Coventry v ROVERS

[Ewood Ace]

5 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

Brereton was never target man striker. 

so if the 4-3-3 doesn't suit us then how would set up then?

There's no doubt about it Brereton was originally signed to take over from Graham however his performances soon showed that he wasn't capable of playing the role.

I would play 4-2-3-1.

Edited October 23, 2020 by Ewood Ace

[simongarnerisgod]

4 minutes ago, Ewood Ace said:

He spent £12 Million on 2 target men to replace Graham but they are not good enough to play the role. So we have had to change our system and style because he failed to bring in an adequate replacement for Graham. But this 4-3-3 system does not suit us at all.

tony has never played with 2 strikers or a target man,so why he bought them is a mystery,in desperation he`s shuffled brereton away from the middle cos he`s tragic there and done the same with gallagher,who while not as bad as ben through the middle,is obviously not trusted to play there,this leaves armstrong up front on his own,hoping that he gets some service from midfield,tony is totally unable to change things if it`s not going well,once a determined side gets in amongst  us we are doomed,you only need to see how pne bullied us terribly at deepdale last season,neil changed things quickly while tony shuffled along the technical area looking perplexed

[roversfan99]

45 minutes ago, islander200 said:

Simple question do you think if we played defensive or doubled up on Sarr we would have got something at Watford?I don't.

And whatever you and others say we created more than enough chances in both the Watford and Bournemouth games to consider ourselves extremely unlucky to have come away pointless.I am a believer that over the course of the season these things even out,we will play a lot worse than we did in those two games and come away with a result.

Also people saying disgrace that Douglas didn't start.The man has had hardly any football and has a history of injuries and we already loaned one full back with historic injury issues in Cunningham who ended up out for a season.

As good a player as Douglas is in no way do his attributes lend to getting the better of Sarr.

I'm still waiting on a response from you over what you said about Brereton last week, how he has done nothing in attacking area's.I pointed out he hit the post that led to a goal and set Rothwell away for an assist.Both examples of threatening play.

Do you still think it's a "myth" that some fans have something against Brereton?The guy had a good match other night,scored a good goal and won countless free kicks.Instead of deserved praise one poster starts giving him shit over his "dives" when yeah he might have gone to ground easy(what player doesn't these days) but they were all fouls.

We have not played our full strength 11 this season and I think it is ridiculous people judging how well or how badly we will do this season.3 players I expect to play an important part in our season have been here 7 days!

I never specifically commented on any tactical mistakes that I believe Mowbray made. My comments were about this underdog mentality not in keeping with a side expecting a top 6 finish, especially based on what i believe is an exaggerated perception of the strength of these relegated teams.

Im not saying that there arent promising aspects to our performances but again in keeping with my earlier comments regarding an underdog mentality, my take home feeling after both games was frustration that we had lost.

I havent seen any comments describing the exclusion of Douglas as a "disgrace" which would be over the top but I personally think that on the back of a Bielsa pre season and appearance in the cup plus the pressing urgency to drop an inept Bell who shouldnt have been given a new deal, Douglas perhaps should have played. You mention his atttibutes but Bell has pace which in theory gives him an advantage but he cant defend so that pace is of little use. If Douglas isnt a better one on one defender and better positionally than Bell then he is a pointless signing but I am sure that he is an upgrade.

My main issue with Brereton is that he offers no goal threat. I dont feel (even on Wednesday) that he anticipates chances in the penalty box and his lack of willingness to get in the box and instead wait well outside the box for the ball to feet is infuriating, Mowbray himself said after the game that he cant score 25 yarders all the time. My comments about his lack of goal threat came before pleasingly he got off the mark, am I convinced that will prompt a spree or even a season where he gets even 8-10 goals? Not really but I am desperate for that to happen, the latter being a reasonable expectation and I was made up when he scored.

I have repeatedly commented on a general improvement post lockdown (on an admittedly non existent benchmark) plus I again commented on Wednesday about his ability (which is a positive one, Craig Conway used to be the master of it) to "win" fouls (sometimes genuinely taken down, sometimes he initiates contact, sometimes he essentially dives, either way its a free kick for us so fair play) and have not seen whoever you have seen giving him "shit" about it, feel free to quote said poster and if so, again id disagree, it gets us up the pitch. I think the fans I know and indeed as shown V Bolton when fans are in the ground are particularly desperate to see him do well. There is no vendetta, to date he has not been a very good signing for us and has got fair criticism for that.

