Donny v Gas match day thread brought to you by BG.

GC clearly made a tactical mistake tonight, before the match Doncaster supporters were saying that the midfield was their weakness I thought GC would pack our midfield to win the midfield battle, instead he played three strikers which played into Doncasters hands. Always thought it would be a tough game but GC didn't help things. Looking at the teams below us fixtures, still think 52 points will see us safe, we need to get those points before the Fleetwood game.

Are you taking part in a competition for the silliest posts?
If you are your easily winning.

Nobody looked sharp but the service to our forwards was atrocious.
I like the screen of three defensive midfielders but if we have that we’ve got to have an attacking creative midfielder in front of them.
No point in playing three out and out strikers in front because there will be no link between midfield and attack as we’ve seen tonight.
Doncaster played between the lines of def- mid and mid- att all night and we’re a class above because of it.
Cogs tactics were embarrassing tonight and the players tried their best but it clearly wasn’t working and I was shouting out for him to change it even before the second went in , it was clear we were on our way to a battering.

Amazing that he didn’t change it until over an hour was gone then just replaced like with like , Sinclair - upson , Psrts - Clarke wtf ? How is that going to have a positive effect on a badly worked tactic that had massively failed for 70 minutes?

He’s got it right more than he’s got it wrong but f**k me did he get it wrong tonight.

I reckon GC must have watched the pre-Montenegro interview with Southgate where he described the “evolution” of England’s formation from a 3-5-2 at the World Cup to the current 4-3-3 to allow themselves more attacking freedom now that the team has greater confidence. GC took a gamble tonight, partly to rotate the squad with an eye on Saturday’s game at home to the league leaders, and partly because he wanted to try different options when there would be no immediate consequence to the league position. Unfortunately his “project’ backfired, however he did warn us there would be bumps in the road and I have every confidence that he will get us enough points by the end of the season.

He got it wrong tonight admittedly but he must have a bit of tactical sense as we were 5 unbeaten in the league before tonight. For me, where he went wrong was he tried to change a system that was working for him, perhaps we got too confident about our form away from home but I was worried the moment I saw the team sheet because logic and reason would suggest a relegation threatened team playing 3 strikers away to a promotion chasing side isn’t exactly a recipe for success.

Our biggest downfall however came from our soft defending and our midfields inability to get the slightest grip of the game which killed the game after 30 minutes, it looked as if we were still on the team coach. Had we managed to ride out the storm of a Doncaster team, who to be fair to them did come flying out the traps, we may have managed to get something, we aren’t a million miles off competing with top 6 teams.

My suggestion for Saturday against Luton would be to go back to the diamond formation which has served us well over the couple of home games, play Kelly at full back and use THD’s attacking play to our advantage and don’t sit too deep against a dangerous Luton side, instead try to give service to the two strikers so that Clarke-Harris can
continue his excellent run in front of goal. We aren’t far off securing our place in L1 next year, we just have to put in a few big performances when it matters.

We had two golden chances before half time with reilly one on one and the scramble from the free kick. Second half we should have had another penalty and the rare times we went forward we did actually look dangerous. So for us to play so dismally and still create, for me with the improvement Walsall have shown recently, they will definitely create chances up there. I know donny took the foot off the gas but I saw lots of opportunity and spaces which makes last night even more frustrating.

There in a couple of sentences is the issue last night.
I'm sure GC must realise this - send him a note someone in case not.

Yeah we were lucky to lose 4-1 .
Not a good night but at least Nichols and sercombe should be fresh for Saturday where we’ll have to play a million times better to avoid another hammering.