Bristol City v Rovers. Wed 9th Dec. 7.45pm

[ben_the_beast]

1 minute ago, DE. said:

I think Williams himself has said he doesn't want to play at left back anymore. In theory Mowbray could order him to play there, but he won't. I don't think Williams is much if any better at LB than Douglas or Bell anyway. 

Shows how poor Douglas has been that we are talking about Williams at left back. A real disappointment thus far. Hasn't won a header, lacking pace, positionally suspect. And weirdly the amount of times his first touch seems to pop up to about knee height. I've not been impressed at all. At least Bell has pace.

[DE.]

Just now, ben_the_beast said:

Shows how poor Douglas has been that we are talking about Williams at left back. A real disappointment thus far. Hasn't won a header, lacking pace, positionally suspect. And weirdly the amount of times his first touch seems to pop up to about knee height. I've not been impressed at all. At least Bell has pace.

He is far too slow to play in our system. There were a couple of times tonight when he ended up trying to whip a ball into the box far too early because he has zero pace to try and run past opposition players. To use an old phrase, it looks like he's running in quicksand.

He would have fit in better in our old system, but I don't think we're going back to that.

[G Somerset Rover]

Nobody should be surprised at Douglas’ lack of pace - he’s never had any. Fans from previous clubs say he’s poor defensively too but awesome going forward. We’ve seen zilch from him going forward yet, so perhaps that’ll come soon with some match sharpness.

Edited December 9, 2020 by Gavlar Somerset Rover!

[darrenrover]

1 hour ago, simongarnerisgod said:

ffs sam get out of the way😝

...Again!

Shane Duffy but in reverse!

Edited December 9, 2020 by darrenrover

[Ewood Ace]

A very disappointing result in a game that neither side really did enough to win and where both sides looked to have settled for a point.

The stand out performers tonight for me were Elliott, Rothwell and Nyambe. Nyambe was dominant down the right hand side in attack and defence, he really is turning into the complete full back. Rothwell produced some quality runs and passes. It was very strange decision to take him of when we needed a goal, Mowbray never seems to go for broke when we are losing and take a defender off. Elliott looked most likely to create a goal but Mowbray doesn't get the best out of him when he moves him to the centre and left of the front 3 or into the midfield 3. Just leave him on the right of the front 3 where he can curl one in the top corner like against Millwall and he can also pick out a through ball which he did on numerous occasions to create chances for Armstrong tonight. 

How Gallagher lasted 85 minutes tonight I don't know he was abysmal and you see better first touches in schoolboy football. Douglas is no better than Bell he's terrible defensively, can't tackle, feeble attempts to stop crosses and he doesn't offer much going forward. If they were going to score it was always going to come from down his side, its where all their dangerous attacks came from. We must have the worst two left backs in the division.  Holtby was disappointing again just mainly just backwards passing from him. The only times he has impressed this season is against sides around bottom of the table and some of the time they were playing with 10 men.

The set piece delivery was abysmal again tonight it really does beggars belief that professional footballers can constantly produce such poor deliveries.

 

[Gav]

How good does our kit look? superb.

We look a very good side, we’ve come on leaps and bounds since last season, I’m feeling optimistic about our chances this season.

On the flip side, promotion winning sides usually win these kind of games away from home, we dominated the first half, losing the game is hard to take as we played really well.

Tony has us playing well, long may it continue. 

[SBlue]

10 minutes ago, Butty said:

Why? Williams was useless at left back but has become a solid centre back option, we know Williams at left back doesn’t work so it would be a waste of time trying that again. I just hope with a few more games under his belt that Douglas gets going for us, tonight wasn’t one of his better nights but I’ve seen enough from him so far to think he will do a job for us this season. 

Hope so. Really not convinced about Douglas so far tbh

His deliveries were shite n’all

[den]

Both disappointed and not disappointed tonight. 
 

Again frustrating at losing a game where we contributed so much, but on the other hand we do have a side now with good individual technique, a game where for the first time I can remember it’s there to be seen - and the players are playing to it.

Add to that a very positive approach throughout the 90 mins and so there are things to applaud.

Its not perfect, but with players such as Dack to come back there is something to look forwards to.

[DE.]

We're always 'x' amount of points away from the playoffs. 

There's an old saying in Tennessee that says, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice — you can't get fooled again.

[Stuart]

26 minutes ago, Bigdoggsteel said:

It was a dive on Saturday and to say he is responsible for us dropping 3 points tonight might just be the funniest back handed compliment I have ever heard 🤣

If Lenihan plays tonight Williams doesn’t. Not something I find funny at all.

But I know that’s not really what you mean.

[joey_big_nose]

24 minutes ago, Doug said:

Any danger from them came down our left. I am concerned that Douglas is out of position too often. Concentrate on staying goal side of your player please as we have enough quality going forward. 

Feel like I am going on about him, but Douglas has got a problem in that he lacks pace. That means he can't get forward because he is worried that the oppo will get in behind. But then even when he sits deeper he still gets beat for pace. Also not great in the air or in the tackle.... 

He wasn't horrendous, but I just felt if we had Bell in there he would have given Bristol City a lot more to think about when we were countering. Bell can carry the ball 30, 40 yards, and can get to the byline like Nyambe on the other side. Yes he is a bit suspect defensively but on the whole seems better in that regard than Douglas too. 

As others have said he is new, and maybe needs to build his fitness. But I suspect at 31 he is not going to get any quicker as he gets fitter.

[Blue blood]

One consistent thing is we get near top 6 and we fluff it. 

We can't fall back on the performance was good - by that logic alone people wouldn't be happy with Millwall and Barnsley. 