Regarding your last paragraph, I am not sure what to suggest, locking the forum and waiting until 10/12 games in before people can comment on our results? Obviously there are people on both sides, there were comments suggesting that we will definitely finish in the top 6 should we maintain a level of performance that didnt earn any points. Ultimately people will judge continiously based on results and our points tally after 6 games is pretty poor. Absolutely terminal and leaving us with no hope? Obviously not.

[roversfan99]

9 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

We created the most chances against a Watford that I have seen twice who has defensive solid and we created a number of good opportunities which we didn't take. 

You might want to be more defensive solid but we don't have a squad for that. 

Our squad and manager want to play positive attacking football and I reckon see us take teams on and beat them instead of playing like Cardiff under Harris. 

Brereton was never target man striker. 

I think this 4-3-3 formation suits us down to treat personally. Armstrong in the 9 role, Brereton suits playing wide of front 3. Elliott seems to like the inside right position in front 3. Holtby and Rothwell can play the centre midfield roles, and Holtby can play the midfield playmaker role. 

so if the 4-3-3 doesn't suit us then how would set up then?

Obviously the acid test is will we actually start beating teams with regularity? Hopefully so but if not, when does the point come in which we become less snobbish to playing styles and more pragmatic? I am not saying we should do that now.

I find "instead of playing like Cardiff under Harris" a little patronising considering that it got them a play off place last season yet seemingly we are too good to consider resorting to that.

[islander200]

30 minutes ago, JHRover said:

You are correct. We've spent less than them. David v Goliath on finances.

So presumably you expect no less than a win tomorrow and anything less will be a failure? As we are Goliath to Coventry's David on that front.

I don't demand we go to these places and get results. I would prefer a manager that sets us up to be hard to break down at these difficult places rather than just turning up and being wide open at the back and conceding for fun. 

I'd have had no major issues with the Watford result had we done the business in recent home games but we didn't and it is 1 point from 9 so the pressure builds.

 

I don't expect to win at places like Watford and Bournemouth currently no because they have much better players all round than we have.I expect those to be competing for automatic, where as we are not at that level we won't be near automatic spots.

I do expect us to try and compete though which I think we did.I think Watford deserved to win the match on Wednesday night but at the same time I'm not blind to the fact we created more than enough chances to pick something up and I don't think Mowbray is at fault for a mixture of poor finishing and top goalkeeping.

I don't think if we had gone defensive and/or doubled up on Sarr that would have led to us getting a result, and like I said in a previous post I also don't think starting Douglas would have either.

In my opinion if we perform going forward as we did against Bournemouth and Watford we will beat a lot of teams in this division, our opponents won't have the same class to capitalise on our errors.

 

[chaddyrovers]

7 minutes ago, Ewood Ace said:

 

I would play 4-2-3-1.

Thanks for reply

[islander200]

4 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

I never specifically commented on any tactical mistakes that I believe Mowbray made. My comments were about this underdog mentality not in keeping with a side expecting a top 6 finish, especially based on what i believe is an exaggerated perception of the strength of these relegated teams.

Im not saying that there arent promising aspects to our performances but again in keeping with my earlier comments regarding an underdog mentality, my take home feeling after both games was frustration that we had lost.

I havent seen any comments describing the exclusion of Douglas as a "disgrace" which would be over the top but I personally think that on the back of a Bielsa pre season and appearance in the cup plus the pressing urgency to drop an inept Bell who shouldnt have been given a new deal, Douglas perhaps should have played. You mention his atttibutes but Bell has pace which in theory gives him an advantage but he cant defend so that pace is of little use. If Douglas isnt a better one on one defender and better positionally than Bell then he is a pointless signing but I am sure that he is an upgrade.

My main issue with Brereton is that he offers no goal threat. I dont feel (even on Wednesday) that he anticipates chances in the penalty box and his lack of willingness to get in the box and instead wait well outside the box for the ball to feet is infuriating, Mowbray himself said after the game that he cant score 25 yarders all the time. My comments about his lack of goal threat came before pleasingly he got off the mark, am I convinced that will prompt a spree or even a season where he gets even 8-10 goals? Not really but I am desperate for that to happen, the latter being a reasonable expectation and I was made up when he scored.

