Just Back

[Northants Nomad]

OK, let's get the negatives out of the way. We were soundly beaten and 3-0 is as good as we could have expected.

That's it, that's all I'm saying that's negative.

What do you expect. We had 11 players on the pitch, the combination of which had never played a competitive match together before. Of that starting 11 only Sulli and Oster would probably make the 11 with a full squad, possibly Friend or Mills. And we seemed to be up against a full strength Swansea who could bring players like Pratley off the bench. The loan players we brought in are available for loan because they're not playing...so they're not fully match sharp.

We're so unlucky, we even lost Copps in the warm up, leaving us with a bench of 3 centre backs and a goalkeeper! With that, we couldn't even mix things up.

So I, for one, am proud of the lads today. Thought Friend and Hird played well. Keegan broke things up best he could. Euell and Moussa came into it more as the game wore on. Oster tried but the quality wasn't around him to feed off him and vice versa, making his passes often look like they had gone astray - they had, but the lack of all round quality was the main cause in my view.

As for the fans - TOTALLY AND UTTERLY AWESOME! That was some unbelievable support from beginning to end. Absolutely shamed the Swansea fans who only started to sing once the sun shone on them...what were they, solar powered fans or something??!?!

We never had a shot. We never really threatened to score. But our expectations were matched and the lads gave their all.

We lost but we weren't beaten and I, for one, am proud to be a Rover!

[Norfolk N Chance]

Sorry to say the stats does not show any positives...no shots or corners??
Was that correct?

[benaldo]

OK, let's get the negatives out of the way. We were soundly beaten and 3-0 is as good as we could have expected.

That's it, that's all I'm saying that's negative.

What do you expect. We had 11 players on the pitch, the combination of which had never played a competitive match together before. Of that starting 11 only Sulli and Oster would probably make the 11 with a full squad, possibly Friend or Mills. And we seemed to be up against a full strength Swansea who could bring players like Pratley off the bench. The loan players we brought in are available for loan because they're not playing...so they're not fully match sharp.

We're so unlucky, we even lost Copps in the warm up, leaving us with a bench of 3 centre backs and a goalkeeper! With that, we couldn't even mix things up.

So I, for one, am proud of the lads today. Thought Friend and Hird played well. Keegan broke things up best he could. Euell and Moussa came into it more as the game wore on. Oster tried but the quality wasn't around him to feed off him and vice versa, making his passes often look like they had gone astray - they had, but the lack of all round quality was the main cause in my view.As for the fans - TOTALLY AND UTTERLY AWESOME! That was some unbelievable support from beginning to end. Absolutely shamed the Swansea fans who only started to sing once the sun shone on them...what were they, solar powered fans or something??!?!

We never had a shot. We never really threatened to score. But our expectations were matched and the lads gave their all.

We lost but we weren't beaten and I, for one, am proud to be a Rover!

So...apart from Hird, Friend, Oster, Keegan, Euell, Moussa, and I guess you can't count Sullivan, you're left with 4 bad outfield players by your reckoning, and 2 of them were centre backs....so 2 other midfield/forward players were not up to much???

I don't believe that I can argue with you, but I think our problems were probably down to more than having 2 bad midfielder or forwards!

There is something seriously wrong behind the scenes in my opinion. Take into consideration the \"injuries\" - which I don't believe are all real, the terrible tactics, the lack of committment by most players and the weird way in which SOD is appearing to attack the board in the press, allbeit in his own subtle manner. I just refuse to believe that the same team as last year has suddenly turned this pants. It now feels like a transition period for real. I think the sharp signing was a mistake, in that no-one else was bought in of any worth apart from Mills, and possibly Keegan (jury still out on that one?). We are going to lose sharp in the summer, of that I'm certain, and possibly one or two others - I'm predicting Coppinger, Stock, at least.
With football becoming a much more expensive game to fund and with a board who, although on paper worth nearly a billion pounds, are apperently reluctant to spend the money it takes at this level to do anything worthwhile; I think we could be in for either a shot down to league one. The alternative is for the crowd to magically double, or the board to spend more than we make by a long way. I feel the choice of where this club ends up in the next two years is out of the managers hands and very much firmly in the hands of the Rovers board. DO they want to speculate to accumulate, or do they want to play it safe and maintain a half decent league one side?
Only they knwo the answers, but to pretend that SOD can make a premiership outfit from £2 and a box of stolen copper, is ludicrous. I'll probably still go to watch even if we're relegated (I managed to keep watching throughout the bad years), but it'll be with a bit less sympathy than in those dark times considering the wealth of the people at the helm of the club.

