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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 10:11:59 GMT
Haven't started a thread on here in a little while, just wanted to make a comment about the general atmosphere at the moment.
I know it's painful to lose against pub sides, but does anyone else think it's not really that bad in judging it on this season and this season alone.
Look, FGR are a decent team at this level, I predicted at the start of the season that they would beat us at least once, was bound to happen. They probably have a bigger budget than us and realistically we could have got something out of that game, we probably also should have beat them away from home too. But forgetting about that a second...
We are still two points off second place. 6 off top, although quite frankly anyone suggesting we'd have won the league this year I thought was mad. I, personally, had us midtable in where I thought we'd be at this point this year.
It's not like we are miles away from having a good team at this level either. 1 or 2 players off tops.
We knew we would have setbacks this season. We knew it probably wouldn't be the worlds most enjoyable season. Okay, so the past few weeks we hadn't played very well, but there isn't a team in this league bar Barnet that hasn't had bad spells and good spells. We're currently ahead of the fellow relegated side and we'll still be in the playoffs when FGR get deducted.
So why the bad feeling around the club?
I know the numbers have been pretty decent, but we talk about making the Mem a fortress. The only thing I could here was 20 FGR fans piping up (just about). Infact, it's been pretty dead all season, people moaning pretty early and often especially in the last couple of weeks. Rarely any singing, apart from if we're really on top or if we've just scored.
We were terrible in the first half on Saturday yes, but in the second you could clearly see 10 players fighting to get back into the game. It's not the best quality but it's the conference, is there many teams in this league with quality all round. We should have got atleast a point from that game, with 10 men and our best player injured. It's not like it's really the end of the world and you come on here afterwards seeing people saying it's disgraceful. Just don't get it.
Maybe I'm not feeling annoyed by it because I've only seen us lose once this season, but I came away as baffled by the atmosphere as I was annoyed about the result. If we find a guy who can put away a few more chances and possibly another presence in midfield, we'll still be right up there. Just can't see why there's all the negativity at the moment.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 10:27:04 GMT
Oh and Balanta coming back, who on paper could well be a good signing at this level and if we sign two like expected, like a third new signing.
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Post by markczgas on Oct 20, 2014 10:33:21 GMT
Oh and Balanta coming back, who on paper could well be a good signing at this level and if we sign two like expected, like a third new signing. what do you mean coming back - he hasn't even started. We are assuming that he is going to improve the team but until we see him play a few games we have no idea. Clarke's other forward signings - how would you rate them after a third of the season ?
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Post by curlywurly on Oct 20, 2014 10:38:41 GMT
Tend to agree that things could be a lot worse. It is embarrassing to lose to FGR, as it used to be embarrassing to lose to Yeovil or Cheltenham - but this is only based on past history. It is still taking many of us some time to come to terms with the level that we are at and that 5 times the amount of supporters than the opposition doesn't guarantee a win. With Vince's money, FGR have assembled a very good squad, have a definite plan (in your face, high tempo, strong to the point of bending the rules). They have their weak points, but they also have some pretty decent players. They won't win the league, but I'd be surprised if they are not in or around the play-offs.
On the plus side for Rovers, we created enough opportunities to win the game, even though we only seemed to really get going when Leadbitter was sent off. And of course, there is our problem. Someone posted a throrough statistical review a few weeks ago, which indicated exactly what we can all see with Rovers. We have plenty of shots/ chances, but score a low percentage. Incidently, we allow the opposition plenty of chances, but are miserly in giving goals away, which is probably testament to the number of times Mildy has pulled off good saves.
In a way, I am relieved that the unbeaten run has ended, because it was becoming a run of draws with the occasional win. Let's hope that two weeks off league football allows a refocusing and Balanta to get fit and challenge for a starting spot. Bring on Telford.
