Rotherham Utd

[DonnyBazR0ver]

We made a lot of calls right until about 2 years ago. Ultimately Moore left us in the absolute shit but we had us right in contention for promotion and had a defined strategy - basically working only with EPL loans as he wasn’t able to work with a squad only of League One players. He was no long term visionary coach but he had us in contention until the last month or two when he basically sacked it off. I’m not defending him but if the criteria is being top end League One contenders, he had us there.

Since then, pretty every single decision we have made in terms of manager and player recruitment has been a total disaster. You name it, we f**ked it up, with just a few very isolated exceptions. So you can date it all back to March 2021. Something happened then and decision-making has been a total disaster zone ever since.

Would broadly agree with most of that. Don't forget we were really unlucky with the curtailed season too. The Bolton and Wigan affairs. Having Jacob Ramsey, Kieron Sadlier, Fejiri, Devante Cole etc, all contributing to us being a great attacking force with 3 games to come against those teams. That season was Rotherhams fortune and our misfortune.

Both the play off season and the curtailed season could easily have gone in our favour. We can't blame the board for those mishaps!

Just a reminder of the form we were coming into.

https://youtu.be/fJ4vRoVlzu4

[danumdon]

To me Moore's strategy was a fools gold approach to the task, it could never be sustainable and could never allow us to build a squad of players to maintain the level he was striving for.

Now you could say it was all money orientated that Moore took this route, he could say that the finances where just not there to build a squad of talent withut dipping into premiership spare parts, or you could say this was his reasoning all along and he could not manage at the level we found ourselves, the lure of going to a club with bigger finances was always going to force his hand, like great many of his ilk, they were conditioned on this type of player.

You could say we just picked a manager who was wrong for our profile and we needed to bring in someone who could grow with the club and survive on the reduced budget, something Moore seemed unable to contemplate.

With hindsight we should of pushed the boat out for McCann, he had the squad flying and was on a upward spiral, some "serious investment" then would of completely changed our current trajectory, we would probably be in a similar situation as Rotherham and Barnsley, in their differing states, with our progression.

[Chris Black come back]

I’d agree with this. Moore was a one trick pony who liked the kind of player he was used to dealing with at WBA as a youth team coach in the EPL. So he brought them in on loan. Weirdly a lot of them were devout Christians as well, which I’ve never seen previously. It’s was clearly not sustainable and limited in duration but he did get us up there for a long time, presumably on a relatively modest budget as well. When he left it fell to pieces quickly though and those recruitment decisions he made or didn’t make are a large part of the shit show we see before us now.

[NickDRFC]

We made a lot of calls right until about 2 years ago. Ultimately Moore left us in the absolute shit but we had us right in contention for promotion and had a defined strategy - basically working only with EPL loans as he wasn’t able to work with a squad only of League One players. He was no long term visionary coach but he had us in contention until the last month or two when he basically sacked it off. I’m not defending him but if the criteria is being top end League One contenders, he had us there.

Since then, pretty every single decision we have made in terms of manager and player recruitment has been a total disaster. You name it, we f**ked it up, with just a few very isolated exceptions. So you can date it all back to March 2021. Something happened then and decision-making has been a total disaster zone ever since.

Would broadly agree with most of that. Don't forget we were really unlucky with the curtailed season too. The Bolton and Wigan affairs. Having Jacob Ramsey, Kieron Sadlier, Fejiri, Devante Cole etc, all contributing to us being a great attacking force with 3 games to come against those teams. That season was Rotherhams fortune and our misfortune.

Both the play off season and the curtailed season could easily have gone in our favour. We can't blame the board for those mishaps!

Just a reminder of the form we were coming into.

https://youtu.be/fJ4vRoVlzu4

Agree with almost all of that but is Devante Cole a typo?! I don’t remember him doing a single thing of note for us!

[DonnyBazR0ver]

We made a lot of calls right until about 2 years ago. Ultimately Moore left us in the absolute shit but we had us right in contention for promotion and had a defined strategy - basically working only with EPL loans as he wasn’t able to work with a squad only of League One players. He was no long term visionary coach but he had us in contention until the last month or two when he basically sacked it off. I’m not defending him but if the criteria is being top end League One contenders, he had us there.

Since then, pretty every single decision we have made in terms of manager and player recruitment has been a total disaster. You name it, we f**ked it up, with just a few very isolated exceptions. So you can date it all back to March 2021. Something happened then and decision-making has been a total disaster zone ever since.

Would broadly agree with most of that. Don't forget we were really unlucky with the curtailed season too. The Bolton and Wigan affairs. Having Jacob Ramsey, Kieron Sadlier, Fejiri, Devante Cole etc, all contributing to us being a great attacking force with 3 games to come against those teams. That season was Rotherhams fortune and our misfortune.

Both the play off season and the curtailed season could easily have gone in our favour. We can't blame the board for those mishaps!

