were two easily containable situations.

[tony gale's mic]

Allardyce is right - if the players can mentally recover and continue playing like this, we'll start picking up wins. But that's the hard part - we're all a bit dizzy at the moment and not sure how to swallow it.

You're sounding relatively optimistic...has a lightbulb switched on in your head or something?

[Anti-Dingle-Brigade]

If we are pointing fingers, Mokoena was suicidal. He lunged in, clearly trying to take out the man and Sturridge walked past. He he had stayed on his feet and just blocked Sturridge running, they probably wouldn't have got the cross in.

[dellinsert]

Sorry, but the 4-5-1 was inviting pressure for me. You could liken to leaving one or two men up top when defending corners, it doesn't allow the "attacking" team to commit too many men forward, both in terms of numbers and the ball coming straight back.

And why oh why didn't Derbs take the ball into the corner...

[grizfoot]

Agreed - but surely it had to be Vogel didn't it? We lost our outlet when we needed it most.

My thoughts exactly. Not only did we lose our only composed central midfielder capable of playing accurate passes under pressure in Tugay. We also lost our only player capable of running with and keeping the ball for any length of time in Emerton by shifting him into the centre. Then again if we'd gone onto win 2-1 we probably wouldn't have been mentioning it.

If we are pointing fingers, Mokoena was suicidal. He lunged in, clearly trying to take out the man and Sturridge walked past. He he had stayed on his feet and just blocked Sturridge running, they probably wouldn't have got the cross in.

Agree completely. Had Mokeona stayed on his feet Sturridge wasn't going anywhere, it was a silly decision to dive in there at best he was going to give away a free-kick in a dangerous position.

[American]

Majiball, completely agree. We need a natural right back and have needed one for a while - Emerton is not the answer there.

I know that Sam has said Carlos doesn't feature in his plans, but has he said anything about Simpson? Was it a 6 month loan, or a season long one?

[T4E]

My thoughts exactly. Not only did we lose our only composed central midfielder capable of playing accurate passes under pressure in Tugay. We also lost our only player capable of running with and keeping the ball for any length of time in Emerton by shifting him into the centre. Then again if we'd gone onto win 2-1 we probably wouldn't have been mentioning it.

Indeed - and if I'm honest, I'd have crucified Ince for that. I can't see any reason to have Mokoena in the team before Vogel. Ever.

[John]

I know that Sam has said Carlos doesn't feature in his plans, but has he said anything about Simpson? Was it a 6 month loan, or a season long one?

As far as I am aware, Sam has not commented on Simpson yet. He signed initally on a season loan I think.

On Vogel, quite annoying that he has not even been playing for the reserves (therefore his match fitness/sharpness must be poor). Ince obviously just had no time for him at all.