[Archived] Blackburn Rovers vs. Aston Villa

[Exiled in Toronto]

Very enjoyable game I thought. We looked dangerous going forwards and it was a terrific defensive effort. Robbo was superb as was Nelsen. We did get a bit lucky in that every loose ball in our box fell to us and if Young's header had gone in on the dreaded 47 minute mark it would have been curtains, but also we could have easily scored 4. Roberts is easily our most effective target man even if he is a poor finisher. I like the way the team is shaping up at the moment.

The only downers were Dunn and Givet, who is now being targeted by the opposition as our weak link. Good subbing by Sam at half time and Chiombonda completely negated Downing in the 2nd half, plus gave them something to think about when we went forwards. Deserves a start I feel.

Seemed a very warm Lancashire welcome for the new owners, though someone should have nipped over to the club shop for a couple of club parkas for them.

[67splitscreen]

2 v 0

[broadsword]

Ah, OK, I apologise for flying off the handle.

Whilst I think that any player playing well should be praised, players who have a prolonged poor spell should be criticised. I think that applies to Pedersen, Andrews, and everyone else.

It doesn't mean that I want to see him have a bad game just so that I can slag him off. That's illogical. I've not seen much football lately, but apparently he's been playing very well. That's obviously what I want to see, congratulayions to him.

[Tom]

You have to admit though Pedersen is criticised quicker than most if he has a bad game, it seems people just don't like the bloke at times.

If all the team play bad you can guarantee many will single out Pedersen for criticism for some reason.

Anyway thats irrelevent today thankfully

[FourLaneBlue]

Oh and I also liked 'Jason Roberts in a nutsehll' At one stage in the second half he burst though really well then turned and hit a shot near the corner flag

[Rovermatt]

A cracking three points to wipe out last week's disastrous display and another stellar contribution from the previously redundant Pedersen.

That said, we let a very young, inexperienced and lightweight Villa side dominate us for the majority of the second half. A better team would have really punished us.

[Exiled in Toronto]

Oh and I also liked 'Jason Roberts in a nutsehll' At one stage in the second half he burst though really well then turned and hit a shot near the corner flag

"If I was mananger? I'd pick myself every week"

"If I was invisible? I'd be in the manager's office to hear what he really says about me."

Ok Jason, we get the point that you're annoyed with him. Having said that, not giving the man a squad number in an unsubtle attempt to force him out was stupid and unnecessary.

[chocky]

I think the change in formation has worked as well. I may be wrong but we seem to be playing a 4-4-1-1 it could be a 4-4-2..

[DavidMailsTightPerm]

Well we were depressingly @#/? I can't think of a single positive thing to say about that performance.

You deserved the 3 points.

See you at Villa Park.

I think you are being a bit harsh on your team. Though I think we just about deserved our win - you created enough chances to make more of a game of it - if you had equalised just after half time it would obviously have been a totally different game. At no point (well except with 4 minutes to go) did I ever feel confident.

BTW - is there a history between Warnock and Diouf - Warnock put in some silly challenges on Diouf today - and seemed really angry about something ?

[Steve Moss]

Hmm... Who has swapped our Pedersen? Seems to have found some of the goalscoring form that has escaped him for the past four years...

Maybe the improvement originates from Benni moving out? I seem to recall that McCarthy loved to heap abuse on MGP

I know it's only one mistake but would anyone swap him for Robbo?

I wouldn't.

Neither would I. Ince got at least one thing right. Then again, a broken clock is correct twice a day.

[DavidMailsTightPerm]

Very enjoyable game I thought. We looked dangerous going forwards and it was a terrific defensive effort. Robbo was superb as was Nelsen. We did get a bit lucky in that every loose ball in our box fell to us and if Young's header had gone in on the dreaded 47 minute mark it would have been curtains, but also we could have easily scored 4. Roberts is easily our most effective target man even if he is a poor finisher. I like the way the team is shaping up at the moment.

The only downers were Dunn and Givet, who is now being targeted by the opposition as our weak link. Good subbing by Sam at half time and Chiombonda completely negated Downing in the 2nd half, plus gave them something to think about when we went forwards. Deserves a start I feel.

Seemed a very warm Lancashire welcome for the new owners, though someone should have nipped over to the club shop for a couple of club parkas for them.

I agree with most of this - except Chimbonda - to me the guy is a liability. The most frustrating thing is that at times he just seems to let the opposition cross - making little effort to close the ball down - he also did some suicidal passing out of defence. If we are going to play an attacking left back - and I agree with you on that point - play Olsson (when fit).

Big plus for me was Hoilett - though he possibly wasn't in the match as much as he should have been - when he got the ball - you always felt something was going to happen. Hopefully he will now kick on and continue to justify all the hype that initially surrounded him.

[Fife Rover]

Well that was a nice surprise. Good win.

