v Norwich City (h) - 24/02/2024

[Groundhog]

I've actually forgotten what it feels like to play slightly better in the second half and come back to draw a game.

When was the last time/how many times other than Millwall on the final day we came from behind to gain any points?

[Torgeir]

7 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

Not a good watch and a fairly drab game, a point is not something we should be settling for at home so happily, wasting time delaying throw ins, and I dont agree with Eustace that it was a very good performance. Though saying that, a point is better than nothing albeit it is 2 points less than basically all of our rivals so not a good day.

I understand if the intention is to solidify and go from there, but we were far from solid today. Norwich had a field day in getting balls in behind in particular McFadzean whose lack of pace really caused us issues today. Sargent wasted numerous chances one on one and we got fortunate. Also, just blindly punting the ball forward is not sustainable, we didnt really carry a threat ourselves, Gallagher went close twice but Dolan and Szmodics were ineffective. The latter is being smothered by these tactics. McFadzean again is guilty of aimless punts more than anyone.

Its early days and there has been minimal training ground time, as he keeps saying contrary to the no excuse culture he keeps banging on about. But we hopefully will try and actually at least play a bit of football amidst the hoofing, and we still have work to do to solidify. McFadzean is a conundrum, reads the game well and excellent when we are deep and backs to the wall, but so slow and limited on the ball.

Pickerings return (replacing Hedges who seems to have been flogged a bit too much) was a big plus. One of few players we have who can do things with one or two touches and fantastic corner.

 

Fadz is quicker than Hyam. Overall our current team is the slowest we've had for a number of years. 

[DeeCee]

50 minutes ago, SIMON GARNERS 194 said:

12,956...lowest crowd by a country mile in the Championship.

A thousand for every page on this thread for a Saturday 3 pm home game against a promotion hopeful says it all.

[K-Hod]

Think others have made the point, but in making us harder to beat, we’ve managed to nullify the man who has been the league’s top scorer for a lot of the season, which is a concern.

 

[yankfan]

56 minutes ago, Groundhog said:

We weren't scoring when we were trying to pass through the middle either, so f*** knows what we are to do. Just got to get hard to beat and keep working on it. 

We weren’t scoring but we’re creating and yielding many more chances. One thing for sure, for a neutral, the matches were more entertaining under JDT. 

[Exiled_Rover]

1 hour ago, OldEwoodBlue said:

I already stopped listening to Eusless reading his scripted pressers. Big con job.

Bloody hell.

I'm one of the JDT diehards, but even I can see that Eustace has come in and quickly picked up 6 points having been handed a squad massively out of form. 

I expected nothing from today, away against PNE or, quite frankly given our club history, away at Cardiff (we usually gift out of form teams a win). 

The football isn't pretty, but it's effective. We've nullified Cardiff, PNE and Norwich in back-to-back-to-back games. 

He's grinding out results. It's not aspirational football, but we're not there anymore - the Venkys have seen to that. 

[Miller11]

Something else that struck me today…

The rule change around goal kicks not having to leave the penalty area is the worst change to the laws of the game since I started watching football.

[Exiled_Rover]

Just now, K-Hod said:

Think others have made the point, but in making us harder to beat, we’ve managed to nullify the man who has been the league’s top scorer for a lot of the season, which is a concern.

 

To play 3-4-3 you need athletes upfront and out wide. Brittain, Hedges and Gallagher are athletes, but nobody else is - and we know the final ball / first touch of two of those is terrible. 

Szmodics has scored twice under Eustace, so he's hardly sidelined him. 

[Penwortham Blue]

7 minutes ago, Torgeir said:

Fadz is quicker than Hyam. Overall our current team is the slowest we've had for a number of years. 

We haven’t had a quick team for many seasons. The odd player with a bit of pace but as a collective, so slow and one of the key reasons why we never seem to move forward and won’t until this is properly acknowledged and remedied.

[joey_big_nose]

7 minutes ago, Groundhog said:

I've actually forgotten what it feels like to play slightly better in the second half and come back to draw a game.

When was the last time/how many times other than Millwall on the final day we came from behind to gain any points?

I think under JDT we had 1 win, 1 draw and 11 losses from the last 13 matches where we went behind.

[superniko]

6 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

Bloody hell.

I'm one of the JDT diehards, but even I can see that Eustace has come in and quickly picked up 6 points having been handed a squad massively out of form. 

I expected nothing from today, away against PNE or, quite frankly given our club history, away at Cardiff (we usually gift out of form teams a win). 

The football isn't pretty, but it's effective. We've nullified Cardiff, PNE and Norwich in back-to-back-to-back games. 

He's grinding out results. It's not aspirational football, but we're not there anymore - the Venkys have seen to that. 

Whilst I agree some-what, we’re not giving him Stoke are we? Appointed Friday, no training session and in the stand until about 3-0 or something. It’s 3 points from 4 games. And I think variance will catch up with the ‘we look more solid now’ mantra. 

Again, to reiterate, he could lose every game for the rest of the season and I’d still not blame him but blame the useless clowns stripping the club to pieces.  

[arbitro]

2 minutes ago, yankfan said:

We weren’t scoring but we’re creating and yielding many more chances. One thing for sure, for a neutral, the matches were more entertaining under JDT. 

Today we had ten shots, five of which were on target. Whilst the football isn't as aesthetically pleasing today we can't complain about our efforts on goal and on another day could easily have won. I liked Tomasson and greatly admired what he did and tried to do but I realise that under Eustace things are going to be completely different. I accept that however results over a longer period will determine much more of my opinion. I am not bothered about what any neutrals think to be truthful.