Just a reminder of the form we were coming into.

https://youtu.be/fJ4vRoVlzu4

Agree with almost all of that but is Devante Cole a typo?! I don’t remember him doing a single thing of note for us!

Unless my memory is playing tricks. He may not have done much but wasn't he another option up front that Moore brought in?

[Chris Black come back]

9 appearances for us, completed 90 minutes on 3 occasions only, 0 goals.

[Alan Southstand]

Reading between the lines across similar topics, I think it’s a reasonable suggestion to say that the funding was reduced to such an extent that it became impossible to rebuild, post DM. At least, rebuild to the level we needed to be at, to compete, particularly at L1.

There was also the crazy decision making, when appointing AB, GM and, to a degree, RW. I say ‘to a degree’ because RW has gone on to prove he had the capability (certainly to have got us back to L1), but a combination of depleted resources and a depleted / under strength squad that needed surgery. Also, the recruitment, post DM, has been extremely questionable, and that’s being kind.

And now, we find ourselves in deeper doo doo than we’ve been for some time. Standards, particularly across the football side, have dropped alarmingly and will take some much needed improvement to get us back competing, even at the top of L2!

The question, for me, is……..have we got it in us, as a Club, to arrest the precipitous slide we’re on?

[Chris Black come back]

The mystery is Wellens. Forget about what he did after, he had beforehand taken up Swindon Town. He had won at Wembley with Salford. He was a winner who had huge goodwill behind him as a former player. What a total disaster it turned out to be. It’s probably the most baffling tenure in our recent history. What on earth happened? Ok the budget might have been modest but we were so absolutely terrible that there was surely more to it than that. Total disaster.

[DonnyOsmond]

The mystery is Wellens. Forget about what he did after, he had beforehand taken up Swindon Town. He had won at Wembley with Salford. He was a winner who had huge goodwill behind him as a former player. What a total disaster it turned out to be. It’s probably the most baffling tenure in our recent history. What on earth happened? Ok the budget might have been modest but we were so absolutely terrible that there was surely more to it than that. Total disaster.

He's shown himself to be a fairly decent manager but I think it was just poor recruitment and wasting large portions of the budget on lesser players.

[Canadian Rover]

To my understanding we offered Matty Blair such a bad contract he decided to try his luck in a trial for the mighty Cheltenham in the middle of a pandemic. He couldn't afford to have taken the contract we offered.

[Goole Rover]

The mystery is Wellens. Forget about what he did after, he had beforehand taken up Swindon Town. He had won at Wembley with Salford. He was a winner who had huge goodwill behind him as a former player. What a total disaster it turned out to be. It’s probably the most baffling tenure in our recent history. What on earth happened? Ok the budget might have been modest but we were so absolutely terrible that there was surely more to it than that. Total disaster.

He's shown himself to be a fairly decent manager but I think it was just poor recruitment and wasting large portions of the budget on lesser players.

It’s very obvious that Welles’s man management was poor when here, like all good managers he’s learnt by his mistakes and achieved success.

[Campsall rover]

The mystery is Wellens. Forget about what he did after, he had beforehand taken up Swindon Town. He had won at Wembley with Salford. He was a winner who had huge goodwill behind him as a former player. What a total disaster it turned out to be. It’s probably the most baffling tenure in our recent history. What on earth happened? Ok the budget might have been modest but we were so absolutely terrible that there was surely more to it than that. Total disaster.

He's shown himself to be a fairly decent manager but I think it was just poor recruitment and wasting large portions of the budget on lesser players.

It’s very obvious that Welles’s man management was poor when here, like all good managers he’s learnt by his mistakes and achieved success.

He definitely upset a few while at Rovers. The Bogle situation didn’t help. I think he mis managed the players and team spirit was very poor.
He has learnt from his time at Rovers and obviously team spirit is good at Leyton Orient this season.
No team wins the league unless everyone is singing from the same song sheet.

[Sammy Chung was King]

We got to the championship, the moment to push on was there. We were at a crossroads, the owners decided they couldn’t push the boat out any further by signing the extra four players that could have made the difference. Since that it’s been a slow decline, with some good bits inbetween.

[DonnyBazR0ver]

There's a few occasions when on the pitch.  we've been deserted by lady luck along the way, and we obviously know when it also shined on us.

These key moments, goals for and against in promotions and relegations had little to do with boardroom issues, but how games went at critical times.

Tris Whitmans last minute thunderbolt, Andy Warringtons penalty save, Fran Tierneys golden goal, James Husbands penalty give away, Birmingham's late, late goal, Brentford crossbar,  Marosi's slip, Rowe and Marquis penalties, the curtailed season, etc etc.

Sometimes a flip of a coin, the bounce of a ball etc determines our fate. That's the beauty of sport. So rewarding but also so cruel.