Speculate to accumulate. If anyone cares to work out the money involved in a trip for a season to the premier league but in my reckoning its -

10 x \"facility games\" shown on tv at a cost of £500,000 each

£800,000 per place finished from the bottom.

\"equal share\" payment C£15,000,000

overseas licencing rights per club £10,000,000

And thats all without gate receipts/spopnsorship and the corporate stuff, so with my crude maths a year up there would net (if we finished bottom) if no-one ever came to watch us and we had no sponsors - £30,800,000!!!!!

Now, thats without a parachute payment or anything else. Monstorous money isn't it??! Worth a punt?

[dickos1]

I've never ever heard so much shite in all my life, I can't go through all your points but it's all just absolute b*llocks

[CJK]

So you are saying that 15+ players have all had a massive fall out and now refuse to play or SOD refuses to play them? I don't know any better than you but I would prefer to think exactly the opposite, additionally I cannot see anything to back up your 'take' on the current predicament we are in. I honestly beleive it is down to a horrendous run on the injury front and we are now left with very little quality to call upon. I have a few theories, one being the Keepmoat pitch, the concrete sub-surface cannot be good on the body; at Belle Vue there was no concrete involved.

Secondly I think (very critically) that there must be something a miss with the physio and associated practices and treatments. I've never known a club anywhere in such mess with injuries. This melarchy or players getting injured in the warm up is ridiculous. I play Sunday League and I'm pretty certain we don't the warm up routine of professionals and we rarely get any problems due to our warm  up - admittedly we are not the highly tuned athletes the Rovers should be.

Who knows, but its just getting stupid now.

[wilts rover]

Bloody hell, why haven't any of the other 22 Championship clubs thought of this, or Plymouth, if only they had spent more money they wouldnt be in with the possibility of going out of existence for spending too much money - what a genius you are. And you even know how the team played at a game you weren't at!! KM2 & O'Driscoll out now - Benaldo on the board and for manager.

There is no conspiricy theory here, you can put the blame on who you like but the truth is that we have a squad of players who are not up to the standard of this league. We have individual ones who are, but if more than 3 or 4 of them are missing we are in trouble.

Other than the first 20 minutes, I thought we played better today than Tuesday, there were signs of organisation and a structure and we limited a very good side to few opportunities. You will be disappointed to know that the improvement came when one of your targets, George Friend, swapped sides with Mills who was having a torrid time with Dyer, and closed him out for most of the rest of the game. We were lacking in midfield and attacking creativity but with the players who were out there who would have expected anything less.

The sooner you keep your promise to stop going (and hopefully stop posting) the better.

[Northants Nomad]

@Benaldo - How to twist words in order to spout your bile. No, I didn't mean the others played badly. I just wanted to single those out for particular mention.

You really are a conspiracy theorist aren't you?

I'm with CJK - I point at the physio and fitness training. I have never seen so many players with muscle pulls, strains, tears etc in ANY club. And we might have had these suspicions before...anyone remember this story for a few years back:

\"Yet Another Doncaster Injury
Jason Price picked up a possible achilles injury during the four-nil away defeat to Oldham.

Price becomes the latest player to join the long injury list at the Keepmoat Stadium.

John Ryan hinted that the club will look to sign a forward on loan this week as cover for Paul Heffernan.

Some fans are pointing the finger of blame at physio John Dicken over the recent injury and illness crisis. He is tagged with bringing the injury curse with him from Sheffield Wednesday who suffered an almost unprecedented number of injuries in recent times.\"

[mushRTID]

Heres another theory, maybe our players have to put more in at this level to compete as some are not as good as the rest of the division.

The more they put in to compete, the more injuries occur??

Im not buying the pitch excuse personally, injuries happen in training and in copps case at Swansea.

