v Norwich City (h) - 1/3/2025

[Lancaster Rover]

1 hour ago, briansol said:

While I agree a high press would be the best tactics against Norwich, I really don't think we have a team that can execute that well. Certainly not the starting 11. You need a high defensive line and with Gueye, Cantwell and Forshaw lacking intensity in their press I fear Norwich would play through the press and open us up. Certainly not something you would be able to drill in one or two days in training.

They played through the non existent mid block anyway 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

2 minutes ago, BankEnd Rover said:

Hedges is just generally awful though...Fair play to him on his cameo today however.

Dolan does show up and chips a few goals in, but mostly he's tragically bad - That's why he's frustrating.

Hedges was ok in the cameo. He’s another bench player, not a starter.

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

1 minute ago, Lancaster Rover said:

They played through the non existent mid block anyway 

Easily.

[roversfan99]

11 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

It felt so great scoring an equaliser in injury time, which I can't remember the less time we did that. 

No problem Tom, Very silly action by Hyam. 

Ohashi foul was a pen all day long. 

Its very tight but those decisions should go the attacking way

We were never going to press too high and allow them the ability to attacking our back 4 with their quality they have and have open spaces. 

The subs on 60 mins was Tronstad needed to shone up the midfield with Travis, Dolan who was piss poor and Cantwell who faded and both needed replacing. 

The more passive tactics we did employ still saw them repeatedly get their players on the ball in attacking areas, the number of time one of them picked the ball up on the half turn was ridiculous. Thankfully in the main they didnt do much from there. As the home team we should have played more on the front foot.

The triple Ismael sub has been something he has done throughout his career. He has often been criticised for it due to the predictable nature of it. That being said, some managers can go the other way and make changes too late.

[Hasta]

First half we had more of the attacking positions but they had the best two chances.

Second half we were getting overrun until Tronstadt come on for Forshaw, who once again looked out of his depth. The big positive is that once Tronstadt was on, the  balance of the game shifted back in Rovers favour until the sending off. Him and Trav are going to be absolutely key from here on in.

Edited Saturday at 20:04 by Hasta

[chaddyrovers]

1 minute ago, roversfan99 said:

The more passive tactics we did employ still saw them repeatedly get their players on the ball in attacking areas, the number of time one of them picked the ball up on the half turn was ridiculous. Thankfully in the main they didnt do much from there. As the home team we should have played more on the front foot.

Cos we didn't wanted to leave us far too open but also if you want to high press you need players who can do it Cantwell and Gueye aren't right for it. Ohashi is 

1 minute ago, roversfan99 said:

The triple Ismael sub has been something he has done throughout his career. He has often been criticised for it due to the predictable nature of it. That being said, some managers can go the other way and make changes too late.

The triple subs were need at this point cos Norwich were controlling the game in the second half until they came on and changed the game 

[roversfan99]

Not even about a high press necessarily. Cantwell and Gueye are regulars and we were particularly passive and flat for much of the game. It felt like a specific tactic/part of the gameplan and I dont think it worked.

Shouldnt be fearing Norwich at home.

[arbitro]

37 minutes ago, Hasta said:

Yeah but in reality he sees the goalkeeper on the floor, doesn’t know what has happened so just gives a free kick. It’s the easy way out for the ref.  9/10 times it wouldn’t be mentioned again.

If he’s being honest he hasn’t got a clue what happened, and the fact he spoke to Dolan just proves it. If Hyam gets no further action it’s cos the ref can’t admit he gave what he hadn’t seen, which is fine with me.

It will be by default if there is no subsequent charge.

It was so out of character from Hyam who must have known he was running a huge risk.

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

5 minutes ago, arbitro said:

It will be by default if there is no subsequent charge.

It was so out of character from Hyam who must have known he was running a huge risk.

Not Hyam’s style at all. If anything he’s usually not physical enough.

[Lancaster Rover]

I’m sorry but you’ve made no sense there chaddy, yes a high press can be open to being played through if you get it wrong. A poor midblock is even worse as your starting position is so much deeper

the midblock we played today with poor cover shadowing and incorrect distances, with poor triggers to slide led to us being played through and being massively unbalanced with the cross field pass with supporting numbers underneath being on everytime. The least compact midblock you’ll see this season. You talk about the danger of Sainz, we literally let him have the ball in ‘zone 14’ continually due to the tactics.

A starting position of activating a press after the half way line made the situation almost comical, we wanted to restrict sainz yet let them play through to him at will. We didn’t engage until Norwich were in the final third and attacking centrally. Really poor out of possession tactics imo. 

Edited Saturday at 19:59 by Lancaster Rover

[ElTwis]

1 hour ago, ... said:

Always wondered this, never done it really the autograph thing how long did you have to wait? At the players entrance i presume?

As another 40 odd yo with 2 kids stood next to me 90mins after the final whistle said, the 1230ko's are good for it as you have the time to wait. Just hang around at the corner of JW and DE, the palyers and staff either come out there or the centre of JW and walk towards the cars. All are happy to stop and sign or have a photo taken

[ElTwis]

Forgot to mention, speaking to Hyam after the game re the elbow he said "don't worry, I know him". Thought that was odd, I don't know if he meant it was a bit of a joke between pals or if they've had issues in the past

[BlackburnEnd75]

I thought we pressed higher with a higher defensive line (that could he due to Carter returning). But i also think that they played with a higher line too which compressed the game adding to the scrappy feel as we couldn't get hold of the ball and sustain attacks. Felt we were too open early and we somewhat self corrected as the game went on.

