[Archived] Blackburn Rovers v Stoke City

[BPF]

Have the two chickens in the Darwen End been discussed?

[cruz]

no $$$$!

And fondly remembering Sam as something he wasn't doesn't help either.

Biggest laugh of the day were the riverside fools chanting "Only one Big Sam"

Same clowns who called him clueless on a weekely basis

[BPF]

Only Dunny would crush someone. He cannot even pass straight. He is spent force in a team that has been neglected for years and lacks even the basic skills

Fully agree, if his contract is renewed then it is the poorest decision thus far.

[tony gale's mic]

Won 1 Drew 3

6 out of 12.

Still doesn't fit the "We were beating teams like Stoke and West Ham under Allardyce" comments.

Sam has gone, he wasn't the messiah, he was a naughty boy who venkys couldn't trust to spend their money due to him wasting whatever money he did get.

Though employing kean isn't the answer

When people say "teams like Stoke and West Ham" they generally mean bottom half teams.

Our record at home against bottom half teams was P15 W 11 D 4 since the start of last season.

So yeah, we were beating teams like Stoke and West Ham.

[jim mk2]

And fondly remembering Sam as something he wasn't doesn't help either.

Biggest laugh of the day were the riverside fools chanting "Only one Big Sam"

They know more about football than you apparently.

It was apparent to anyone with half a brain cell that ditching Sam was football suicide.

And so it is proving.

[FourLaneBlue]

Though employing kean isn't the answer

This is the point.

We are getting sidetracked with "Sam this" and "Sam that" stuff. He has gone.

However, we need someone to replace him.

Now is not the time to gamble with an unknown. Nor is a Premiership dogfight the place.

[beerwins]

They know more about football than you apparently.

It was apparent to anyone with half a brain cell that ditching Sam was football suicide.

And so it is proving.

Never mind, read it wrong

[AggyBlue]

This is the point.

We are getting sidetracked with "Sam this" and "Sam that" stuff. He has gone.

However, we need someone to replace him.

Now is not the time to gamble with an unknown. Nor is a Premiership dogfight the place.

True, Blackburn Rovers hasn't got the time to wait for Kean to learn the job. He should have started at the start of a season

[Drummer Boy]

After all the utter turmoil our club has been thrown into and someone HAS to come out with that statement.

K'in roll on!

Made the statement based purely on the sentiments being expressed today, the level of invective and the language being used - albeit by a small minority. Frankly, it was bloody nasty and uncalled for

[Tom]

It wasn't a day for positives but I feel it should be said that Hoilett looked good when he came on and should be starting now

[m1st]

Well; I've spent much of the last couple of hours doing a bloke's multi-tasking [i.e.; "watching" the highlights of the 4th Test on ITV 4, followed by the end of "MotD", while trawling through the post-match comments on this thread]. As I emailed my friends in Perth, WA; when I got home from the game, I now know what the Aussies at the "G" must have felt like. However, if you like attractive football, there were at least some positives for us from today's game.

Let me say at the outset that I never expressed a view one way or the other whether or not we ought to get rid of Big Sam. I didn't particularly like the style we played under his management but, if the aim was to retain Premier League status [as it surely must have been], then that style was, for want of a better phrase, a necessary evil.

Yesterday, I saw occasions when the team tried to play a more attractive style of football and it may be that Steve Kean [btw, can we at least do him the courtesy of spelling his name correctly on here?] will bring about an improvement in that area of our game. A chap who sits behind me made the point that it's not wise to try to change a team's style in mid-season and, while he has a point, what worried me was the lack of basic technique in some of our players who seemed unable to pass to their colleagues. The guy behind me also made the point that, once we'd gone behind, a "Manager" [as opposed to a coach] would have done more than bring just one substitute on in an attempt to change the game around.

I thought that, while Kalinic, for example had one of his better games for us, he reamains awfully light-weight for a forward in the English game and needs someone more substantial to play alongside him. I'm sorry to have to put this because, while I'm sure that Dunnie's blue-and-white through and through, I sadly agree that he's not up to giving us 90 minutes Premier League football in a game - use him as a sub, by all means; but don't expect him to influence a game for us as the Dunnie of yesteryear could. And who was supposed to be marking Huth when he came forward for set-plays? He found space on a couple of occasions after he'd scored. Our major problem is midfield; it seems unbalanced so that, even if Kean had a full squad to choose from, I don't know what our least bad midfield would be.

By nature, I'm a "glass-half-full" bloke; so I'm going to clutch to the straw that there are still three worse teams [the three "W"s?] in the Premier League than us; and that we'll finish no lower than 17th.

One other thought which may not be totally relevant. I'm not as well-connected as some on this Board, but I'm sure I can't be the only Rovers fan to be worried about the Venky style of management. If I'm right in assuming that BRFC is, in one sense, now little more than a specialised subsidiary of Venky's Industries, I was more than a little surprised that any conglomerate should acquire a specialised new division and NOT expect the Chairman of that subsidiary to advise the Main Board, particularly when the Chair of the conglomerate has admitted how little she and others on the Main Board know of the intricacies of the specialised new division. So why on earth was John Williams not on the plane to Pune with Steve Kean earlier this week?

[cruz]

Kean is rightly getting critism but surely the players need to take a large chunk too?

The only thing they did right was putting one foot before the other, they lacked any other necessary footballing skills.