[Northants Nomad]

Loving how the two Wiltshire boys both used the words 'conspiracy' and 'theory' without actually having any anti-Benaldo conspiracy between them

[vaya]

Heres another theory, maybe our players have to put more in at this level to compete as some are not as good as the rest of the division.

The more they put in to compete, the more injuries occur??

Im not buying the pitch excuse personally, injuries happen in training and in copps case at Swansea.

I'd go with that being a large factor - we have to play flat out in terms of individual effort and SOD's constantly-mobile style to maintain parity. The Catch 22 situation is that it may be increasing the chance of injury...which then effects or ability to compete.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Hmmm. Only a fool would ignore the injuries that we have at present. Any club would suffer with so many out.

But only a deluded fool would put it ALL down to injuries. We were playing poorly before the injury crisis reached epic proportions.

Against Reading, we put the following side out:

Neil Sullivan; James O'Connor, Matt Kilgallon, Adam Lockwood, Joseph Mills; James Coppinger, Sam Hird, Mark Wilson, John Oster; James Hayter, Billy Sharp.

MAybe three short of our best 11? (Martis for Lockwood, Stock for Wilson, Shiels/Woods/Keegan for Hird).

Against Barnsley we put the following side out:

Neil Sullivan; James Chambers, Adam Lockwood, Matt Kilgallon, James O'Connor; James Coppinger, Mark Wilson, Dean Shiels, John Oster; James Hayter, Billy Sharp

Again, maybe three short of our best 11.

What do we expect at this time of the season? To have no injuries at all? Every club has injuries and suspensions by this time. Missing three players is not unusual.

Yet in those two matches, we were shockingly bad and managed barely a shot on target in 180 minutes against 2 middling, mid-table sides. In particular, we made Reading look like thoroughbreds, like Top 2 contenders. In fact that was one of only 4 wins for them in the last 18 matches.

More worringly, that match is the only time in the last 12 games that Reading have kept a clean sheet. Barnsley have only kept 2 clean sheets in the last 12 (the other was against Preston). Yet we, with our first choice attack out in both those matches, would not have scored if we had played till midnight.

Face it. The injuries have turned a crisis into a potential disaster. But the crisis was there already. There has been something badly wrong with the side for much of the season and the injuries have simply thrown that into stark relief.

IF we stay up (and at the moment I don't see us getting another point in the next 7-8 games even if we DO get half a dozen players back) then we have a huge re-building job in the summer.

And a re-assessment of the policy of building a side that is so heavily dependent on one player, to the extent that we're left with pennies to build the rest of the side and provide cover. We've seen this year that it clearly is NOT the answer.

[Boycie]

Top post by BST. I mentioned in another topic SOD's comments after tuesdays match where even though we had been winning our performances were not good.
In a number of home games we have rode our luck and scraped some wins, the reality is that we have a number of under performing players, a number of players not up to championship standard and an unbelievable injury list.

[vaya]

In the midst of that though we managed a draw (I'm not counting that goal in terms of our own performance) against Burnley, who are on a decent run at the minute.

The injuries haven't been the cause of the position we're in at the minute (by SOD's own admission the defence has been poor all season) but why they have done is taken away any margin of error we might have held onto.

[The Red Baron]

Hmmm. Only a fool would ignore the injuries that we have at present. Any club would suffer with so many out.

But only a deluded fool would put it ALL down to injuries. We were playing poorly before the injury crisis reached epic proportions.

Against Reading, we put the following side out:

Neil Sullivan; James O'Connor, Matt Kilgallon, Adam Lockwood, Joseph Mills; James Coppinger, Sam Hird, Mark Wilson, John Oster; James Hayter, Billy Sharp.

MAybe three short of our best 11? (Martis for Lockwood, Stock for Wilson, Shiels/Woods/Keegan for Hird).

Against Barnsley we put the following side out:

Neil Sullivan; James Chambers, Adam Lockwood, Matt Kilgallon, James O'Connor; James Coppinger, Mark Wilson, Dean Shiels, John Oster; James Hayter, Billy Sharp

Again, maybe three short of our best 11.

