[Archived] Rovers versus Manchester City, 25th April 8pm

[Kamy100]

Rovers showed plenty of passion, pride and commitment. However, we lacked quality in the final third of the pitch.

I expected City to beat us easily but apart from the first 20 minutes we matched them stride for stride. Rochina showed some good touches but got badly caught for just before City scored.

Players have to provide the same kind of performance against Bolton, it really is a must win game. I still think that 4 possibly 5 points will be enough.

Well done to the fans, totally and utterly behind the team.

[rebelmswar]

I personally am a bit nonplused about all this.

Most of us expected a slaughter and complete surrender. We fought bravely and did very well on the whole against a club with playing staff worth the entire GNP of asmall country.

Yet people are suprised we lost and looking for very minor points to tar Kean with. I want him gone as much as anyone, but he was not completely at fault.

Yes Roberts seems incapable of scoring, but do does every other bugger. I feel Roberts should have come off for Kalinic myself, but Red Fraggle seems incapable of finishing a game.

Nice try Kean.

Still personally wouldn't let you manage a Barbie house.

[vintageadidas]

Great effort by the lads but still no decent efforts on goal against a below par Man City team.

Salgado, P.Jones, Samba and Benjani played well.

Kalinic, who came on to the welcome of a hero was AWFUL YET AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!

The sad thing is with a decent manager and a few quid we could build a good team around Jones, Hoilett, Ollson, Nzonzi and Rochina; but most if not all will be playing elsewhere once we are relegated.

No win in 11

[den]

Just a quickie.

All credit to the players tonight. To a man they worked their socks off and really couldn't have done much more. The obvious gulf in quality was kept to a minimum and there were some superb performances, particularly from the back four. Phil Jones is top class, the lad seems to have everything. I just hope we don't lose him at the end of the season through relegation. Junior might just have made that difference between a win and a loss tonight. Shame he was missing.

I don't suppose it would be me, not to point out the one continuing worry - Keans substitutions. Fair enough if Dunny had picked up a knock, he had to come off. Every game though, we seem to start making substitutions just for the sake of it, and more often than not rather than give us that bit extra, they seem to change us for the worse. On 60 minutes we'd just got on top of City [in the second half]. They were getting rattled, but our fairly needless subs at that time actually slowed us down and we lost that momentum. Our subs just never seem to improve us.

As for City, they're just a team of big, soft, foreign cheats.

[Mercer]

Men against boys for the first 30 minutes.

I actually believe that Kean set us up wrong. We should have gone 4-5-1 to at least give us a chance to break-up their possession and create something ourselves.

If the City attempt that hit the post early doors had gone in thenm it would have been curtains far earlier.

Second half we competed well but created virtually nothing.

Rochina, apart from one delightful flick, was little boy lost. Emerton is a spent force and Roberts is just Roberts and useless.

Noted the use of Sam's tactics again but we didn't put them under enough pressure in their box because we couldn't get enough possession.

11 league matches without a win and still our deluded manager remains confident.

Walked across the Blackburn End car park just ahead of Dalglish and Commoli and asked Kenny how many of our young stars he was going to nick, the usual wry smile said it all!

[BPF]

I'm not too sure how to feel about tonight.

On the good side, I feel that we put in a good fight and often took the game to City. For a reason that I really cannot put my foot on, it made me think that we are going to beat Bolton.

On the negative side, I started to think that it wouldn't really matter who we had has manager, I think even Sam might have ended up struggling. We have a large amount of Championship quality players and the real lack of quality upfront is largely reminiscent of the Ward / Blake partnership that saw us relegated. One could argue that this is the result of mass underfunding from the Walkers. There are almost too many aspects against us. It is like several different factors have all sealed our fate.

Anyway, we didn't lay down and fight, there is still fight in the old dog yet. Kean is going nowhere, we all have to pull together, we still haven't dropped into the bottom three. Let's keep the faith.

[modes98]

People can slate Roberts and Benjani all they want but Niko "better than Drogba and Rooney" Kalinic gave the ball away about four times in the space of five minutes when he came on.

Rubbish. Kalinic came on and straight away pinged a lovely cross field ball to Emerton who brought it down and then went down. Kalinic hasn't played in 6 or 7 weeks, he is hardly going to be match sharp, not that it is his fault.