[Drummer Boy]

One other thought which may not be totally relevant. I'm not as well-connected as some on this Board, but I'm sure I can't be the only Rovers fan to be worried about the Venky style of management. If I'm right in assuming that BRFC is, in one sense, now little more than a specialised subsidiary of Venky's Industries, I was more than a little surprised that any conglomerate should acquire a specialised new division and NOT expect the Chairman of that subsidiary to advise the Main Board, particularly when the Chair of the conglomerate has admitted how little she and others on the Main Board know of the intricacies of the specialised new division. So why on earth was John Williams not on the plane to Pune with Steve Kean earlier this week?

After all the debate on this thread, this is the key point to me about events over the last fortnight - I'd be much more worried about John Williams walking than losing against Stoke.

On a more general level, Mattyblue goes on about losing a footballing argument - I hadn't even started one!! My argument is how we as a crowd of supporters are contributing to our current situation and my concerns at the underlying motives. I feel we are all in "Daily Mail" mode letting the hyperbolic assessment of others get in the way of the facts. If we are having this debate at the end of January then is the time to worry.

[rovermagic]

Many of the posts here don't make sense. The Venkys have invested £43m. If we go down they will lose at least half. They did not buy us to add to the value of the Venkys brand. Would KFC add to their brand value by buying Bolton? Chelsea help make Abromovich famous but do not add to value of his oil companies. Losing Phil Jones and poss Samba, we could easily go down. If so the c £8-12m better off we would have been per annum will probably be wasted.

[tony gale's mic]

After all the debate on this thread, this is the key point to me about events over the last fortnight - I'd be much more worried about John Williams walking than losing against Stoke.

On a more general level, Mattyblue goes on about losing a footballing argument - I hadn't even started one!! My argument is how we as a crowd of supporters are contributing to our current situation and my concerns at the underlying motives. I feel we are all in "Daily Mail" mode letting the hyperbolic assessment of others get in the way of the facts. If we are having this debate at the end of January then is the time to worry.

The only game between now and the end of January which is remotely as winnable as the last two is W Brom at home. Apart from that it's West Brom away, Sunderland away, Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs in early Feb.

If you can see us getting many points out of those games after what you've just witnessed then you must be an optimist...

[Torgeir]

True, Blackburn Rovers hasn't got the time to wait for Kean to learn the job. He should have started at the start of a season

No. Sacking Sam was wrong, he should have been kept on until the summer, but to say we have the quality to stay up with our current players is gambling. I said all along we need reinforcements, that's down to the owners more than the manager(s). There's no guarantee that Sam would get us more points from the two games we've just played - just consider our recent injuries to Samba and Jones and it's easy to see our first XI isn't as strong as it was.

[AggyBlue]

No. Sacking Sam was wrong, he should have been kept on until the summer, but to say we have the quality to stay up with our current players is gambling. I said all along we need reinforcements, that's down to the owners more than the manager(s). There's no guarantee that Sam would get us more points from the two games we've just played - just consider our recent injuries to Samba and Jones and it's easy to see our first XI isn't as strong as it was.

Isn't that how my post reads?

[JMillZz]

Have the two chickens in the Darwen End been discussed?

Haha I saw there was one but didn't know there was a second. How the hell did someone get them in past the stewards?!

It did make me chuckle.

[RoversSG]

Sigh, yet another poor game. I don't think we created even a single decent half-chance in the last 2 games.

As i said after the WH game, not since the Ince days have i seen us pass the ball for an entire game without doing anything worthwhile with it. It might be earlier days but Kean does not inspire confidence in me right now.

PS - I attribute Nelsen's goal against WH to be down to luck and poor marking.

[Rover Down Under]

Watched the game this morning a few hours after the result (which I didn't check.)

- Salgado, Niko, Junior, Robbo and Olsson were all positives. Hanley had an OK debut. Salgado should be moved to right wing and Emo to right back, he was far more effective when he attacked than Bert.

- Diouf was dropped because he has been awful the last 3 games - he will come back on fire.

- Some players - Emo, Gamst and Dunn namely, appeared to have sore heads.

- Injuries, weather and appalling ref didn't help.

- Stoke's first was a typical Allardyce goal that we probably would have scored if he were still here....ahhh the irony. Their second was a typical goal against Sam's Rovers that they would have scored anyway as we nodded off towards the end of the game.

- How in God's name do we have a reputation as a dirty team? Stoke had 5 yellows and were lucky to finish with ll men, far dirtier than we ever were when Arsy Whinger and the Southern media branded us several years ago.

...and finally...after all the recent turmoil the last thing we need is our own fans turning against us, I did not call for Hodgson, Kidd or Sam to go so this is a first for me:

FANS OUT! *

(*Does not apply to those getting behind us)

[Bobby G]

I thought the fans were supportive until the final whistle. Werent they?

[imy9]

You'd rather I didn't pick the 3 foot wide holes in your post.

That's absolutely fine...

Ok Tony, may I suggest continuing this in the Sam thread?

[47er]

Sigh, yet another poor game. I don't think we created even a single decent half-chance in the last 2 games.

As i said after the WH game, not since the Ince days have i seen us pass the ball for an entire game without doing anything worthwhile with it. It might be earlier days but Kean does not inspire confidence in me right now.

PS - I attribute Nelsen's goal against WH to be down to luck and poor marking.

Yet we are playing 4-2-4!

[Paul Mellelieu]

Yet we are playing 4-2-4!

Not yesterday we weren't.

[philipl]

There were four positives for me from this game:

- Kalinic looked a Prem striker albeit one marooned in a non-Premier League team.

- Hoilett had as big an impact as I have seen him have. His final balls looked to have improved without being dangerous.

- Whilst not being ready at this level, Handley did not look too far off.

- Robinson produced two stunning saves; we are going to need a lot more heroics from him.