What do we expect at this time of the season? To have no injuries at all? Every club has injuries and suspensions by this time. Missing three players is not unusual.

Yet in those two matches, we were shockingly bad and managed barely a shot on target in 180 minutes against 2 middling, mid-table sides. In particular, we made Reading look like thoroughbreds, like Top 2 contenders. In fact that was one of only 4 wins for them in the last 18 matches.

More worringly, that match is the only time in the last 12 games that Reading have kept a clean sheet. Barnsley have only kept 2 clean sheets in the last 12 (the other was against Preston). Yet we, with our first choice attack out in both those matches, would not have scored if we had played till midnight.

Face it. The injuries have turned a crisis into a potential disaster. But the crisis was there already. There has been something badly wrong with the side for much of the season and the injuries have simply thrown that into stark relief.

IF we stay up (and at the moment I don't see us getting another point in the next 7-8 games even if we DO get half a dozen players back) then we have a huge re-building job in the summer.

And a re-assessment of the policy of building a side that is so heavily dependent on one player, to the extent that we're left with pennies to build the rest of the side and provide cover. We've seen this year that it clearly is NOT the answer.

I can't really disagree with anything you say apart from one thing- we are NOT dependent on one player. Sharp was supposed to be the icing on the cake and was paid for from outside the transfer budget. We could probably cope OK without him if we had Martis, O'Connor, Stock, Woods, Coppinger and Hayter all fit.

Other than that- I agree. There is a massive rebuilding job to be done and Sean needs to stand back, stop talking about running over black cats and look at why we have so many injuries. Two words for me- basic fitness. We lack it and we're paying for it now.

[BillyStubbsTears]

In the midst of that though we managed a draw (I'm not counting that goal in terms of our own performance) against Burnley, who are on a decent run at the minute.

We did, and you make the point for me.

In that match, agian with our first choice forwards playing, as well as Stock, Oster, Coppinger and Keegan, we didn't once test the Burnley keeper.

We've been shite at the back all season. Regardless of who we play in central defence, we've been piss poor at stopping the opposition scoring. But we coped with that for the first half of the season by scoring more than we conceded on a regular basis. The real reason that we are in a crisis is that we had stopped scoring long before injuries took away our best strikers. All that's happened in the last week as the injury crisis went ballisitic, is that we've lost any semblance of quality that might allow us to hold on to games. But make no mistake, we were on a slippery slope before the injuries got to ridiculous levels and THAT is the root of the problem.

There has been something badly wrong with us up front since Xmas. It is that lack of punch that might yet send us down. I don't see why the happy clappers assume that everything will click back again when Hayter and Sharp return.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Hmmm. Only a fool would ignore the injuries that we have at present. Any club would suffer with so many out.

But only a deluded fool would put it ALL down to injuries. We were playing poorly before the injury crisis reached epic proportions.

Against Reading, we put the following side out:

Neil Sullivan; James O'Connor, Matt Kilgallon, Adam Lockwood, Joseph Mills; James Coppinger, Sam Hird, Mark Wilson, John Oster; James Hayter, Billy Sharp.

MAybe three short of our best 11? (Martis for Lockwood, Stock for Wilson, Shiels/Woods/Keegan for Hird).

Against Barnsley we put the following side out:

Neil Sullivan; James Chambers, Adam Lockwood, Matt Kilgallon, James O'Connor; James Coppinger, Mark Wilson, Dean Shiels, John Oster; James Hayter, Billy Sharp

Again, maybe three short of our best 11.

What do we expect at this time of the season? To have no injuries at all? Every club has injuries and suspensions by this time. Missing three players is not unusual.

Yet in those two matches, we were shockingly bad and managed barely a shot on target in 180 minutes against 2 middling, mid-table sides. In particular, we made Reading look like thoroughbreds, like Top 2 contenders. In fact that was one of only 4 wins for them in the last 18 matches.

More worringly, that match is the only time in the last 12 games that Reading have kept a clean sheet. Barnsley have only kept 2 clean sheets in the last 12 (the other was against Preston). Yet we, with our first choice attack out in both those matches, would not have scored if we had played till midnight.

