v Millwall (h) - 8/3/22

[USABlue]

52 minutes ago, LeftWinger said:

Well, Bristol City next, who have failed to keep a clean sheet in 16 games.......

Oh Buggar, we KNOW what that means.  Rovers will fix that.for them.

[Wheelton Blue]

7 minutes ago, USABlue said:

Oh Buggar, we KNOW what that means.  Rovers will fix that.for them.

Have faith. We're creating loads of clear chances, so it's only a matter of time before we get the results we deserve and put these poor quality sides to the sword ... 😀

Edited March 9, 2022 by Wheelton Blue

[LeftWinger]

9 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

I think he only touched the ball once and got a season finishing injury.

It's unusual to talk about one of players with the word 'finishing' in the sentence - unless it's preceded by a word like 'awful' or 'poor'.

[AllRoverAsia]

I was not able to watch the game live and so far have only seen the 'highlights'.

I will get around to watching a full replay ... maybe, maybe not.

Anyway:

JRC - it was a good chance, at least he hit it hard enough.

Gallagher - words fail me. The 2nd time recently that he has failed to get on the end of an inswinging cross for a toe poke goal. No anticipation, no bravery. Fecking useless waste of space. 

Buckley - at least he hit it hard but no aim as he was already turning to start his goal celebration. Score first ..idiot.

Lenihan - he is just no good at aiming headers at goal. Never really has been. Non directional defensive headers are his limit.

From the above 4 decent chances 2 should have been scored with no excuses, Buckley and Gallagher.

I think it is common knowledge that I am no fan of Mowbray but he didn't miss the open goals.

[arbitro]

52 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Do you remember Maurice Fussey ? Tall, lanky guy. His party trick was to sprint backwards from the edge of the penalty area to the half way line after giving a goal kick so he was always facing the ball. I remember him bringing the players off 15 minutes early at Bolton. Everybody was stood about looking at their watches or that big clock over the main stand before starting to leave the ground. Then after about 7 or 8 minutes the players came back out drying their hair and their kit back on to play out the rest of the game.

I remember the rather apt name Fussey but I can't actually place him. I have heard the story about the shenanigans at Bolton.

[lraC]

1 hour ago, Mellor Rover said:

Think that’s an injustice to him mate. He’s not a great footballer but he certainly puts his body on the line. 2 punctured lungs and put the QPR keeper out for the season last game out!

Fair point.

I am possibly looking at the last couple of performances and thinking that, or perhaps the injuries you have mentioned have left doubts in his mind. 

[lraC]

2 minutes ago, AllRoverAsia said:

I was not able to watch the game live and so far have only seen the 'highlights'.

I will get around to watching a full replay ... maybe, maybe not.

Anyway:

JRC - it was a good chance, at least he hit it hard enough.

Gallagher - words fail me. The 2nd time recently that he has failed to get on the end of an inswinging cross for a toe poke goal. No anticipation, no bravery. Fecking useless waste of space. 

Buckley - at least he hit it hard but no aim as he was already turning to start his goal celebration. Score first ..idiot.

Lenihan - he is just no good at aiming headers at goal. Never really has been. Non directional defensive headers are his limit.

From the above 4 decent chances 2 should have been scored with no excuses, Buckley and Gallagher.

I think it is common knowledge that I am no fan of Mowbray but he didn't miss the open goals.

I have quite rightly been pulled up on the bravery thing with Gallagher, but that's how it has seemed to me too. I was at the Fulham match and he seemed to be holding back at times, so who know whether the punctured lung and clash with the QPR keeper have left a mental scar.

[glen9mullan]

Another flat performance, square pegs round holes and we are doing our best to blow the best chance we had of promotion in years.

Points I took from game.

Team selection. 

Giles - He is all left foot, showed against Swansea what he is all about, a good attacking Left wing back. What does Tombola Tony do? Plays him as a right sided forward (beggars belief)

Gallagher - once again showed how clueless he is. Has no one told him his job is not to mark their centre back? He does not split the centre backs, pull players out of position, and I lost count the amount of times Buckley Rothwell and Travis, were waving their arms at him to move into space, run a channel or do what centre forwards need to do. He had run his race after an hour and TM kept him on, ridiculous decision.