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Post by markczgas on Oct 20, 2014 10:40:48 GMT
By the way, I agree about the atmosphere. I was in the South Stand on Saturday and I barely heard any Rovers chants. You are right FGR supporters were vocal. I put it down to a hangover from last season but also because even at home we are unable to get on top of teams and peg them around their box. I still think the players, management and the fans don't yet believe we have turned the corner. Sorry to say but from what I have seen (despite being 6th) I don't think we are good enough to stay in the play off positions. We will see if the club will strengthen. By the way I was trying to get my 7-year old to sing "Come on you Blues" when we had a corner !! Not quite successful yet
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 10:45:45 GMT
Oh and Balanta coming back, who on paper could well be a good signing at this level and if we sign two like expected, like a third new signing. what do you mean coming back - he hasn't even started. We are assuming that he is going to improve the team but until we see him play a few games we have no idea. Clarke's other forward signings - how would you rate them after a third of the season ? We'd be assuming any signing is going to improve the team. That's the same with any signing in football - we can only judge player on paper but from what I know of Balanta I'd have thought he could make an impact at this level. I meant really coming back as in coming back to fitness. He hasn't hit on all of the attacking signings but did we think every signing was going to be a hit? Think he's had more hits than misses in general signings to be honest, not like Cunnington has been a bust either in terms of attackers. Even without being prolific upfront, we're still in and around the playoff places. Even the slightest improvement attacking and I see no reason why we can't maintain that, especially when you factor in our dreadful start.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 11:01:36 GMT
By the way, I agree about the atmosphere. I was in the South Stand on Saturday and I barely heard any Rovers chants. You are right FGR supporters were vocal. I put it down to a hangover from last season but also because even at home we are unable to get on top of teams and peg them around their box. I still think the players, management and the fans don't yet believe we have turned the corner. Sorry to say but from what I have seen (despite being 6th) I don't think we are good enough to stay in the play off positions. We will see if the club will strengthen. By the way I was trying to get my 7-year old to sing "Come on you Blues" when we had a corner !! Not quite successful yet Mark, I get some of the things you are saying but have you seen a really good side this season, bar Barnet? We've won as many as we've lost against the teams up there this year, beat Halifax and Woking but lost to Barnet and FGR. Of the teams up there, i'd actually say we've got the highest ceiling as if we had someone who could tuck away even an average amount for a striker at this level, we'd be comfortably second. I know we've looked poor in quite a few games, but it's a poor league full of poor teams. That's why i'm not too depressed, even Conference fans on TFF have said the division as a whole looks weak, I see no reason why we can't be right up there. Actually think we needed to lose at some point, might get back to the form of the early part of our run. Cup game also coming at the perfect time.
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Post by markczgas on Oct 20, 2014 11:26:05 GMT
Take your point Harley. Why can't we look at ourselves though ? I mean here the manager and the board more than supporters. We have struggled for several weeks, the quality of play in my eyes has got worse - the longer Cunnington has been in the team the more we seem to play long high balls to him. The opposition don't have much to fear do they when they play against us hence how few goals we are scoring at home especially, but overall. Don't go to away games but fans writing in have been saying the same - we have been HANGING ON in games. I didn't expect us to hammer every side this season - far from it but I did think that Clarke (after all his promises) would revamp the team and the playing style and John Ward's dark days of ugly football would have gone. I honestly don't see much if any difference in what Clarke and the players are serving up other than we have 2 up front instead of 1 this season. What do you think ?
In the long run it is performances that produce results - at least that's what managers say. Our manager is now just saying oh we can win ugly every game, except that's stopped happening - 1 win in 5. Let's see what happens with new players, a 2 week break maybe a few players fully fit again (Sinclair, Monkhouse and that Balanta) but in the end it comes from the management team and how they are going to play Home and Away !!