Face it. The injuries have turned a crisis into a potential disaster. But the crisis was there already. There has been something badly wrong with the side for much of the season and the injuries have simply thrown that into stark relief.

IF we stay up (and at the moment I don't see us getting another point in the next 7-8 games even if we DO get half a dozen players back) then we have a huge re-building job in the summer.

And a re-assessment of the policy of building a side that is so heavily dependent on one player, to the extent that we're left with pennies to build the rest of the side and provide cover. We've seen this year that it clearly is NOT the answer.

I can't really disagree with anything you say apart from one thing- we are NOT dependent on one player. Sharp was supposed to be the icing on the cake and was paid for from outside the transfer budget. We could probably cope OK without him if we had Martis, O'Connor, Stock, Woods, Coppinger and Hayter all fit.

Other than that- I agree. There is a massive rebuilding job to be done and Sean needs to stand back, stop talking about running over black cats and look at why we have so many injuries. Two words for me- basic fitness. We lack it and we're paying for it now.

Agreed TRB. But the problem is that we've taken a massive gamble. Signing Sharp WAS the icing on the cake. The first XI, on form is as good as any in the division. But (apparently) his signing has meant that we simply can't afford decent cover. Lose any of the players you mention, and their replacement would struggle to hold down a place in a bottom-end L1 side. And THAT is the problem. We've gambled on the star players remaining fit and several of them have broken down.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Gambled or not?  Tought one to call, how big a squad should we have?

We play a clear 4-3-3 I'd say.

We have 3 right backs, two left backs - should be plenty for two positions, just the two left backs fit.  All 5 are of the good quality IMO.

Centre halves, we use 2.  IMO 3 are good quality, with the other 3 we have not.  That's 6 that we have.  Two of the good 3 are out and one half fit.  Again 3 good and one for cover should be enough.  In previous seasons we had 3 in total.

Defensive mid we have 4.  We use one usually.  Stock and Gillet are the two I'd keep,  Keegan and Wilson not of the same standard.  Plenty there in numbers there should be.

Attacking - Woods, Oster, Shiels - Not enough there quite clearly, an area we need to strengthen.

Front Men - Coppinger, Sharp, Hayter, Brooker, Fairhurst, Mason - That should be plenty, maybe add in one more but how many do you have?  You end up with unhappy players like Fairhurst.  All 6 of them injured right now, that should be enough.


I'm sorry but fact is we have the squad for normality. This aint a normal situation that's for sure.  Remember who we are, we're a small club in this league, it gets even tougher in these situations.

[mikeward]

could the keepmoat pitch be part of the problem as suggested ? After all they player 23 games on it per league season, woods hasn't got a full season in for the last two years with , hernia and groin problems now sharp with the groin after his  hamstrings . In the promotion season wellens was struggling with similar injuries to woods and i don't think he has had any problems at leicester in nearly two seasons ..

[wilts rover]

Is it a 'problem' or is it just financial reality? I would make out that there are actually three 'problems'. We dont have a good enough squad, far too many average players and hence no strength in depth when players get injured; there seems to be something wrong in the way our physio dept works, how we pick up injuries and the time it takes to get people back; and even with our best XI out we are lacking in key areas of the pitch, we need a better keeper, centre half and strong midfield general - as benaldo pointed out above, nothing that around £10 million wouldn't solve.

AS BST points out above, something changed at that Reading game. The matches before we had beaten Boro in the last minute, whopped Scunny and then only dropped points at Sheff U through lapses of concentration in the last 10 minutes. So what was different at Reading - well we went for it, brought in a 'better' player, disrupted the defence and have gone downhill since - its all Matt Kilgallon's fault. Easy to find scapegoats when you want to.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Hang on BFYP

We went into the season with one fit left back (Friend)

At centre half, one who is up to this level and who spends more daylight hours on his back than Dracula (Martis)

Up front, we had Sharp and Hayter who are proven strikers at this level. In addition, we have Coppinger (not a striker, but an emergency filler-in), Brooker (who had not played 90 minutes for 22 months by the start of this season) and Fairhurst (who O'Driscoll clearly doesn't rate).

Thise are the three areas that have hobbled us this season.

