v Bristol City (a) - 10/04/2024

[MarkBRFC]

5 hours ago, arbitro said:

 

One thing for sure is that four more performances like this will more than likely see us relegated.

Your underestimating how bad the sides below us are.

Genuinely think we could lose the next 4 fairly comfortably and still stay up due to sides around us all playing each other.

Edited April 11, 2024 by MarkBRFC

[Blue blood]

I think the squad is very weak as others have said. The problem is players who previously were solid back ups are now essential first teasers. The goal keeper situation is embarrassing. Hyam reminds me of Dann in that he's a fair weather player - good when the team is, bad when they aren't. Not what you want in a captain. Lack of experience doesn't help.nor does zero squad depth. It means useful players who either the specific game doesn't suit or are having a bad day have no one to replace them (thinking of Dolan in particular here.) .

What makes this doubly annoying is you don't need much quality to stay in this division or even make a charge for playoffs - look at us and Millwall and Coventry last season,  or that even this year we probably won't be relegates. Yet we run with a barebones squad devoid on experience and quality. 

[OJRovers]

8 hours ago, davulsukur said:

Stunning to see how we've assembled a squad of such losers. The mentality of these lot has been pathetic for far too long.

It costs nothing to have some professional pride, how can none of them have any?

This is the crux of it. The club has a culture of failure from the top down. No surprises that the losing mentality is firmly embedded in the squad. No-one at the club cares about their standard of work, because their bosses never hold them to account. Until venkys go, this will just carry on. The club deserve to be relegated because it is run with such little care, that's the sad thing about it.

[JHRover]

7 hours ago, Ghost7 said:

Ipswich have spent 4 or 5 times what we spent on transfer fees and probably double what we could offer wage wise + god knows what on loan fees. The teams that are buying freebies and spending pennies are out of their depth. We are one of them IMO.

We wouldn't have been able to afford the majority of loans or free transfers they have done. Sarmiento, Moore, Williams, Tuanzebe, Hutchinson... we couldn't touch any of them.

Even if we wanted to we weren't able to afford George Hirst at £2m and have been bringing on players like Markanday and Telalovic all season. Leonard and Garrett have also played plenty and should both be on loan in League One.

Pickering is one of the worst fullbacks in the division. He makes everyone look quick and we had half the season without a suitable backup. He is League One and probably one of the first names on the team sheet.

Neither GK would start for Rotherham or any other Championship side. That says a lot.

On top of that... 71 goals against.

We are well out of our depth this year personnel wise other than Szmodics. He's the only reason we aren't already down with Rotherham and is carrying one of the most useless Rovers teams I've ever seen.

 

We've brought in nearly £30 million in the last 2 transfer windows and it should have been more had we looked after the Brereton contract situation.

We can and could afford to do all of those things

The owners have decided we aren't because of their issues and because they want to use the money to pay bills instead.

Their choice. Their responsibility when it goes wrong.

[Penwortham Blue]

24 minutes ago, MarkBRFC said:

Your underestimating how bad the sides below us are.

Genuinely think we could lose the next 4 fairly comfortably and still stay up due to sides around us all playing each other.

I think you are very wrong, I still think we need 50 points and just can’t see us getting that. Three points, especially if taken from Wednesday might be enough but without another point, we definitely go down.

[JHRover]

2 minutes ago, OJRovers said:

This is the crux of it. The club has a culture of failure from the top down. No surprises that the losing mentality is firmly embedded in the squad. No-one at the club cares about their standard of work, because their bosses never hold them to account. Until venkys go, this will just carry on. The club deserve to be relegated because it is run with such little care, that's the sad thing about it.

When the CEO is going public that his ambition is to stay in the division and develop more players just weeks after missing out on the play offs on goal difference and the manager then spends 6 months taking the mick out of him publicly for those comments then yes, it's certainly a culture of failure.

[NeilInBristol]

Just a note on Gally

Last night they were just lumping it to him and he often missed the lump but even when he was near it there was no one around him so it always ended up being absorbed by Bristol who then took control. 

Not sure Gally succeeds in this type of role so why continue to try this tactic?

[Penwortham Blue]

4 minutes ago, NeilInBristol said:

Just a note on Gally

Last night they were just lumping it to him and he often missed the lump but even when he was near it there was no one around him so it always ended up being absorbed by Bristol who then took control. 

Not sure Gally succeeds in this type of role so why continue to try this tactic?

When he feels like it, he grafts hard, last night, like the rest, he simply didn’t break sweat. Notwithstanding effort, he is an absolutely atrocious CF, just look at his goal return and injured / non-availability record. 