I have repeatedly commented on a general improvement post lockdown (on an admittedly non existent benchmark) plus I again commented on Wednesday about his ability (which is a positive one, Craig Conway used to be the master of it) to "win" fouls (sometimes genuinely taken down, sometimes he initiates contact, sometimes he essentially dives, either way its a free kick for us so fair play) and have not seen whoever you have seen giving him "shit" about it, feel free to quote said poster and if so, again id disagree, it gets us up the pitch. I think the fans I know and indeed as shown V Bolton when fans are in the ground are particularly desperate to see him do well. There is no vendetta, to date he has not been a very good signing for us and has got fair criticism for that.

Regarding your last paragraph, I am not sure what to suggest, locking the forum and waiting until 10/12 games in before people can comment on our results? Obviously there are people on both sides, there were comments suggesting that we will definitely finish in the top 6 should we maintain a level of performance that didnt earn any points. Ultimately people will judge continiously based on results and our points tally after 6 games is pretty poor. Absolutely terminal and leaving us with no hope? Obviously not.

For me Watford have far better players than us and will be going for automatic.We will be fighting for top 6 but won't go near the automatics it's as simple as that .We perform as we did v Watford we will beat Coventry.

You didn't say goal threat last week you said he doesn't do anything in threatening areas I then gave 2 examples of how his play led to two goals ,him hitting the post for Dolan to put away and his driving run before playing Rothwell through for an assist which led to another goal.Of course he needs to start scoring goals to come anywhere close to justifying a 7 million fee, but THIS season he is contributing and adding value to the sid

[chaddyrovers]

1 hour ago, roversfan99 said:

Obviously the acid test is will we actually start beating teams with regularity? Hopefully so but if not, when does the point come in which we become less snobbish to playing styles and more pragmatic? I am not saying we should do that now.

I find "instead of playing like Cardiff under Harris" a little patronising considering that it got them a play off place last season yet seemingly we are too good to consider resorting to that.

The manager has committed us this style of play and formation. We played well in most games. Only 2 games we struggled against teams. 

Harris deserved huge credit for getting them to playoffs when Warnock left them last season. It will be interesting to see if Cardiff change at all now they got Harry Wilson there  

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

1 hour ago, chaddyrovers said:

We created the most chances against a Watford that I have seen twice who has defensive solid and we created a number of good opportunities which we didn't take. 

You might want to be more defensive solid but we don't have a squad for that. 

Our squad and manager want to play positive attacking football and I reckon see us take teams on and beat them instead of playing like Cardiff under Harris. 

Brereton was never target man striker. 

I think this 4-3-3 formation suits us down to treat personally. Armstrong in the 9 role, Brereton suits playing wide of front 3. Elliott seems to like the inside right position in front 3. Holtby and Rothwell can play the centre midfield roles, and Holtby can play the midfield playmaker role. 

so if the 4-3-3 doesn't suit us then how would set up then?

The problem with having Armstrong as a No 9 is his game is not naturally suited to leading the line.  Look at Speedie leading the line in the nostalgia thread, that's how you do it if you lack size. Paul Dickov was a lesser version. The thing with Armstrong is If he's not scoring goals his contribution is negligible. Then we have Gallagher who should be a natural No 9, he's got the physique, he's relatively quick once he gets going, got a reasonable shot in his right foot, but for some reason he's a lightweight up front. After that there's Brererton, who doesn't want to go anywhere near the six yard box if he can help it. He should look at videos of Dack to see where he gets most of his goals from, late runs right into the heart of the defence. How hard is it to just run into the box a stride behind everybody else ? What do they do in training ?

Edited October 23, 2020 by Tyrone Shoelaces

[chaddyrovers]

57 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

The problem with having Armstrong as a No 9 is his game is not naturally suited to leading the line.  Look at Speedie leading the line in the nostalgia thread, that's how you do it if you lack size. Paul Dickov was a lesser version. The thing with Armstrong is If he's not scoring goals his contribution is negligible. Then we have Gallagher who should be a natural No 9, he's got the physique, he's relatively quick once he gets going, got a reasonable shot in his right foot, but for some reason he's a lightweight up front. After that there's Brererton, who doesn't want to go anywhere near the six yard box if he can help it. He should look at videos of Dack to see where he gets most of his goals from, late runs right into the heart of the defence. How hard is it to just run into the box a stride behind everybody else ? What do they do in training ?

Armstrong's strength is pace, movement and finishing ability. 

He did contribute with an assist on Wednesday by winning the ball in the air for Brereton's goal.

Brereton isn't a natural fox in the box/target man player tho.

[yellowsubmarine]

3 hours ago, chaddyrovers said:

Brereton isn't a natural fox in the box/target man player tho.