People look to have a go at Kalinic when he is given half a chance yet love Benjani who did brilliantly to do nothing, apart from take one off Olsson's head, in the 70mins he was on the pitch.

Roberts looked ok, had a couple of good shots.

We are down and I can't see us beating Bolton or stopping Whu or Wolves beating us.

Kean is inept and Venkys are standing by and letting him take us on the worst run the club has had in my lifetime.

[grizfoot]

Rubbish. Kalinic came on and straight away pinged a lovely cross field ball to Emerton who brought it down and then went down. Kalinic hasn't played in 6 or 7 weeks, he is hardly going to be match sharp, not that it is his fault.

People look to have a go at Kalinic when he is given half a chance yet love Benjani who did brilliantly to do nothing, apart from take one off Olsson's head, in the 70mins he was on the pitch.

Roberts looked ok, had a couple of good shots.

We are down and I can't see us beating Bolton or stopping Whu or Wolves beating us.

Kean is inept and Venkys are standing by and letting him take us on the worst run the club has had in my lifetime.

Yes one good ball but like I said he lost control of the ball about four times, think it was no coincidence we lost grip on the game when Benjani was replaced by him.Some people go on about Kalinic as if he's a wonderkid or something, he has shown glimpses of talent no doubt but for me he drifts out a game too much (still better than Roberts granted). But for me Benjani is the all-round better player thanKalinic, just a shame he's never fully fit to last a full game.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

No win in 11

[Josh]

Slightly off topic but how small is Andy Todd?! walked past him as he was (I presume) on his way to his seat in the Darwen End, it's a credit to him that he got as far as he did as a centre half

[Mattyblue]

Behave BPF, just an extra 4 points would have had us pretty much safe.

Ragtag bunch of players or not, the last manager would have achieved that over this imposter.

[chaddyrovers]

where the owners there tonight?

I thought i seen them but i was sat in the Blackburn End so mite not have been them

[blue_and_white]

I thought we played well to be honest. The desire, work-rate and approach were top notch. After a wobbly first 20 minutes we were on top and only Kean's insane decision to play Rochina alongside Jones in midfield reversed the flow of the game. Annoyed about the Roberts penalty which was absolutely stonewall but we just don't seem to be getting any decisions from referees these days. Phil Jones, Samba and Salgado were magnificent at the back and and I thought Dunn and Jermaine Jones performed admirably against their 5-man midfield. Kean is right in saying if we play like that against Bolton we should win, the key is to actually play like that instead of lowering our level again like we did after Arsenal.

[bazza]

I thought we played well to be honest. The desire, work-rate and approach were top notch. After a wobbly first 20 minutes we were on top and only Kean's insane decision to play Rochina alongside Jones in midfield reversed the flow of the game. Annoyed about the Roberts penalty which was absolutely stonewall but we just don't seem to be getting any decisions from referees these days. Phil Jones, Samba and Salgado were magnificent at the back and and I thought Dunn and Jermaine Jones performed admirably against their 5-man midfield. Kean is right in saying if we play like that against Bolton we should win, the key is to actually play like that instead of lowering our level again like we did after Arsenal.

I was about to post on here but you've said it all for me.

IF, IF we play like that for the next 4 matches, we'll stay up. Cup finals every one.

[DE.]

Would like to add that I thought Salgado was excellent tonight. Struggled a bit at the start but soon got to grips with the game and looked completely assured throughout the match.

[rebelmswar]

I just can't get over replacing Benji, at least he can hold up play a bit whilst Roberts doesn't seem to be able to hold up a sign. He can run around a bit and fall over and get the odd free kick.

Roberts must either talk a better game than Kean, be a God on the training ground or have some very broken in knee pads.

[tony gale's mic]

People can slate Roberts and Benjani all they want but Niko "better than Drogba and Rooney" Kalinic gave the ball away about four times in the space of five minutes when he came on. I thought Benjani had a good game to be honest and his hold-up play was good. But like all our strikers they seemingly don't know where the back of the net is.

Oh shutup, noone said Kalinic was better than Drogba and Rooney, just that his scoring rate is better.

Kalinic: 4 in 6 before his little cameo today, and 5 in 16 in the league.

Roberts: 1 in his last 19 games.

Hmm...which one to start with?