[NeilInBristol]

4 minutes ago, Penwortham Blue said:

When he feels like it, he grafts hard, last night, like the rest, he simply didn’t break sweat. Notwithstanding effort, he is an absolutely atrocious CF, just look at his goal return and injured / non-availability record. 

Agreed. I just can't understand what he brings to the team.

We didn't even carry players last night only Sammie looked like he put an ounce of effort in 

[NeilInBristol]

9 hours ago, Ricky said:

Wharton must have been carrying a knock or something. I see no reason why he gets hauled off instead of Hyam otherwise. 

Seen the Eustace interview and he talks the talk again. However he’s just not good enough. None of them are! 

LT report a "back spasm" 

[LDRover]

Could the 2 million from Ipswich for Gallagher have kept the lights on long enough for us to keep Wharton (at least until the inevitable sale in the summer) and almost certainly retain status in this division?

Either way, it's an extremely odd decision not to have sold him, the lad is, and has been, so so poor from day 1. Aside from defending corners against us he brings sod all to the table and is probably our top earner, it's incredible really.

[Waggy76]

8 hours ago, JHRover said:

Another stat is that we've won 14 out of 86 Championship away games played on a Monday-Friday since we were relegated from the Premier League in 2012. 

Dismal. Hardly worth even incurring the travel expenses. 

Does this stat include the one season in league 1 ?

[DavidMailsTightPerm]

Though the performance obviously wasn't great - we were very much undone by Bristols best attacker Hyam. The way teams set up in the Championship it is difficult to come back from 1 goal, let alone 2. You also have to look at respective squad depth - they brought on 3 attackers - we struggle to start with 3 attackers.

TBH until Hyam intervened I thought the match had become fairly even - with them having some early chances and then us getting a foot hold and creating chances of our own.

After going 2 goals down - they defended in depth and just let us huff and puff.

Without Hyam's nightmare - not certain how the match would have panned out. TBH we created their best chances.

What really p@#£ed me off was the 5th - seeing their player run through unchallenged - while in the background Hyam jogged backed. For me summed up his match.

[BlackburnEnd75]

18 minutes ago, Penwortham Blue said:

When he feels like it, he grafts hard, last night, like the rest, he simply didn’t break sweat. Notwithstanding effort, he is an absolutely atrocious CF, just look at his goal return and injured / non-availability record. 

He bottled one at the back post where there was a goal for a lad his size if he was brave enough. He wasn't. Doesn't have the desire or the instinct. 

[ruggles1995]

What annoyed me the most last night was we played the same way all game, even when we changed formation, we played the same way. Sometimes you need to admit passing through a side isnt working. You have a 6ft plus striker on the field, get it up to him, play percentages, get us up the pitch, get fans onside. But no, we pass sideways all the way until we are at our own corner flag then just punt it to nobody. 

Brittain was the worst one of the lot, looked sunday league, i think I could of knocked it past him on 2 pints of Guinness, a hot dog and a pie. 
Unfortunately thats the reality, we have 2 keepers that would be numbers 2s for any other championship club, we've got 2 slow rubbish fullbacks, pickerings bang average. Whartons bang average and hes prob our best cb, sums it up. Our cms aren't too bad but there made of glass. We've signed a crop of loanees that are all technically great but cant do eustcae ball, we've got no attacking players with half a brain apart from szmodics. 

We are done for imo. Dreadful going forward. We are literally clutching at straws trying to say how good markhandy is, the bloke can dribble... that's it, he cant kick a football. Dolan, decision making woeful, gallagher lacks any ounce of quality, hes almost chris brown esc. I would rather with games last night go, you know what we are playing sh!t, tw4t it up to gallagher play off him get us in there 3rd put some pressure on, sam alladyce style. All these wana be pep coaches can do one. Over complicated, and we also need an old school style alladyce foot up the backside to the players. If he gave one it cant of been that good as the 2nd half was a shambles. 

I dont care if its Leeds away Saturday, these players need to roll their sleeves up and turn it on.

[MB Rover]

Wonder if Eustace will get an international management role after his time with Rovers? JDT’s time would have at least been filled with honest interviews and tough questions being answered. 

Scott Wharton’s interview which people loved on Twitter as being ‘refreshingly honest’ was laughable. Oh I didn’t like the last manager he hurt my feelings 😭 you didn’t play because you’re shite.

Watching us setting up for 0-0’s against Birmingham and Cardiff were the first red flags under Eustace, imagine was 3 points would have done now.