They played through our press in the first half and got into good area, and missed a couple of chances. Interestingly forshaw was pressing higher with Travis deep, which switched when tronstad came on. 

One of the things I knew about ismael coming into this was he was going to do a triple sub on the hour, and I think we looked better for it too. Whether that was personnel or fresh legs but we had a good period of pressure until the red card.

Wasn't overly impressed with the first half or so but with Carter, tronstad, kargbo and ohashi getting mins in the tank and another week between the game, we could yet improve.

[chaddyrovers]

10 minutes ago, ElTwis said:

Forgot to mention, speaking to Hyam after the game re the elbow he said "don't worry, I know him". Thought that was odd, I don't know if he meant it was a bit of a joke between pals or if they've had issues in the past

Won't him and Gunn know each other from the Scotland international squad

11 minutes ago, ElTwis said:

As another 40 odd yo with 2 kids stood next to me 90mins after the final whistle said, the 1230ko's are good for it as you have the time to wait. Just hang around at the corner of JW and DE, the palyers and staff either come out there or the centre of JW and walk towards the cars. All are happy to stop and sign or have a photo taken

great to hear that the players and staff are so welcoming and will stop for photos or signatures  

24 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

Not even about a high press necessarily. Cantwell and Gueye are regulars and we were particularly passive and flat for much of the game. It felt like a specific tactic/part of the gameplan and I dont think it worked.

Shouldnt be fearing Norwich at home.

No one has said they fear Norwich have I? They have clear identity to their play and Saniz moves away from that left side. 

 

[Andy]

43 minutes ago, Hasta said:

First half we had more of the attacking positions but they had the best two chances.

Second half we were getting overrun until Tronstadt come on for Forshaw, who once again looked out of his depth. The big positive is that once Tronstadt was on, the  balance of the game shifted back in Rovers favour until the sending off. Him and Trav are going to be absolutely key from here on in.

Agreed. It's no coincidence that we improved when Tronstadt came on.

Also agree on a couple of posts on Dolan.
Today he was effectively a disadvantage to us; did more to break up our attacks than any Norwich player.

[Ossydave]

Bit disappointed really, didn't feel like a classic new manager bounce performance teams often put in. Maybe I'm being a bit harsh given the 2 training sessions VI has had to stamp his mark on the team?

Hopefully a full week with the players ahead of Saturday will help. Eustace will have had 3 weeks or so at his new home.

Quite a startling stat, for Derby fans anyway, is that in his 3 games in charge his team have managed 2 shots on target 😳 That includes registering 0 at home to Millwall. There's simply no excuses, i personally think our play-off chances are very slim, but I'd probably write them off completely if we can't beat Derby.....

[martonrover]

Whatever happens at Derby, for whatever reasons,  will not alter the fact that Eustace did a decent job for us.

[joey_big_nose]

2 hours ago, arbitro said:

It appears that Ben Benson has taken a back seat as the set piece coach. Dean Whitehead was the prominent one in the Technical Area at every set piece.

I thought our set pieces have been much better recently but today back to being absolutely shite.

[Tom]

Just now, joey_big_nose said:

I thought our set pieces have been much better recently but today back to being absolutely shite.

Couple of times today Cantwell was in the inverse ‘Pedersen zone’ 

it needed a whip into the far corner on target and hope for a touch or straight in, first one he lofted out of play with no pace on it, second one dinked at chest height to the first man 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

2 minutes ago, joey_big_nose said:

I thought our set pieces have been much better recently but today back to being absolutely shite.

A succession of really poor corners, free kicks topped off by the Brittain “ attempt “ at the end thst went yards over the bar !

[neophox]

What is it with Dolan..do he thinks he's that good. He needs to work hard and not think about where he should be next season. Rovers been there for him. Now time to step up.

[neophox]

Ribeiro was immense today..still think he and Beck on the left could be really good.

[M_B]

54 minutes ago, Andy said:

Agreed. It's no coincidence that we improved when Tronstadt came on.

Also agree on a couple of posts on Dolan.
Today he was effectively a disadvantage to us; did more to break up our attacks than any Norwich player.

Thought Forshaw did fine today,to me the improvement looked more down to Hedges coming on.

[Hasta]

14 minutes ago, M_B said:

Thought Forshaw did fine today,to me the improvement looked more down to Hedges coming on.

He’s fine keeping it simple on the ball, but without it he’s just not good enough. He’s slow and gets bypassed too easily. Situations he’s in where you expect a holding midfielder to come out with the ball or break up play they seem to just come through us. It happened today. I pointed it out within 6  minutes at Swansea last week.

Hedges didn’t come on until the 76th minute, and by that point rovers were back in the ascendancy. That wasn’t entirely down to Tronstadt as we also replaced the ineffective Dolan and Cantwell, but he did play a big part of it. 
 

Forshaw works hard but simply hasn’t got what it takes anymore in a two man midfield against the better sides in this league.

Edited Saturday at 21:40 by Hasta

[BankEnd Rover]

21 minutes ago, M_B said:

Thought Forshaw did fine today,to me the improvement looked more down to Hedges coming on.

He did okay in certain parts but his passing was awful...Gave away possession numerous times and does struggle to pick a pass further than 5 yards unless it's going backwards...He couldn't keep up with their energy and I think this does effect Trav's performances...Both Tronstadt and Hedges helped the Balance of the game.

One of Tronstadts first moments today was deep in our half, where he turned, pressed forward and played a ball Foreshaw had been "trying" to make all game...Such a relief to have him back.

 

Edited Saturday at 21:47 by BankEnd Rover