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 11:39:56 GMT
Take your point Harley. Why can't we look at ourselves though ? I mean here the manager and the board more than supporters. We have struggled for several weeks, the quality of play in my eyes has got worse - the longer Cunnington has been in the team the more we seem to play long high balls to him. The opposition don't have much to fear do they when they play against us hence how few goals we are scoring at home especially, but overall. Don't go to away games but fans writing in have been saying the same - we have been HANGING ON in games. I didn't expect us to hammer every side this season - far from it but I did think that Clarke (after all his promises) would revamp the team and the playing style and John Ward's dark days of ugly football would have gone. I honestly don't see much if any difference in what Clarke and the players are serving up other than we have 2 up front instead of 1 this season. What do you think ? In the long run it is performances that produce results - at least that's what managers say. Our manager is now just saying oh we can win ugly every game, except that's stopped happening - 1 win in 5. Let's see what happens with new players, a 2 week break maybe a few players fully fit again (Sinclair, Monkhouse and that Balanta) but in the end it comes from the management team and how they are going to play Home and Away !! You're not wrong Mark, there's no way we don't need to improve and i think there's a lot we can improve to - and you're completely right in that respect. My point is mainly that in perspective to the other teams in the league, we aren't doing badly. I think ou two main issues are that we don't stick away enough chances and that we don't get enough control in midfield when the pairing isn't Mansell and Sinclair. We've really missed Sinclair in the last couple or so games, and before that funnily enough he had a couple of games in wide position that I think we missed him not being in the middle even though he played in those games. I'm hoping with added bodies in the squad (i.e. Balanta, if he proves to be fit and good enough to start) that Mansell and Sinclair play the lion's share of games in the middle, it's what gave us our best run. I don't think it's co-incidence either that we look a little bit weaker in midfield when Monkhouse plays, he isn't my cup of tea and another reason why we need an extra body in midfield. But two signings might answer a lot of our problems, particularly the one you brought up about killing off games. Those games become ugly because we hadn't been converting chances that put games away, but a decent signing or two and I really think we're on the right track. Even with all these weaknesses, we're still right up there.
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Post by markczgas on Oct 20, 2014 11:54:31 GMT
Ok Harley maybe my realism (pessimism) is balanced out with your optimism .
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 12:13:39 GMT
Ok Harley maybe my realism (pessimism) is balanced out with your optimism . I don't think there's anything wrong with a bit of either, you back up your points on here as do I and there's nothing wrong with that either way. I think what annoys me is when that pessimism (not from you, obviously, you've said you get behind the team) manifests at the ground. The mem can be a difficult place for away teams to come to when it's at it's best, when it's at it's worse it can be difficult for the home team, to say the least. I've seen it worse, but seems a bit ridiculous how quickly the fans got on peoples back when we previously were unbeaten in 9 and unbeaten at home all season.
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Post by Congas on Oct 20, 2014 13:38:34 GMT
It could improve now that the unbeaten run is over.
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Post by Gas Go Marching In on Oct 20, 2014 13:43:21 GMT
I agree that people are over the top pessimistic and over the top optimistic. Me and you Harley are realists and don't get too carried away either way.
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Post by LJG on Oct 20, 2014 14:20:59 GMT
I don't see that the problems of the last eight games of last season are any different to any of the games we've played this season - we play without shape, defined roles and formation and route one is our preferred method. We've been poor and lucky and we're being found out when we're actually tested.
The thing about this league is that one third of it is absolute junk, one third is bottom Lg 2 standard and one third of it is strong - we'll go on good streaks because we're coming up against rubbish that shouldn't hide the fact we haven't actually improved one iota.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 14:40:42 GMT
I don't see that the problems of the last eight games of last season are any different to any of the games we've played this season - we play without shape, defined roles and formation and route one is our preferred method. We've been poor and lucky and we're being found out when we're actually tested. The thing about this league is that one third of it is absolute junk, one third is bottom Lg 2 standard and one third of it is strong - we'll go on good streaks because we're coming up against rubbish that shouldn't hide the fact we haven't actually improved one iota. Christ, that makes it seem like we've only beat the small teams. We've beat two of the top three!
