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Post by warehamgas on Jan 14, 2024 19:42:07 GMT
Not now but he did until Jed Ward came back from Wealdstone. I doubt he’s on too much. Blimey Somerset who’s rattled your cage today? 😉 A tad unfair to call Sinclair and Wilson dross tbf. Isn’t it? But MT seems to be half agreeing with you and is clearing out a few players who won’t be needed. UTG! Possibly working nineteen days straight Wareham 🤣 with seven to go! I’ll cheer up after the four home games, feeling Rovers deprived! He’s still taking up a squad position, What has Sinclair done this season other than take a wage? I’d pay him up. Wilson was always going to be a risky signing with his injury record over the years. That’s a hard one, nineteen straight days. Look after yourself and enjoy the next few games. I’m doing the Exeter matches home and away and looking forward to it. You may still be right over Scott S but dross he is not! And if we haven’t got anyone yet in the window MT a at least is clearing away fringe players. Now and the summer will see some big changes I think. 😉 UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 14, 2024 17:43:37 GMT
Then what happens we just replace them with another group of "wasters", as we're never going to have a full squad of 22 fully fit players all bang on form like Man C? Hall was brought in to never play so you can hardly call him a waster for just doing what he was signed to do! Pointless signing and a waste of a wage, guy doesn’t even get on the bench. Not now but he did until Jed Ward came back from Wealdstone. I doubt he’s on too much. Blimey Somerset who’s rattled your cage today? 😉 A tad unfair to call Sinclair and Wilson dross tbf. Isn’t it? But MT seems to be half agreeing with you and is clearing out a few players who won’t be needed. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 14, 2024 12:32:50 GMT
You’re both right. We really should be better than we are and you feel given really good ownership such as a ‘man or woman with a plan’ that we could have been Brentford, AFCB or Brighton esp given our names starts with a B! I think the nearest comparison is Bournemouth given we both had very rich foreign owners. One who planned his spending strategically (Denim) the other (AQ) liked the celebrity of it all but really didn’t have a workable plan. Especially given the potential that so many talk about.🤔 But you’re right eric, York, Chesterfield, Southend, Oldham and even Grimsby and many, many others have done worse and are reminders of what we could have been. So definitely a real balance out there. In the end we are just about where we are when I started supporting us in ‘66. Then we were promotion challengers now we’re just a tad below, same division but not really challenging. UTG! i started supporting in the early 60's and was fortunate to do some consultancy work for he club for about 10 years. Whilst you can argue that a snapshot of the footballing side is comparable to that period , the changes in the structure of the club are vastly different. Those were completely different times and we rightly earned the reputation of rag bag Rovers as we were getting along on a wing and a prayer . Credit to the managers at that time because they were maximising the potential of what was available to them. Now however we seem to have a much more solid foundation with proper trainng facilities and an improving ground that we own- debt free. We are now correctly geared to moving upwards playing wise - which is not something that you could have said for the 60's Thank you. Im sure you’re correct about many things. I was commenting on specific posts and a bottom line that more or less says we’re in the same position now as we were then. Of course things have changed and I’m sure you’re right about some of the improvements. And from my memory, which may not be the best, but I’m pretty sure we weren’t known then (the 60s) as ‘ragbag Rovers’. That was a name given to us by SC this century. Of course we suffered having only a rented ground, Eastville, but we had proper scouting and recruiting staff, a ground (in the 60s) that was superior to the Mem and better than many grounds then. We actually paid transfer fees in the 70s and we were considered a comparably well run club. You only have to see some of the personnel then, Tann, Dodgin, Ford, Campbell even some of the Chairmen (unexciting perhaps but people who ran a tight ship). Of course after the fire Eastville deteriorated rapidly through the late 70s and 80s and we suffered. So whilst I can appreciate what you’ve said, I’m not sure that I can agree that we have more ‘solid foundation’ now. Yes we have training facilities but I’m struggling to see anything else specifically that we didn’t have then. And as to your last sentence, that is completely misleading, imo. After promotion in ‘74 we lasted some years until ‘81 in Division 2 comfortably, albeit in the bottom half. Now, without a lot of expenditure and a re-set every single season it seems we are light years away from a 7 year stint in the Championship or even a one year stay, and even probably some distance away from a serious challenge in League 1. Which is why everybody on here gets excited when we have an away win in this league and start talking about promotion. I wish it would and I’m an optimist but realistically we need more to make a sustained challenge. And are we debt free? I’m not sure. Of course football has changed but I’m sure that we’ve really not kept up with the changes that have happened. Some, our previous rivals, have changed and adapted well and are doing better in the leagues above us and no longer think about us. Other rivals have not done so well which were the points others made and are far lower down the chain than us and that was the point I was commenting on. League-wise were in a similar position to the 60s but remain light years away from the Championship or being comfortable there. (Probably the MDT is not the place to be discussing this so apologies to those who just wanted to read about yesterday!! 😉) UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 14, 2024 11:35:48 GMT
