v Cardiff City (a) - 9/11/2024

[KentExile]

This may be a very unpopular take, but the past two games with Pickering playing instead of Beck has enabled Rovers to go back to a back 3 when in possession, (rather than 2 full backs who are more comfortable going forwards in Beck and Brittain) and this seems to have helped with build up play  (I know Rovers lost and didn't score against Stoke, but the build up play was still pretty good, they just didn't take their chances).

I am not saying that Pickering is better than Beck, just that having one attacking full back and one who tucks inside to make a back 3 in possession definitely seems to have benefits to Rovers, and was working well in the early weeks of the season before injuries made it more difficult to implement.  Fingers crossed we can bring back Hill from Bournemouth (or someone similar) on loan in January, and play him and Beck as full backs for the second half of the season.

Edited November 9 by KentExile

[damo100]

59 minutes ago, speeeeeeedie said:

I commented the other day that Travis should score more. He didn't score but set one up and was trying to play more attacking football. It was good to see.  

How many passes for the first goal? 30+? Most of them were 5 yards sideways and backwards before Pickering switched it but it was a long possession. 

41

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

25 minutes ago, joey_big_nose said:

I am usually a fan of Hedges, and no one can question his work rate off the ball.... But think today and every game hes had on the left he just seems so unsure what to do when he gets into the final third. He tends to come inside onto his weak right foot, congests things, and picks a poor shot / pass.

For a left footed player it's so odd how uncomfortable he is to go outside his full back on the left. 

He’s not got that burst of pace that gets you goal side of the full back.

[Forever Blue]

 

[Forever Blue]

 

[Bbrovers2288]

Said before the game that weimann is probably our best finisher and he seems to be the only one that has a strikers instinct, he is going to give games where he is ineffective and tired but I’d rather have him up there than gueye, what a difference a few days makes. I still think we will be closer to relegation than playoffs come the end of the season but nice to finish up for a couple of weeks with a win and a cushion

[DeeCee]

Finally got to wear my Rovers poppy today, had it nearly 3 weeks 👍 

Great team performance, well done to all that travelled 💪

[Paul Mani]

Great win, fully deserved. Honestly though, we played better against Stoke, we just didn’t convert any of the 25 chances we had on goal in midweek.

We’re not world beaters, but based On performance, we should’ve beaten West Brom, Watford and Stoke where we dominated and missed guilt edged chances. With those 8 points we’d be sat in 2nd, a point off top!

it’s small margins.

Well done lads. Trav my standout player. Credit to Pears and Pickering who played well and of course, Weimann. I wouldn’t be against giving Baker a chance to start a couple after the international break.

[J*B]

I think our best team may be:

Pears

Brittain Carter Hyam Beck

Tronstad Travis Baker

Cantwell

Dolan Ohashi

[booth]

16 minutes ago, Paul Mani said:

Great win, fully deserved. Honestly though, we played better against Stoke, we just didn’t convert any of the 25 chances we had on goal in midweek.

We’re not world beaters, but based On performance, we should’ve beaten West Brom, Watford and Stoke where we dominated and missed guilt edged chances. With those 8 points we’d be sat in 2nd, a point off top!

it’s small margins.

Well done lads. Trav my standout player. Credit to Pears and Pickering who played well and of course, Weimann. I wouldn’t be against giving Baker a chance to start a couple after the international break.

It's tight owners.

[roversfan99]

43 minutes ago, Paul Mani said:

Great win, fully deserved. Honestly though, we played better against Stoke, we just didn’t convert any of the 25 chances we had on goal in midweek.

We’re not world beaters, but based On performance, we should’ve beaten West Brom, Watford and Stoke where we dominated and missed guilt edged chances. With those 8 points we’d be sat in 2nd, a point off top!

it’s small margins.

Well done lads. Trav my standout player. Credit to Pears and Pickering who played well and of course, Weimann. I wouldn’t be against giving Baker a chance to start a couple after the international break.

We definitely didnt deserve to beat West Brom, they had the main 2 chances, and there are other games we won when we on the balance of play "shouldn't" have done according to the same logic.