[Chris Black come back]

Not even a flip of the coin at Charlton! The ref just awarded the penalties to take place at the Charlton end. Total bullshit. Full on cheated.

[Donny Exile in York]

When did the sad passing of Dick Watson occur? A true Rovers fan. That might have something to do with our trajectory since, maybe a season later when the financial impact kicked in aligned to a Covid pandemic and a strategic decision by the board to undertake a policy of sustainability or austerity.. you choose the wording for their policy. For me the Covid pandemic was a good excuse for them to justify to themselves after Watson's sad departure (RIP) to reign in their investment.. reaffirmed in the statement by TB a few weeks ago. Blunt out.

[Campsall rover]

The one fact that is indisputable is we won’t make progress while Blunt is Chairman.
We need some positive leadership. Blunt isn’t giving it.
He is just allowing the Club to drift along as it is.
If you drift you end up lost in a very large ocean and find it impossible to get back to where you want to be.

The rot has to stop now. We need a change of Leadership to steer the club in the right direction.

Come on TB this is your call you’re the only one that can make this happen.

[TonySoprano]

I'm hoping to see change this summer regarding the board room.
Reading the post the other week which got taken down, there's something in the works .

[pib]

On the subject of the chairman and driving things forward, I thought this was a really good read from Tony Stewart at Rotherham:

https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/sport/football/tony-stewart-another-relegation-for-rotherham-united-would-have-been-indefensible-and-left-me-embarrassed-4128146

He says that relegation from the Championship this season would've been indefensible and left him embarrassed, and would show that, in his eyes, they'd learnt nothing from previous relegations.

Now as an outsider, I would say that Rotherham staying in the Champ is a huge achievement, and there would be absolutely no shame in them being a yo-yo club. The same as it would be for Rovers if we were in that position.

But I thought it was an interesting insight into the standards he sets as chairman of that club, and struck me as something we are really lacking at Rovers. I don't think I've heard any of our current regime speak like that about our setbacks/failures, which probably says something about why we're sliding backwards.

Rather than be embarrassed and taking personal responsibility for the situation we're in, our lot seem to bat it off as not their fault, or make excuses (COVID, injuries, other teams' progression, managers leaving, "having a plan"). That's a major difference.

Rotherham have had horrendous injury circumstances, departure of a successful manager and some key players, and still managed to stay up, and still have high standards for their own performance and achievements and don't seem to tow this "woe is me" attitude that Blunt and co. have. I have to admit to being envious.

[ForsolongaRover]

You wonder whether Blunt really wanted the job. I don't know the history of the Keepmoat business, but looking at his previous appointments, his profession is that of accountant and in such a large business as that was, you would expect him to be fully qualified in that role.

It is perhaps not surprising that Bramall turned to him to run the DRFC Board, but his reticence and low profile makes you wonder whether his heart is in the job. When times are bad you need dynamic leadership and DB is behaving like the popular architype of his profession.

Whilst it is understandable for TB to want to safeguard his investment, you have to question whether that should be the overriding consideration. It would surely be in the best interests of DRFC and the effective use of the funds to install a specialist in the chair.

[ncRover]

Been watching footage on Twitter. Matt Taylor gave a rousing speech in the dressing room after the game and singled out Richard Wood for his professionalism. Could be hanging up his boots listening to that.

I wonder if he’d be a good signing for us?

[i_ateallthepies]

The mystery is Wellens. Forget about what he did after, he had beforehand taken up Swindon Town. He had won at Wembley with Salford. He was a winner who had huge goodwill behind him as a former player. What a total disaster it turned out to be. It’s probably the most baffling tenure in our recent history. What on earth happened? Ok the budget might have been modest but we were so absolutely terrible that there was surely more to it than that. Total disaster.

Completely agree with this, CBCB but there are plenty on here glibly accuse Wellens of wasting the budget on a handful of players when it has now been admitted by TB that the budget was significantly reduced for Wellens' tenure and those following him.  If not, why the sudden public announcement of 'significant' additional funds for next season?  It is all the proof that is needed that the club were not funding us to be competitive.

[tyke1962]

Well I think our two clubs and The Millers are pretty much set with regard to attendances at our top level .

There isn't any more growth than what we haven't seen before .

It can be slightly misleading with ourselves , doing very well in the championship I reckon 14 to 15k but if we were playing a top side with good support they'd be 20k inside Oakwell but that's because we have a very generous away stand .

I can't imagine we'd ever need to split the North Stand so as not to lock our own fans out of Oakwell as was originally thought when it was built in 1999 , that's why it's so big .

Things have changed massively in football today , you could have made a good case that if we'd got to the old first division in the early 80's we would have seen 25k plus inside Oakwell .

The league cup quarter final in December 1981against Manchester City pulled in 33,678 with 8k travelling from over the pennines .

There was even a 32,251 against Everton in the FA cup 5th round in 1989 but I believe those days are now gone even if Oakwell was capable of holding such a crowd .