Formation - MIllwall came for a point, played for a point and IMO we should of gone back 4, played Lenihan at right back, and gone 4-4-2 with Dolan playing off Gallagher. At what point do we become less predicactable? Is that 1 goal in 8 games? Are we really a one man team. 

This shite talk playing down why we didnt need a striker, why we dont play a formation that warrants a striker is P45 territory for me. They blew the transfer window. Markanday was a long term prospect not a here and now signing. Never since Ray Harford didnt strengthen after we won the league  have I been more disappointed with our transfer business.

The fault lies with the Manager and the board, pure and simple, and the KFC representative they use, who is impersonating a football professional.

Needless to say, very disappointed, they are bloody joke, the lot of them

[Angry_Pirate]

I almost had a panic attack after the 55th minute when Millwall were full on time wasting and brought on their 5th defender to go with 2 CDMs... 

Thankfully Mowbray kept true to his 3CBs for the rest of the game. Imagine my relief.

[AllRoverAsia]

11 minutes ago, lraC said:

I have quite rightly been pulled up on the bravery thing with Gallagher, but that's how it has seemed to me too. I was at the Fulham match and he seemed to be holding back at times, so who know whether the punctured lung and clash with the QPR keeper have left a mental scar.

I am sure they have but he was the same prior to those injuries.

The QPR incident had nothing to do with Gallagher bravery, just his clumsiness in missing the cross and the 'bravery' of a man going in feet first.

Edited March 9, 2022 by AllRoverAsia

[islander200]

16 minutes ago, Wheelton Blue said:

Have faith. We're creating loads of clear chances, so it's only a matter of time before we get the results we deserve and put these poor quality sides to the sword ... 😀

Nobody said that.We had 4 clear chances last night.Watch the game back .Sitters that should be put in the net by professionals.

I have not said we deserved to win the game last night.We didn't score so we didn't deserve to win.

And it's a big worry to me that we can't score but that doesn't mean that Millwall got a draw due to their game plan or defending.

12 shots to their 0

10 corners to their 2

[USABlue]

The way I see the rest of the season going is more of this, dropping like a stone.  THEN and only then, when playoffs are ALMOST unattainable our results will pick up with a winning run and come up just short of the playoffs.

This accomplishes two things for the Lemon Drizzle club.  Don't have to actually go to work by managing in the Prem.  Tony gets a new and improved contract because of the late run.  Several more years of mediocrity and missed opportunities.  ToMo thinkin Phew that was close I almost helped get us promoted.  

If our Indian owners understood even a little bit abiut foitball surely they would be on the phone asking pertinent questions as to just why Tony is oicking players as he does.  In lieu of Nyambe he has to sub Buckley cos he does not have the gonads to pull senior players.  only pulls the young uns who won't ask him why.  Pussy.

Edited March 9, 2022 by USABlue

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

Would it be worth giving Van Hecke a go up front ? At least he’ll get stuck in and he can head the ball. Do they try these things in trainimg.

[Wheelton Blue]

Just now, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Would it be worth giving Van Hecke a go up front ? At least he’ll get stuck in and he can head the ball. Do they try these things in trainimg.

My mate said the same to me last night. Just to try somethig different, anything to grab a goal.

[USABlue]

26 minutes ago, Wheelton Blue said:

Have faith. We're creating loads of clear chances, so it's only a matter of time before we get the results we deserve and put these poor quality sides to the sword ... 😀

Really?  Been watching us long?  We just do things this way.

[USABlue]

3 minutes ago, Wheelton Blue said:

My mate said the same to me last night. Just to try somethig different, anything to grab a goal.

Like beat the first man on corners or not give the ball away at throw ins.  Maybe somethin revolutionary like  wingers in their right side on the wing and a tall striker in the middle.  You know that rocket science stuff.

[Miller11]

We’ve played over 12 hours of football without scoring a goal from open play. The one set piece goal we managed during that time owed a great deal to some dodgy goalkeeping.

There’s no dressing it up, it’s disgraceful. There are no attempts to address it, we just keep hearing “I’m not worried, goals will come, we are creating chances”. That’s the kind of clichéd tripe normally reserved for managers whose teams are hurtling towards relegation and they don’t have a clue how to stop it.