Till now, i think no one knows exactly what kind of a striker BB is really, probably not even Mowbray. He's played striker, right wing, left wing so far, and i think his current position seems to be a better one compared to the rest he played in.

[47er]

Nowhere to hide with this game.Nothing other than a win is acceptable.

[Exiled_Rover]

10 hours ago, Ewood Ace said:

There's no doubt about it Brereton was originally signed to take over from Graham however his performances soon showed that he wasn't capable of playing the role.

I would play 4-2-3-1.

I mean by now it's pretty evident that Mowbray signed Brereton because he was available.

He doesn't have a plan for him.

[Ruaney]

Anybody else resent paying £10 for this game after forking out £400 for a ST? ?

 

Like 47er said though, anything less than a win today is unacceptable. If we want to be serious about top 6, we can’t lose games like today. 

[philipl]

1 hour ago, 47er said:

Nowhere to hide with this game.Nothing other than a win is acceptable.

Pretty well how I feel about it especially as Coventry seem to be down to the bare bones.

The big squads at Rovers and Forest could well be decisive in this season of Covid quarantines and two games a week. I have no doubt there are managers who would get this Rovers squad up in first or second place. Not sure Mowbray is one of them.

[TheKitGuy]

Anyone else enjoying how direct Brereton has been this season? he's come on leaps and bounds.. forget the transfer fee etc.. his drives with the ball have opened up defences and his passing hasn't been bad either.. excited to see how he can develop his game further

[Sparks Rover]

6 minutes ago, TheKitGuy said:

Anyone else enjoying how direct Brereton has been this season? 

No. For me he's all thud and blunder...  

[darrenrover]

Assuming all are available, I'd line up:

                     Kaminski

JRC   Lenihan   Williams   Douglas

       Johnson   Evans   Trybull

Elliott/Dolan  Armstrong   Brereton   

Coventry are there to be beaten, we need to be on the front foot and nothing but a victory should suffice.

COYB!!

Edit: As Rothwell is unavailable, I can't see us starting with anything other than above in the middle of the park.

Edited October 24, 2020 by darrenrover

[G Somerset Rover]

Rothwell isn’t available and won’t be for the next match either by all accounts.

[philipl]

11 minutes ago, TheKitGuy said:

Anyone else enjoying how direct Brereton has been this season? he's come on leaps and bounds.. forget the transfer fee etc.. his drives with the ball have opened up defences and his passing hasn't been bad either.. excited to see how he can develop his game further

Not totally convinced but he is not the soft touch he was and he has the ability to get through or past more than one player.

My gut feel is that when Dack is back we will simply have too many players on the park the opposition need to double up against and if Brereton can play well enough to sustain his place, he should thrive in such conditions. Then it will be down to Holtby, Travis, Rothwell, Trybull, Johnson, Dack, Arma, Elliott, Brereton and Dolan to scrap it out for who gets into the midfield and forward 6. Notice there are several significant names missing whom I don't think are good enough to challenge those ten.

[tomphil]

I hope those who constantly refer to budgets as if it's the bank balances playing each other and how we've no right to be competing with some clubs fully expect a win today, against a club thats no right competing with us on those terms.

Edited October 24, 2020 by tomphil

[philipl]

1 minute ago, Gavlar Somerset Rover! said:

Rothwell isn’t available and won’t be for the next match either by all accounts.

Reading game comes a day too soon before his quarantine ends.

[darrenrover]

Just now, Gavlar Somerset Rover! said:

4 minutes ago, Gavlar Somerset Rover! said:

Rothwell isn’t available and won’t be for the next match either by all accounts.

 

Shame that, I wasn't aware. I guess we're going to see a dollop of sideways, backwards possession play induced by Evans! Hopefully not.

[Miker]

5 minutes ago, darrenrover said:

Assuming all are available, I'd line up:

                     Kaminski

JRC   Lenihan   Williams   Douglas

       Johnson  Rothwell   Trybull

Elliott/Dolan  Armstrong   Brereton   

Coventry are there to be beaten, we need to be on the front foot and nothing but a victory should suffice.

COYB!!

 

That would be my team as well. Anything but a win unacceptable, especially after the disappointing dropped points in the last 3 games.

[philipl]

1 minute ago, darrenrover said:

Shame that, I wasn't aware. I guess we're going to see a dollop of sideways, backwards possession play induced by Evans! Hopefully not.

Very much hoping we get a continuation of Trybull who subbed for Evans and was dramatically better.