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 15:33:44 GMT
Haven't started a thread on here in a little while, just wanted to make a comment about the general atmosphere at the moment. I know it's painful to lose against pub sides, but does anyone else think it's not really that bad in judging it on this season and this season alone. Look, FGR are a decent team at this level, I predicted at the start of the season that they would beat us at least once, was bound to happen. They probably have a bigger budget than us and realistically we could have got something out of that game, we probably also should have beat them away from home too. But forgetting about that a second... We are still two points off second place. 6 off top, although quite frankly anyone suggesting we'd have won the league this year I thought was mad. I, personally, had us midtable in where I thought we'd be at this point this year. It's not like we are miles away from having a good team at this level either. 1 or 2 players off tops. We knew we would have setbacks this season. We knew it probably wouldn't be the worlds most enjoyable season. Okay, so the past few weeks we hadn't played very well, but there isn't a team in this league bar Barnet that hasn't had bad spells and good spells. We're currently ahead of the fellow relegated side and we'll still be in the playoffs when FGR get deducted. So why the bad feeling around the club? I know the numbers have been pretty decent, but we talk about making the Mem a fortress. The only thing I could here was 20 FGR fans piping up (just about). Infact, it's been pretty dead all season, people moaning pretty early and often especially in the last couple of weeks. Rarely any singing, apart from if we're really on top or if we've just scored. We were terrible in the first half on Saturday yes, but in the second you could clearly see 10 players fighting to get back into the game. It's not the best quality but it's the conference, is there many teams in this league with quality all round. We should have got atleast a point from that game, with 10 men and our best player injured. It's not like it's really the end of the world and you come on here afterwards seeing people saying it's disgraceful. Just don't get it. Maybe I'm not feeling annoyed by it because I've only seen us lose once this season, but I came away as baffled by the atmosphere as I was annoyed about the result. If we find a guy who can put away a few more chances and possibly another presence in midfield, we'll still be right up there. Just can't see why there's all the negativity at the moment. I dont agree, people are just pointing out the obvious that we need more quality up top and out wide. I havent found it too gloomy. We had a woeful start followed by a superb run followed by a drop off in form. To be where we are now is a miracle after how bad we looked in August. I think a lot of us realise we are at a crossroads and we need to get the decisions right. There are more positives then negatives but we are a bad decision away from a mid table finish and a good decision away from promotion. Its a nervous time. I think to expect a good atmosphere when we are playing teams like Telford is a little unrealistic. Its just not that exciting. The number turning up is the factor to focus on
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Post by LJG on Oct 20, 2014 15:41:13 GMT
I don't see that the problems of the last eight games of last season are any different to any of the games we've played this season - we play without shape, defined roles and formation and route one is our preferred method. We've been poor and lucky and we're being found out when we're actually tested. The thing about this league is that one third of it is absolute junk, one third is bottom Lg 2 standard and one third of it is strong - we'll go on good streaks because we're coming up against rubbish that shouldn't hide the fact we haven't actually improved one iota. Christ, that makes it seem like we've only beat the small teams. We've beat two of the top three! And we're top six - but that's exactly my point - that tells us nothing; The league at this stage of the game is contingent on who has played whom, when.
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Post by socrates on Oct 20, 2014 15:54:48 GMT
Anyone can beat anyone in this league and every league is the same the world over. People say that losing to FG is embarrassing but the way I see it being in the conference at the beginning of the season was embarrassing and then you get on with it. Everyone in this division is here becsuse they were too good for the division below or they weren't good enough for the division above. Woking lost at home to Telford on Saturday. We haven't lost at home to one of the bottom four yet but we probably will at some point and it won't be a giant killing or anything like a lot of people will make out because we're all in the same division. What matters is where you finish come May. We're doing alright yes we can get better but we need to get behind the team and hope that the right decisions get made. If you'd offered me just outside the play offs at the end of October I would have taken it at he beginning of the season. Now we push on and try to improve , win our next game we could go second it's not exactly a disaster of a season so far is it .
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Post by Gas Go Marching In on Oct 20, 2014 16:06:56 GMT
Anyone can beat anyone in this league and every league is the same the world over. People say that losing to FG is embarrassing but the way I see it being in the conference at the beginning of the season was embarrassing and then you get on with it. Everyone in this division is here becsuse they were too good for the division below or they weren't good enough for the division above. Woking lost at home to Telford on Saturday. We haven't lost at home to one of the bottom four yet but we probably will at some point and it won't be a giant killing or anything like a lot of people will make out because we're all in the same division. What matters is where you finish come May. We're doing alright yes we can get better but we need to get behind the team and hope that the right decisions get made. If you'd offered me just outside the play offs at the end of October I would have taken it at he beginning of the season. Now we push on and try to improve , win our next game we could go second it's not exactly a disaster of a season so far is it . People that say this are a joke. Losing to a village side they say but this is no ordinary village side. It is a village side with a chairman who is worth over £100mil at least and have the highest wage budget in the league.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2014 16:15:10 GMT
I have no issue with losing a game of football to a club that have invested in better players then us.
I dont feel our squad is quite there yet and we need to address that to fulfill our potential. We also for all my scepticism about DCs appointment need to give him the right tools to do the job. Operating without a scout is not doing that.
We are in touch and that is a bloody relief
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