Too many changes of tack and internal struggles seems to be why, at least that is how I see it. Our lack of an in-house recruitment and a scouting team has not helped. I look at the teams who we used to play and how many of them have been promoted and yet I always saw us as the bigger club. You are right, it is shameful. For a bit of balance there are a lot of our old foes in league two and the national league 😁 You’re both right. We really should be better than we are and you feel given really good ownership such as a ‘man or woman with a plan’ that we could have been Brentford, AFCB or Brighton esp given our names starts with a B! I think the nearest comparison is Bournemouth given we both had very rich foreign owners. One who planned his spending strategically (Denim) the other (AQ) liked the celebrity of it all but really didn’t have a workable plan. Especially given the potential that so many talk about.🤔 But you’re right eric, York, Chesterfield, Southend, Oldham and even Grimsby and many, many others have done worse and are reminders of what we could have been. So definitely a real balance out there. In the end we are just about where we are when I started supporting us in ‘66. Then we were promotion challengers now we’re just a tad below, same division but not really challenging. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 13, 2024 19:28:28 GMT
I personally don't see the.point in signing anyone in this transfer window now I do, we have to finish as high as possible and from what Ive seen of the teams near the top it wont take much for a few of them to drop. You cant sack a manager for league position and not back your new manager in the next window, they are even stuttering over offering Martin a new dealI agree about the teams at the top looking similar with no stand outs but think we’re probably going to be top half team, nothing more atm. I hope we get better but a decent performance today with very obvious short comings. As to Chris M I’m not sure. I think they may have already offered him a deal similar to what he’s got now but having seen the reports about the **** and QPR being interested I wonder if him and his agent are holding out for more money or perhaps an 18months contract or something. I don’t know but it would seem that offering him an extension is a no-brainer and that we’ve already done it but he’s just holding out. I guess time will tell when he signs at the last moment. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 13, 2024 9:45:11 GMT
A few people have said “it’s their money not ours”. But surely bad financial decisions equal more chance of problems later and even loss of club whereas sustainable decisions mean we can grow and improve. So it does affect us all. It's not even just the 500k fee, it's the £1.17m in wages we agreed over a 3 year contract. That pushes up wage demands from other players too and has the potential to cause problems in the dressing room, we've seen similar before. Buying low and selling high gives you the chance to reinvest in the squad and infrastructure, increasing the overall quality level and gives you a better chance of sustained success (relatively speaking) from season to season. Peterborough are actually decent example of this usually - producing, buying and developing young players, selling the better ones on for vast profits, but still producing exciting teams that are there or thereabouts around the playoffs most seasons, have been in the championship a couple of times, improved their stadium and have a cat 2 academy producing England youth internationals. Brentford are another (extreme) example with their outstanding recruitment that was instigated by their owner Matthew Benham when the club was in League One. Exactly this pirate. I suspect I’m an older vintage than you and istm that Posh are very similar in their approach to things that we were 30 years ago, discovered players then sold them on, we’re always challenging for promotion from this division and sometimes being successful, generally being one of the better division teams. Something went wrong with us in our inability to keep doing what we did. I suspect it’s the old, old question of a lack of a stable football infrastructure. Too much dependency on who’s manager, who’s owning the club. For whatever we think of Darren Mac and Fry they have given that club a very good and stable club over the years with a clear approach to football matters. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 23:31:35 GMT
Bond was number 2 to Harry Redknapp for several years at some top clubs so he will have picked up a lot of knowledge and he did most of the coaching at those clubs. After watching him as manager at AFCB for a few years he wasn’t the best manager so I think he’s best in a coaching role. And I think we missed him when JB sacked him last season at the start. I think we’re better for having him at the club. I hope MT thinks the same.
UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 21:32:05 GMT
12,666 with 567 gasheads.
UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 21:18:09 GMT
Birmingham v Swansea. 1-1 Cardiff v Leeds. 1-1 Hu-field v Plymuff. 1-1 Rotherham v Stoke. 0-1 Barnsley v Gas. 2-1 Charlton v Posh. 1-2 Wycombe v Lincoln. 1-1 Accy v Gills. 2-1 Colchester v Bradford. 1-1 Morecambe v Mansfield. 0-2 Tranny v M K Dons. 1-1 Boston v Curzon. 2-1
UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 21:04:02 GMT
That’s fair enough. I’m doing a 4 hour train journey with 3 changes to get there so adding another hour hassle getting the ticket in the first place (going on my Pompey attempts earlier on) means I’ll have to put up with sitting with some Devonians I suppose. No real problem, at my age I’ve learnt how to behave! 😉 And it’s always good to have chats with opposing fans, we’re not that different. 👍 UTG! I hope you don't ever bump into the Wealdstone Raider. 😣 You’ve got me there. No idea…. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 14:49:04 GMT
FWIW I went on yesterday to the Exeter website and got my ticket. I just find the Rovers way too hard to get away tickets now. It’s much simpler to just go to home clubs website. I’ve done Charlton and Pompey the same way and have got all of them within a few minutes. Of course the away tickets for us must be harder with the demand perhaps. In the past I was able to phone up and get them easily, not now. UTG! Good for you Wareham but personally the experience wouldn’t be the same being in with the home fans and there’s no way I couldn’t celebrate a Rovers goal. ( Went in the Williams stand at Ashton Gate back in the day as couldn’t get ticket for Gas end. Let’s just say a scuffle broke out when Big Dev notched). That’s fair enough. I’m doing a 4 hour train journey with 3 changes to get there so adding another hour hassle getting the ticket in the first place (going on my Pompey attempts earlier on) means I’ll have to put up with sitting with some Devonians I suppose. No real problem, at my age I’ve learnt how to behave! 😉 And it’s always good to have chats with opposing fans, we’re not that different. 👍 UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 14:38:30 GMT
FWIW I went on yesterday to the Exeter website and got my ticket. I just find the Rovers way too hard to get away tickets now. It’s much simpler to just go to home clubs website. I’ve done Charlton and Pompey the same way and have got all of them within a few minutes. Of course the away tickets for us must be harder with the demand perhaps. In the past I was able to phone up and get them easily, not now. UTG! You choose to go in home ends when tickets are available in the away? 😐🫤😐🫤😐 I choose to support my team and as I said it’s hard to get tickets through Rovers atm. As I said tickets sorted in minutes on all three occasions. My account details didn’t work on the first occasion so did it through Pompey and all went smoothly. Ditto Charlton. This time I didn’t even bother to spend time getting annoyed at it not working and just went to Exeter. UTG! ps. I should have added I wanted to sit down!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 12, 2024 12:16:39 GMT
FWIW I went on yesterday to the Exeter website and got my ticket. I just find the Rovers way too hard to get away tickets now. It’s much simpler to just go to home clubs website. I’ve done Charlton and Pompey the same way and have got all of them within a few minutes. Of course the away tickets for us must be harder with the demand perhaps. In the past I was able to phone up and get them easily, not now.
UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 11, 2024 18:30:52 GMT
You say it as if DoF and HoR are the same, I’m not sure they are. Certainly iirc Tommy W did both from November 2020 when Tis was appointed. The DoF will oversee transfers and football operations but a HoR would concentrate on recruitment and transfers. Overlap perhaps but not the same. Did MT have one at Exeter? I’m sure he may have done at Rotherham. But don’t know. I said ‘unlikely’ to a DoF because that would make sense to appoint one before you start recruiting but as we're in the window now getting transfers in now is the priority and the infrastructure stuff will likely come later. That’s why I said unlikely atm. Have we ‘always had one in recent years’? And I mean a proper one not just one of the managers mates. I though Tommy W was the last one. UTG! TW was DC's "mate" from Salisbury? Whether they are mates or not they will be still paid a decent wage to do the job, so you'd expect them to do it properly. My comments about employing a DoF/HoR, was in reply to your suggestion we won't employ one before the end of the season. I thought I said it was “unlikely”. Oh well! 🤔 UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 11, 2024 17:24:38 GMT
Never understood why telling the public domain the injury status of the players days before a game.If it was me I'd be like yeah Ward would be out for a few weeks. Rest Ward for Saturday then. Bang! hour before KO next wednesday he's on the Team sheet 😅 From the DC a school of thought then. Istr DC never talking about injuries or how long players would be out and it seemed to annoy him when pushed about it. Was there a player who actually told the press more information than DC wanted and he was annoyed about it and didn’t last much longer? UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 11, 2024 17:11:21 GMT
Yes, I think I’d be happy with 8th as well. A true indication, probably, about where we are currently. But it’s more interesting to look at the points total and that shows we’d be 15 points behind 6th place, a huge, huge gap. Whereas atm we’re only 9points off with a game or two in hand. So I’m not convinced that computer table tells a true picture. I guess in the end we just need to get as many wins as possible and put pressure on those above us. Winning some of those games against those better teams will be important, Barnsley, Blackpool etc. As to this window, or actually until the end of the season, I think the best hope is that MT with the owners can put in place some kind of recruitment/scouting team/even DOF (though that would be unlikely) so that we’re in a better position to get players in during the summer. Can’t remember exactly but iirc we’ve got several players out of contract in the summer so we need to be ready. UTG! Why's it unlikely we'll have a DoF or HoR when we've always had one in recent years? If we don't employ one is MT up to dealing with recruitment on his own, rather than with the assistance of a DoF/HoR? As MT certainly had one at Exeter and I assume one at Rotherham. You say it as if DoF and HoR are the same, I’m not sure they are. Certainly iirc Tommy W did both from November 2020 when Tis was appointed. The DoF will oversee transfers and football operations but a HoR would concentrate on recruitment and transfers. Overlap perhaps but not the same. Did MT have one at Exeter? I’m sure he may have done at Rotherham. But don’t know. I said ‘unlikely’ to a DoF because that would make sense to appoint one before you start recruiting but as we're in the window now getting transfers in now is the priority and the infrastructure stuff will likely come later. That’s why I said unlikely atm. Have we ‘always had one in recent years’? And I mean a proper one not just one of the managers mates. I though Tommy W was the last one. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 11, 2024 11:34:53 GMT
Computer says we will finish 8th I would be happy if that's how it turned out. Yes, I think I’d be happy with 8th as well. A true indication, probably, about where we are currently. But it’s more interesting to look at the points total and that shows we’d be 15 points behind 6th place, a huge, huge gap. Whereas atm we’re only 9points off with a game or two in hand. So I’m not convinced that computer table tells a true picture. I guess in the end we just need to get as many wins as possible and put pressure on those above us. Winning some of those games against those better teams will be important, Barnsley, Blackpool etc. As to this window, or actually until the end of the season, I think the best hope is that MT with the owners can put in place some kind of recruitment/scouting team/even DOF (though that would be unlikely) so that we’re in a better position to get players in during the summer. Can’t remember exactly but iirc we’ve got several players out of contract in the summer so we need to be ready. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 9, 2024 21:48:04 GMT
Well it’s not the most interesting forum post I’ve ever read but props for giving it a go. Might not be but it definitely surprised me. Blimey, I’ve always thought he was on the edge of a red card on many occasions. So he must have been / is a very clever player to have just stayed the right side of not getting a red. Well done him. UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 8, 2024 18:27:21 GMT
FFS! Have we bought or borrowed anyone yet? It’s not January 30th yet is it? UTG!
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Post by warehamgas on Jan 7, 2024 11:56:38 GMT
Leaving JB out of it should the question be' does the public profile of a manager /player influence or affect the decision making of an official,? IMHO i think it likely, just as in a court of law a juror would probably be influenced if they knew of a defendants past misdemeanours, it is a very interesting debate ,i mean, it is not possible to 'blank' out something which is implanted in your mind is it? Goodness it's an interesting debate E.G would a bad tackle by say the late great 'Bobby Charlton'( if there was ever such a thing!) be punished in the same way as one by say 'Roy Keane'? and so on................! Generally I think you’re correct halifax. We should leave JB out if it and look at it in the terms you say. But you know and I do that JB is such a character that it becomes almost impossible to do. When I was writing my earlier post I was trying to leave JB out of it but it was hard to do so when making a direct comparison of then and now. But you are correct, irrespective of the characters I think refs, jurors, the watching public will always be influenced by the demeanour/behaviour of others in their decision making. I know I did when working, I would make decisions regarding those I did/didn’t trust and those whose judgements I did/ didn’t trust. Human nature I guess and we’re all subject to that. Aren’t we? UTG!
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