4 hours ago, M_B said:

I didn't say he was or  wasn't the best in the league, or the world. It's this idea that Pears seems to supposedly be the only keeper who makes mistakes.

Especially early on this season, Johansson was being vilified by Stoke fans. Be it Pears, Johansson or anyone else, at our level of recruitment, the keeper will make bad mistakes.

 

You have totally fabricated the idea that people expect a goalkeeper to make no mistakes.

The issue with Pears last season was the QUANTITY of mistakes made. It was far too high, I think it worked out into double figures directly leading to a goal and be didnt even play all of the games.

This season he has been afforded much better protection but he certainly hasnt been the same level of calamity that he has been in the past, so far anyway, he has shown notable improvment. 

Johansson wins his team more points than he costs, hence why he is regarded as one of the best in the league. Doesnt mean that he never makes mistakes.

4 hours ago, DaveyB said:

Pears is just an average Championship keeper. Pretty much every keeper in this league has the ability to have a blinder or a shocker on any given day. 
I imagine that, on the way out of the ground today, most Cardiff fans would happily have swapped Pears for their keeper (who had a shocker for Bakers goal) in much the same way we were raving about Stoke’s keeper on Wednesday. 

Unfortunately, after a very poor run of performances last season, he has become something of a scapegoat for many and even when he does ok they aren’t willing to give him any credit. 
I heard two guys on the way out of Ewood on Wednesday blaming him for not saving Stoke’s opener - then they saw it on the tv screen, admitted that it was a fantastic strike that Pears couldn’t have done anything about and then finished with ‘…he’s still shit though’

It seems from reading on here that Hedges falls into the same category - he played ok today, but is still singled out for criticism by some 

I am not comfortable with the narrative that the nasty fans are scapegoating individuals.

Those 2 players either are or have been consistently our weaker performers. Thats why they naturally receive an above average amount of criticism.

Pears to be fair has not been the liability that we saw making so many mistakes last season. And I think that has been acknowledged by most, although especially as a keeper he has to work to get peoples full trust in him.

Hedges is an attacking player whose main asset is trying his best. He consistently fails to be productive in the final third. He again today wasnt, the main time he got into the final third he made the wrong decision and played a poor ball well in advance of anyone.

You look around him, Weimann scored twice and Cantwell slipped in Travis to set up the first. He again was less effective.

[roversfan99]

45 minutes ago, J*B said:

I think our best team may be:

Pears

Brittain Carter Hyam Beck

Tronstad Travis Baker

Cantwell

Dolan Ohashi

Seems a strange conclusion within the aftermath of an away victory to come to the conclusion that our best side makes 4 changes to that and adopts a totally different formation that we have never played before.

[M_B]

36 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

We definitely didnt deserve to beat West Brom, they had the main 2 chances, and there are other games we won when we on the balance of play "shouldn't" have done according to the same logic.

You have totally fabricated the idea that people expect a goalkeeper to make no mistakes.

The issue with Pears last season was the QUANTITY of mistakes made. It was far too high, I think it worked out into double figures directly leading to a goal and be didnt even play all of the games.

This season he has been afforded much better protection but he certainly hasnt been the same level of calamity that he has been in the past, so far anyway, he has shown notable improvment. 

Johansson wins his team more points than he costs, hence why he is regarded as one of the best in the league. Doesnt mean that he never makes mistakes.

I am not comfortable with the narrative that the nasty fans are scapegoating individuals.

Those 2 players either are or have been consistently our weaker performers. Thats why they naturally receive an above average amount of criticism.

Pears to be fair has not been the liability that we saw making so many mistakes last season. And I think that has been acknowledged by most, although especially as a keeper he has to work to get peoples full trust in him.

Hedges is an attacking player whose main asset is trying his best. He consistently fails to be productive in the final third. He again today wasnt, the main time he got into the final third he made the wrong decision and played a poor ball well in advance of anyone.

You look around him, Weimann scored twice and Cantwell slipped in Travis to set up the first. He again was less effective.

Where have you got the "wins more points than he costs" figure from?