[Exiled_Rover]

Just now, superniko said:

Whilst I agree some-what, we’re not giving him Stoke are we? Appointed Friday, no training session and in the stand until about 3-0 or something. It’s 3 points from 4 games. And I think variance will catch up with the ‘we look more solid now’ mantra. 

Again, to reiterate, he could lose every game for the rest of the season and I’d still not blame him but blame the useless clowns stripping the club to pieces.  

Yes, he picked the team. He even came down from the stands in the second half. 

[NeilInBristol]

unbeaten in 3 games now ! McFadz has changed the defence and again solid today

[NeilInBristol]

7 minutes ago, superniko said:

Whilst I agree some-what, we’re not giving him Stoke are we? Appointed Friday, no training session and in the stand until about 3-0 or something. It’s 3 points from 4 games. And I think variance will catch up with the ‘we look more solid now’ mantra. 

Again, to reiterate, he could lose every game for the rest of the season and I’d still not blame him but blame the useless clowns stripping the club to pieces.  

( i wouldnt give him that game just as we gave tony parks a record for the games he managed as interim)  however  tomato tomato. it doesnt really matter. ultimately we havent made huge improvements but we have had 1 clean sheet. 3 points out of 12, 1 defeat in 5, scored much fewer goals but hay ho. hope gilsenan gets a run against newcastle and hope hedges isnt out for too much time 

[roverblue]

Pleased with the point and performance against one of the leagues form sides.

It feels a lot more solid defensively but we are struggling to create anything without Wharton in the side. 

Unless Buckley steps up this is the style for the rest of the season I think. Lots of effort but nobody capable of playing the killer balls for Sammy, Dolan or Gally to get on the end of.

 

[chaddyrovers]

I think it was good solid performance against a very good team. Its another point on the board and defensively we look much better as a team given that Eustace has had very little time on the training ground with them. Norwich caused problems for us but given their quality I would expect this but they only had 7 shots at goal which surprised me to be honest given their quality. Kenny McLean makes them tick and Szmodics and Dolan had a job to do defensively on him. 

After Norwich scored, Sam Gallagher had 3 good chances to score each time Gunn made a good save. After Half time, we applied more pressure and Hyam scored a good header from Pickering good corner. 

After that we continue to tried and work hard but just couldn't find that winner we all want. 

Stand out performers for me were Sam Gallagher, John Buckley, Domonic Hyam, Sammie Szmodics(given his partner just given birth this morning) and Ty Dolan. 

Yes we are playing less on the front foot and more pragmatic under Eustace who is taking the team back to basics and similar to what Mark Hughes did when he took over the team. 

I thought the ref was awful and clueless. Just another out of depth ref at EFL level

On to Tuesday night and the Alan Shearer derby. It will be very interesting to see the team we will pick for this game. 

Edited February 24 by chaddyrovers

[johnradfordsubbuteo2]

1 hour ago, OldEwoodBlue said:

5 teams below us won today.

2 points dropped.

No idea how they gave Gally MOM. His job is to score and he missed 4 sitters.

Pears by a country mile. Saved about 4 goals and got us a point.

Don't get me wrong, he's the best keeper we have but that goal was his fault from start to finish.

[johnradfordsubbuteo2]

1 hour ago, superniko said:

3 points from 4 games now under the new manager. 
I’m told we’re allegedly ‘moving in the right direction, towards mid-table’ - despite simple maths telling us that’s nonsense. 

The next 3 games are huge. Can’t barely see us getting a point after them. 

the manager is trying to rebuild on sand. weakest squad for 10 years. this manager ain't the problem. it's definitely defensively better despite the sacrifice in productivity up the pitch.

[joey_big_nose]

47 minutes ago, arbitro said:

First point I have to makes how inept the referee was. I thought he didn't look interested in the game and lots of decisions both ways were afterthoughts. He just didn't have any empathy with the game and his attitude was questionable, almost like he didn't want to be there. From my view it was a relatively easy match to referee but he made really hard work of it.

I enjoyed today's game and I thought we played more football today than we have in the previous three. It was always going to be difficult against an in from footballing team but I'm pleased we had a go at them particularly after going one down. You could make a strong case for the Norwich keeper being their best player and the number of chances we created was impressive. Lots of good performances today but probably most pleasing was Buckley. Hopefully he has got over his issues and will be the player most of us know he can be. We were quite solid defensively but susceptible to balls in behind given our lack of pace but Pears read the situations well and came out quickly. Norwich have some really talented players so I think today is a decent point and given a bit of luck it could have been three.

for me it was the best performance of the new managers shirt reign as we mixed up the way we played, absolutely the right thing to do in my opinion.

A post so good it deserves to be posted twice!

Good to read a fair assessment from someone who knows their stuff.

I think theres too many who refuse to see the good stuff as well as the bad.

[Gav]

On 23/02/2024 at 15:19, Gav said:

 

Rovers 1 Norwich 1

VENKYS OUT - NOTHING ELSE MATTERS

If you know, you know 😉

Edited February 24 by Gav

[simongarnerisgod]

we were a lot better in the 2nd half and looked a decent side,i thought norwich were a bit **** tbh,just shows there is`nt a lot of difference between 7th and 16th,look where pne are despite being a one dimensional bunch of cloggers

Edited February 24 by simongarnerisgod
missed word

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

35 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

Something else that struck me today…

The rule change around goal kicks not having to leave the penalty area is the worst change to the laws of the game since I started watching football.

Apart from the new kick off rule.

[broadsword]

Win, lose, draw. It all leaves me cold. Looks like I'm not the only one given that there's just thirteen pages here. 

When's the next court hearing? 

[Upside Down]

46 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

Something else that struck me today…

The rule change around goal kicks not having to leave the penalty area is the worst change to the laws of the game since I started watching football.

And five substitutes.

Total bollocks.