[blue_and_white]

I just can't get over replacing Benji, at least he can hold up play a bit whilst Roberts doesn't seem to be able to hold up a sign. He can run around a bit and fall over and get the odd free kick.

Roberts must either talk a better game than Kean, be a God on the training ground or have some very broken in knee pads.

I thought Roberts played well and was more dangerous than Benjani. Like I said the penalty was stonewall (check Sky if you taped it) and he won quite a few free-kicks taking defenders on. His headed chance was vintage Roberts, totally fluffed it, but I was a lot more impressed with his overall performance tonight than I have been the rest of the season. Also considering how much defenders climb all over him and tug his shirt, I don't blame him for going down now and again. Seems like the bigger guy you are, the harder it is to get refs to give you a free kick in the PL.

[rebelmswar]

Kalinic: 4 in 6 before his little cameo today, and 5 in 16 in the league.

Roberts: 1 in his last 19 games.

Hmm...which one to start with?

Steve McManaman even questioned that one today.

[Hughesy]

MOM - Samba for me.

Il ask this question.

Which is our best Central defensive partnership? Samba & Jones or Samba & Nelsen....I think tonight (Except the poor clearance) showed that we need to use the 1st from the start of next season (If we stay up).

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

IF, IF we play like that for the next 4 matches, we'll stay up. Cup finals every one.

Only one small problem there,we have shown absolutely no winning consistency all season!

[Roverdale]

Phil Jones was just in a different class tonight.. unreal. All of the back 4 played well against a top quality attack. Roberts for me had the best game I can remember him having, Benjani was above average until he came off. Our downfall was 'master tactician' Steve Kean bringing a young lad in Rochina on out of position against a midfield 5. I would love to have asked Kean what he was thinking would happen. Rochina showed glimpses of what he will be able to do and his first 30 seconds had me thinking he was gonna bang one in but it wasn't to be. Another huge decision going against us with the penalty, it's just not our year is it.

That game summed up our season brilliantly.. Weren't given a stonewall penalty (as usual), our youngsters look promising (Jones, Olsson, Rochina), Our strike force may as well be my gran and we can dominate anyone on our day we just can't make it count.

[sambo]

Phil Jones put in one of the best performances I've seen in a very long time.

Won every 50-50, made some stampeding runs, he had it all.

[Parsonblue]

We played with more passion tonight than against Everton but the end result was still the same - another defeat and now almost three months without a win.

I felt that Kean got his line-up wrong from the start as we were totally outnumbered in midfield. Fortunately, Mancini still can't get away from his slightly defensive approach to away games and this enabled us to stay in the game. If City had upped the tempo I feel sure they would have swept us aside. The amount of space that de Jong and Barry had was alarming and they were able to control the first half without any pressure being applied to them. Far too often we simply stood off and allowed them to pick their passes without applying any pressure. Good players, which de Jong and Barry are, will always cause problems if you give them space in which to play. I find it incredible that Kean and Jensen couldn't see the problems that playing two strikers and Dunny just behind was likely to create.

Our best attackers, Samba and Phil Jones, were also our key defenders and this is the crux of the matter. Samba looks more likely to score than any of our so called strikers, while Jones is far more powerful in midfield than Emerton, Dunn, Jermaine Jones or Pedersen. However, with Nelsen injured we need both of them at the back.

I felt the back four did well, although Givet still looks short of the form he displayed earlier in the season. However, our midfield and so called attack look desperately short of quality.

On Saturday we will be drinking at the Last Chance Saloon and somehow, and I'm not sure how, Kean has to find a pattern of play that will enable us to create chances and once created, the players have got to be able to put the ball in the back of the net. At the moment we simply don't create enough and when we do get into the area our powder puff attack offers little in the way of threat.

Tonight we showed passion and endeavour but lacked the quality to carve out and take anything that resembled a clear cut chance. Anything less than a win on Saturday will surely leave us too much to do in the final three games. At the moment I feel our Premier League life is ebbing away with little prospect of an upturn in fortunes. I've now got past the stage of being angry and am just sad at the whole spectacle that Blackburn Rovers has now become.

[Tom]

How many free kicks did we waste tonight? Awful delivery.

Got to say I thought Dunn was poor and quite lazy but we had better shape when he was on.