[roversfan99]

23 minutes ago, M_B said:

Where have you got the "wins more points than he costs" figure from?

Its not a figure, its obviously an opinion. 

With Pears, he certainly cost us last season far more points than he won us.

Either way, this idea that people expect Pears to make no mistakes is very misleading. His issue was the number of mistakes he made.

Edited November 10 by roversfan99

[Herbie6590]

Photos from yesterday…

[chaddyrovers]

10 hours ago, arbitro said:

I'll never understand this game. Expectations were pretty low today it's fair to say after an awful run of results, no goals in four games and a poor away record without a win. Leaving home at 6.30 to go to Cardiff we said days like today were pretty much borne out of a blind loyalty and the consensus of Rovers fans I spoke to would have snatched your hand off for a draw. But we were wrong and delighted to be wrong. Fast football, good movement, intensity, aggression and skill were seen in abundance as we fully deserved our win with three of the best team goals you are likely to see. I honestly think counter attacking suits us away from home despite the lack of pace. Today was another reason why I believe statistics are a load of bollocks. The stats today were almost the polar opposite of the Stoke game where we had more possession, more shots and a host of other meaningless numbers. We lost and today with a lesser percentage of nearly everything we won.

Thanks Rovers for helping to make the next two weeks without real football more palatable.

Great effort by you and others Rovers fans to attend the game. Longish trip. Wish I could have gone because it was one of the away grounds we wanted to do. 

It's just shows how unpredictable this league is and why we enjoyed it. 

I think we can both styles of play but yesterday we took our chances finally. 

 i agree on your last point 100%. Hate international breaks

7 hours ago, roversfan99 said:

Those 2 players either are or have been consistently our weaker performers. Thats why they naturally receive an above average amount of criticism.

Is Ohashi one of these 2 players? 

7 hours ago, roversfan99 said:

Hedges is an attacking player whose main asset is trying his best. He consistently fails to be productive in the final third. He again today wasnt, the main time he got into the final third he made the wrong decision and played a poor ball well in advance of anyone.

You don't rate Hedges do you? In the first half he was good, but second half he didn't do much..

Why did you think Cozier-Duberry will be ready to a start the first game after the international break given he would have been out for a while? 

[arbitro]

54 minutes ago, Herbie6590 said:

Photos from yesterday…

The 'pitch encroachment officer' in pictures 2 and 6 was getting on my wick. Simply overkill.

Games gone 😁

[M_B]

7 hours ago, roversfan99 said:

Its not a figure, its obviously an opinion. 

With Pears, he certainly cost us last season far more points than he won us.

Either way, this idea that people expect Pears to make no mistakes is very misleading. His issue was the number of mistakes he made.

How can you come up with an "opinion" like that without knowing the stats, yet accuse me of fabricating an idea?

[Forever Blue]

56 minutes ago, arbitro said:

The 'pitch encroachment officer' in pictures 2 and 6 was getting on my wick. Simply overkill.

Games gone 😁

I think he was suffering ‘main character’ syndrome! 

[Mattyblue]

On a poor run but still 700+ for a Cardiff Sky game at 12.30pm.

Terrific support that.

[Forever Blue]

5 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

On a poor run but still 700+ for a Cardiff Sky game at 12.30pm.

Terrific support that.

799 to be exact

 

[Mattyblue]

We didn’t 800 to local-ish PL games at times, the away support has transformed in recent years… no reason why Ewood couldn’t follow the same path in different circumstances.

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

28 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

On a poor run but still 700+ for a Cardiff Sky game at 12.30pm.

Terrific support that.

Yeah, I tip my hat to every one who went down. It’s not an easy place to get to.

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

1 hour ago, arbitro said:

The 'pitch encroachment officer' in pictures 2 and 6 was getting on my wick. Simply overkill.

Games gone 😁

He’s encroaching in one of those photo’s.

[BankEnd Rover]

12 hours ago, Penwortham Blue said:

I agree he played well today, except when it came to finding the final pass, getting a shot away and as a result, missing good chances.

He must be up there with one of the best left foots in the league...Play to your strengths man! He's too nice a player for me, needs to start being more selfish!