We probably blew our chance to do anything about it with our nonsensical January business. We have about 10 “wide forwards” on our books, none of which (except Diaz recently) look capable of any more than the very occasional goal.

The situation is now desperate. We need to rush Dack back. We should also be scouting the free agent market for someone who actually knows where the goal is. I’d take Joe Nuttall or Dominic Samuel back at this point.

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

5 minutes ago, Wheelton Blue said:

My mate said the same to me last night. Just to try somethig different, anything to grab a goal.

He might be shite but unless you try it out on the training pitch you’ll never find out. “ SuperMac “ Malcolm Macdonald was a left back until they gave him a go up front, as was Fred Pickering.

[rigger]

4 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Would it be worth giving Van Hecke a go up front ? At least he’ll get stuck in and he can head the ball. Do they try these things in trainimg.

As with most basic footballing things, it looks like they don't bother with them in training. Throw-ins, corners, free-kicks, goal-kicks.

[Angry_Pirate]

Low key need is for Lenihan to get booked and miss 2 games whilst Ayala injured - forcing Mowrbay to abolish this safe formation. 12 clean sheets, but 9 games without scoring since the swap. We need to attack with these 10 fixtures.

Switch back to the 4-2-3-1. Travis and Rothwell continue as are, as does Buckley - but he actually has a #9 ahead of him. Khadra right and Giles on THE FUCKING LEFT! Gallagher would look a lot more competent in that formation too as we wait for Brereton and Dack to get going.

Alas, Mowbray is a fucking moron.

 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

2 minutes ago, USABlue said:

Like beat the first man on corners or not give the ball away at throw ins.  Maybe somethin revolutionary like  wingers in their right side on the wing and a tall striker in the middle.  You know that rocket science stuff.

Liverpool and City don’t play like that, Tony thinks we should, what with all the attacking talent we have.

[G Somerset Rover]

14 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Would it be worth giving Van Hecke a go up front ? At least he’ll get stuck in and he can head the ball. Do they try these things in training.

IF he were ever fit I'd genuinely be putting Ayala up top for the final 20-30 mins of matches (at least) and just ask Giles to whip balls into the box. It's a better tactic than we're presently going with.

[rovers11]

It's all very frustrating given what a good position we were in to at least get the play off - now we're outsiders and the odds are against us. 

There are certainly criticisms of the manager to be had but we are missing a huge amount of attacking talent at the moment - Breo, Dack, Khadra, Poveda, Markanday. With one or two of those on the pitch last night we would have won. Attacking options of Gally, Giles and Vale is just not good enough. 

But why did we not sign another striker in Jan, why have we gone back to Tony Tombola with square pegs in round holes. 

We have big problems in the summer with SIX first team players departing - Nyambe, Breo, Lenihan, Rothwell and two brighton loaness. That's a lot of talent that will be very hard to replace. 

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, rovers11 said:

It's all very frustrating given what a good position we were in to at least get the play off - now we're outsiders and the odds are against us. 

There are certainly criticisms of the manager to be had but we are missing a huge amount of attacking talent at the moment - Breo, Dack, Khadra, Poveda, Markanday. With one or two of those on the pitch last night we would have won. Attacking options of Gally, Giles and Vale is just not good enough. 

But why did we not sign another striker in Jan, why have we gone back to Tony Tombola with square pegs in round holes. 

We have big problems in the summer with SIX first team players departing - Nyambe, Breo, Lenihan, Rothwell and two brighton loaness. That's a lot of talent that will be very hard to replace. 

So why play Dack behind closed doors the day before when he knew Khadra wouldn’t make it? He scores all 4 of the chances we had last night. 

[jim mk2]

29 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Would it be worth giving Van Hecke a go up front ? At least he’ll get stuck in and he can head the ball. Do they try these things in trainimg.

 

Mike England in the relegation season 1965-66. Stuck him up front IIRC and it worked for a while. Seems to remember him scoring in a 4-1 win at Turf Moor - I was there!! Just about the only plus point in a dire season

All this is hazy memories now but yes why not stick one of our big centre halves  in the forward line and bang crosses at him - anything's work trying and better than Gallagher

Edited March 9, 2022 by jim mk2