Whatever else our failings the clearest one is we have no bottle when it matters. A hearty, nay heroic, performance v Brentford when most would have written us off (and thus the pressure was off).  But when it comes to doing the business when the playoffs are in sight we cannot do it. Tough opponents, bottle it. Weaker ones, fluff it. We really can't handle pressure. 

Gutting

 

[tomphil]

Not the Williams to left back cries again surely ?

How many times !   It isn't happening he's a centre half and told his manager that's all he is now.

[RevidgeBlue]

44 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

At fault for goal. Poor defending 

Ah yes I forgot. We haven't given him a new contract so you're maintaining he's s h I t.

Wasn't great on the goal, apart from that thought he had an excellent game.

[jny]

Elliott though, what a player, some genuinely Pirloesque passes in that game

[Butty]

12 minutes ago, Stuart said:

If Lenihan plays tonight Williams doesn’t. Not something I find funny at all.

But I know that’s not really what you mean.

Don’t think it would have made a difference to the result if Lenihan played tonight ahead of Williams, Williams clearly not fully fit but still didn’t do much wrong and certainly wasn’t at fault for the goal, we lost the game tonight by not creating enough clear cut chances in the final third, they’ve had one real golden chance and scored it. 

[Gamst]

Disjointed display really and looked tired. You could see that their was plenty of quality within the squad, it just didn't click tonight. Opposition defended well but were pretty limited so a draw would have been a fairer result. Quite acceptable to lose the odd match and not perform well every game, how we respond on Saturday is the most important thing and we have the tendency to struggle against good teams and go on streaky runs of good and bad results. 

[Commondore]

Thought we had that under control but Diedhiou is just the kind of quick, strong forward that can bully mediocre Championship defenders like Williams and Ayala. I had a bad feeling when ha came on, and was proven right. Terrible set piece delivery today and our attackers looked off the boil, Armstrong has certainly earned the right to try some audacious finishes after the season he's had so far but went overboard tonight with overconfident shots from distance. 

All in all this looked more like a blip on an upward trajectory than the start of a downturn, hopefully I'm as right about that as I was about Diedhiou.

[Hasta]

The goal is frustrating. Douglas could stop the cross. Nyambe could win the header. Ayala could clean it up as it comes across and Williams could maybe be tighter in the scorer. 

If just one of them happens it stops the goal.

[darrenrover]

55 minutes ago, ben_the_beast said:

Shows how poor Douglas has been that we are talking about Williams at left back. A real disappointment thus far. Hasn't won a header, lacking pace, positionally suspect. And weirdly the amount of times his first touch seems to pop up to about knee height. I've not been impressed at all. At least Bell has pace.

You forgot to mention he can't beat the first man with a corner and his general crossing is poor too. All that apart, he's not a bad fullback.

Edited December 9, 2020 by darrenrover

[dallydally]

The Barnsley and Millwall results flattered us. Fair enough Brentford was impressive given the circumstances but time and again we fail to take points against the better sides something we must do to have any chance of making the playoffs. We don't have the X factor when it comes to the games that would see us break into the top 6. 

[chaddyrovers]

42 minutes ago, RevidgeBlue said:

Ah yes I forgot. We haven't given him a new contract so you're maintaining he's s h I t.

Wasn't great on the goal, apart from that thought he had an excellent game.

I never said he was s h I t tho did I Rev? 

Yes he was very poor for goal. Poor marking and reaction from him

[47er]

Hard to take that result. We were clearly the better side. We had a big period of domination mid-first half but couldn't make it count. I was feeling very uneasy just before they scored as they had a 10 minutes of possession in our half for just about the first time in the game. And a real scrappy, ugly goal was the outcome.

We didn't create many clear chances tbh for all our possession and Armstrong scuffed just about all of them.

Gallagher is a tremendous worker but what a poor first touch.

Our man of the match for me was Rothwell, he's going to be some player. Elliott showed sublime skills, Liverpool have a lot to look forward to there.

Defence had them in their pocket. 

Just one of those games I'm afraid.Like Bournemouth again.

 

[darrenrover]

1 hour ago, Stuart said:

Mowbray isn’t up to it but, I agree, you have to blame Lenihan for us dropping 5 points in the last two games. Williams should be nowhere near this side. Even Mowbray admitted he had barely played this season.

This is the difference between real promotion candidates and pretenders. We drop important points at important times.

Fine margins.

It's not often I question and vehemently disagree with you Stuart (bit in bold) but I do over this. In fact I'm still uncertain as to whether you're being sarcastic/taking the pi55 or not?!

Lenihan has been diabolical this season, a liability and I feel Williams deserves his place in the side (at the expense of Darragh) based upon how he has performed at centre half so far this season. Their forward did well for the goal tonight, good control, swivel turn and finish. Someone doesn't always have to be to blame, if that's what you inferred.

Most promotion contenders have to come to Ewood in the second half of the season, let's see how we fare at home against them before we write ourselves off.

Beating Norwich on Saturday would be a good start!

[booth]

4 minutes ago, dallydally said:

The Barnsley and Millwall results flattered us. Fair enough Brentford was impressive given the circumstances but time and again we fail to take points against the better sides something we must do to have any chance of making the playoffs. We don't have the X factor when it comes to the games that would see us break into the top 6. 

The defence lets the team down time and time again. They are far too prone to switching off for large parts of the game, you could see it happening tonight, they began to look very tired all of a sudden.

That and we rely too much on Armstrong and Mowbray has a soft spot for Gallagher. He's improved recently but tonight he should have been taken off a lot quicker. We really need Dack back to help with the goals.