- Pedersen was brilliant, still not sure why he didn't take that early free kick instead of letting Samba have a blast though

- I was disappointed Hoilett went off I thought he looked dangerous today, he's come on leaps and bounds

- Villa were poor, we get criticised for our long ball tactics but their main form of attack was a big boot or big throw up to Downing

- I thought Dunn should have come off for Goulon earlier but it's lucky he didn't due to Mortens injury

- Friedel had a stinker, every cross he ran into his own man, we now have the better keeper there, Robbo made some great stops

- We could have had 3 or 4 today with a bit more of a killer edge, nice to see us create chances from open play even when we only had 10 men on the pitch to their 11

- I thought Chimbonda did well when he came of save for one bad plass early on that led to a Villa chance, controlled the winger with relative ease

More or less exactly as I saw it too. I didn't think Villa played badly though; they passed it around and tried to stretch our defence on countless occasions. but luckily our midfield (especially EH Diouf , Pederson and Jones) were up to it, whilst the back four and Robbo were right on top if their jobs all day. OK Givet was the weak link but with his early injury and feeling ill he can be excused, and certainly did not let us down. Chimbonda did OK too when he came on.

Up front Roberts was a real thorn in their sides right from the start, and when M. Diouf came on he combined well with J Rob too. We could easily have had 2 or 3 more goals with better finishing.

Excellent game to watch overall. Non stop end to end stuff, with quite a few good perfomances and no bad ones. Give us more of that Rovers!!

[bazza]

Unfortunately I missed the game today, so I was wondering what the reception was like for the new owners???

Did people chant anything?

I heard "One Jack Walker. There's only one Jack Walker" once. Other chants were "Who are ya?" and "Are you Burnley in disguise".

The new owners, the two Rao brothers, were introduced to the crowd before the match and waved to us all from the pitch. Later they sat next to John Williams and Sam.

I presume the Walker family still occupied the special seats. They didn't look like Venky people to me.

Very pleased with 3 points. Dunny played the full game and looked OK, contrary to earlier reports. Hoillet was out of it in the second half. That's why he was subbed.

Herold looked big, slow, off the pace and didn't track back but he'll speed up if he gets more game time.

Nelsen and Robbo had great games.

[broadsword]

You have to admit though Pedersen is criticised quicker than most if he has a bad game, it seems people just don't like the bloke at times.

If all the team play bad you can guarantee many will single out Pedersen for criticism for some reason.

Anyway thats irrelevent today thankfully

Yes, he is criticised quicker than most. I'd like to think that rather than people wanting a whipping boy, it's through pure frustration with him because they know he can play, but he hasn't seemed able to for long periods. The can't-get-a-corner-past-the-first-man syndrome being a particular bugbear.

[RIML]

I'm glad everyone took notice of Nelsen's performance The defence would not be beaten today, great spirit and determination. Well done Rovers, bring on United!

[BPF]

Brilliant.

Really enjoyed today .

We are playing good football and getting results. More of the same please.

A great start to the Venky's era.

[Smithy]

I'm glad everyone took notice of Nelsen's performance

I thought he had a shocker.

[Tom]

I think you are being a bit harsh on your team. Though I think we just about deserved our win - you created enough chances to make more of a game of it - if you had equalised just after half time it would obviously have been a totally different game. At no point (well except with 4 minutes to go) did I ever feel confident.

BTW - is there a history between Warnock and Diouf - Warnock put in some silly challenges on Diouf today - and seemed really angry about something ?

I don't know but thankfully Warnock's stupidity lead to our first goal with that needless tackle.

Warnock today showed to be no better than Chimbonda, good going forward but suspect at the back

[USABlue]

Another massive win with some very winnable games ahead next month, along with a trip to Old Trafford to face the poorest United side in decades.

The poorest United team who are still joint top on points. It is Old Trafford after all.

[ABBEY]

Good result.had to laugh at villa fans tho after all the @#/? they gave us last year about ###### support..and today they didn't sell all their tickets .big club? Bollux.

[USABlue]

Well that was a nice surprise. Good win.

- Pedersen was brilliant, still not sure why he didn't take that early free kick instead of letting Samba have a blast though

- I was disappointed Hoilett went off I thought he looked dangerous today, he's come on leaps and bounds

- Villa were poor, we get criticised for our long ball tactics but their main form of attack was a big boot or big throw up to Downing

- I thought Dunn should have come off for Goulon earlier but it's lucky he didn't due to Mortens injury

- Friedel had a stinker, every cross he ran into his own man, we now have the better keeper there, Robbo made some great stops

- We could have had 3 or 4 today with a bit more of a killer edge, nice to see us create chances from open play even when we only had 10 men on the pitch to their 11

- I thought Chimbonda did well when he came of save for one bad plass early on that led to a Villa chance, controlled the winger with relative ease

I was baffled by Hoilett, or Sam's use of him. He has looked quite good on the left for a couple of games now so we start with him on the rigth, I thought he was a bit out of it. Did better when he moved to the left. Did not have the same impact as the last few games.

[Tom]

To be fair its the first ive seen of hoilett this season and he is starting to look a proper player. Won a lot in the air to his credit and picked a few good balls out.

[Exiled in Toronto]

As an aside, did Pires actually come on or did they just hold the board up - I didn't notice him once. Another has been taking a last ride on the Premier LEague gravy train

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

2 v 0

Quite a few Rovers fans with the Chicken Head gear on today

[Amo]

You just hate Pederson. At least be man enough to admit it!!

Here's my view on Pedersen. He's a talented player who's underperformed for too long and got away with it. If he can perform more consistently, we don't have a problem.

At least I have the courtesy to spell his name right.