The social media team creaming themselves over a 0-0 at home to the mighty Soton was equally as appalling. I’ve never seen a 0-0 at home celebrated more.

Just been beaten 5-0 by a team literally nobody cares about. As mediocre as you’ll get. ‘A good team’ Eustace says… laughable. Leeds will dry bum us on Saturday and then it’s onto a relegation decider against Sheffield Wednesday where we surely haven’t given them 7000 tic…. Never mind.

Not sat in my season ticket seat since JDT was sacked and nor will I again this season. Soul sapping, budget cutting, useless cunts the lot of them. 

[ruggles1995]

30 minutes ago, NeilInBristol said:

Just a note on Gally

Last night they were just lumping it to him and he often missed the lump but even when he was near it there was no one around him so it always ended up being absorbed by Bristol who then took control. 

Not sure Gally succeeds in this type of role so why continue to try this tactic?

not sure what game you were watching, but I dont rmember anyone lumping it to him until we passed it all the way into our own corner flag with no option but to try and lump it. We passed it out wide alot and back to where it came from until we got forced back to our own goal and then lumped it. Or we would try and pass the ball down the sides, but Brittain cant pass wind, so the ball never reached our front line. 

[Waggy76]

What puzzles me about last nights debacle ( I wasn't there ) is why Carter didn't come on at half time ?

I am not defending anyone but it was Rovers 4th game since Good Friday evening , we just have not got 

the squad to play those fixtures ! 

That is down to the owners and no one else !

[aletheia]

9 hours ago, Paul Mellelieu said:

Another way to look at this season's calamity to acknowledge that two managers have got similar tunes from this set of players.

Or that perhaps JDT got the points that might just keep us up.

[JHRover]

31 minutes ago, Waggy76 said:

Does this stat include the one season in league 1 ?

No Championship matches only

[Mattyblue]

If JDT’s record this season had been as poor as this mon’s we’d be pretty much down already.

Edited April 11, 2024 by Mattyblue

[Torgeir]

9 hours ago, Paul Mellelieu said:

Another way to look at this season's calamity to acknowledge that two managers have got similar tunes from this set of players.

Fair point. But last night Eustace tried to adjust tactically and only made matters worse. Makes me more than sceptical about the rest of the season.

[roverblue]

Still fuming this morning, I still can't see an apology from the manager or players in the post match interviews.

At any functioning club there would be repercussions from a performance and result like that.  Here it will just be ignored as a bad night.

[tomphil]

39 minutes ago, NeilInBristol said:

LT report a "back spasm" 

Wouldn't be surprised if it was tactical which is what we thought at the time but it made things worse so now its become a 'twinge' in the back !

[Penwortham Blue]

2 minutes ago, ruggles1995 said:

What annoyed me the most last night was we played the same way all game, even when we changed formation, we played the same way. Sometimes you need to admit passing through a side isnt working. You have a 6ft plus striker on the field, get it up to him, play percentages, get us up the pitch, get fans onside. But no, we pass sideways all the way until we are at our own corner flag then just punt it to nobody. 

Brittain was the worst one of the lot, looked sunday league, i think I could of knocked it past him on 2 pints of Guinness, a hot dog and a pie. 
Unfortunately thats the reality, we have 2 keepers that would be numbers 2s for any other championship club, we've got 2 slow rubbish fullbacks, pickerings bang average. Whartons bang average and hes prob our best cb, sums it up. Our cms aren't too bad but there made of glass. We've signed a crop of loanees that are all technically great but cant do eustcae ball, we've got no attacking players with half a brain apart from szmodics. 

We are done for imo. Dreadful going forward. We are literally clutching at straws trying to say how good markhandy is, the bloke can dribble... that's it, he cant kick a football. Dolan, decision making woeful, gallagher lacks any ounce of quality, hes almost chris brown esc. I would rather with games last night go, you know what we are playing sh!t, tw4t it up to gallagher play off him get us in there 3rd put some pressure on, sam alladyce style. All these wana be pep coaches can do one. Over complicated, and we also need an old school style alladyce foot up the backside to the players. If he gave one it cant of been that good as the 2nd half was a shambles. 

I dont care if its Leeds away Saturday, these players need to roll their sleeves up and turn it on.

I agree, we never seem to have a Plan B. Whether 2 0 down at half time in a crucial relegation match or desperately chasing an equaliser or winner at the death, at Ewood or away, there is never any urgency or kitchen sink approach. If anyone ever wonders why we never get late goals or come from behind, the answer is as above.