We've had to bring in emergency cover at left back (Mills, who then fell to the injury voodoo).

We had to bring in emergency cover at centre back (Thomas, who fell to the injury voodoo and who is generally considered to be shite, Souza, who IS shite and Kilgallon who, when not injured, is doing a damn good impression of being shite).

And then up front. Where we have been fine until Hayter ran our of breath and Sharp ran out of patience. And then the roof fell in.

And you ignored the most vulnerable position of all. Goalkeeper, where Sullivan has aged rapidly, and his cover looks like decent Conference standard. Maybe.

We have no cover in these positions. We've brought in emergency players who, generally, are not good enough for the scrap that we are in. And we are losign the scrap.

If we DO (perish the thought) go down, it will be these positions, and the problems we have had there that will have killed us.

Here's a thought experiment: Had we stuck with a moderate lower-Championship level striker, signed, say Shackell and had the money to keep Roberts, would we be in our current crisis? Or were we better signing Sharp and then having to make do with Friend (albeit that he's been the best of a cack lot for the last two matches), Souza, Webster, Thomas etc

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Hang on BFYP

We went into the season with one fit left back (Friend)

At centre half, one who is up to this level and who spends more daylight hours on his back than Dracula (Martis)

Up front, we had Sharp and Hayter who are proven strikers at this level. In addition, we have Coppinger (not a striker, but an emergency filler-in), Brooker (who had not played 90 minutes for 22 months by the start of this season) and Fairhurst (who O'Driscoll clearly doesn't rate).

Thise are the three areas that have hobbled us this season.

We've had to bring in emergency cover at left back (Mills, who then fell to the injury voodoo).

We had to bring in emergency cover at centre back (Thomas, who fell to the injury voodoo and who is generally considered to be shite, Souza, who IS shite and Kilgallon who, when not injured, is doing a damn good impression of being shite).

And then up front. Where we have been fine until Hayter ran our of breath and Sharp ran out of patience. And then the roof fell in.

And you ignored the most vulnerable position of all. Goalkeeper, where Sullivan has aged rapidly, and his cover looks like decent Conference standard. Maybe.

We have no cover in these positions. We've brought in emergency players who, generally, are not good enough for the scrap that we are in. And we are losign the scrap.

If we DO (perish the thought) go down, it will be these positions, and the problems we have had there that will have killed us.

Here's a thought experiment: Had we stuck with a moderate lower-Championship level striker, signed, say Shackell and had the money to keep Roberts, would we be in our current crisis? Or were we better signing Sharp and then having to make do with Friend (albeit that he's been the best of a cack lot for the last two matches), Souza, Webster, Thomas etc

Some good points, it's a difficult thing to gauge because it's so subjective.  IMO though without Sharp we'd have lost Copps, Woods, Oster etc as they'd not have seen the ambition.  That would have set us back further.  Would Shackell have come for more money?  Yes, but then his fitness record last season wasn't great.  Killgallon is as good if we get him fit, we showed a marked improvement when he came on today.

It's too subjective to say and a matter of opinion, but also look at where we'd be without Billy - it wouldn't be good.

[neil grainger]

For God's sake BST, lighten up.
You're starting to really depress me.
We're a relatively small club punching above our weight in the Championship. You are picking over our current bad run like a crow picking over road-kill.
What is your agenda? Who do you blame? Have we got the wrong manager, or the wrong board of Directors? Or are we just fighting like hell to stay at a level which is considerably higher than that which is our accepted norm?

If we stay in the Championship this season, as far as I'm concerned the dream lives on.

Give it a rest for God's sake.

[hoolahoop]

Billy doesn't like Billy since he usurped Heffs from the team ergo he will always be the reason for our lack of strength in depth on the budget.
Personally I agree with you in that without Shsrp; we would already be swimming with the fishes.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Here's another little fact to throw into the debate.

How many points have Sharp's goals won us this season?

Now I fully realise that you can't judge a player solely on criteria like this. Sharp brings other facets to our play. When his head is on right.

But all of that said, when you sign a centre forward for 4 times what the club has ever paid for any player before, you expect to see a difference in the outcome of matches.

Here's the answer.

Take away Sharp's goals and we'd be 4 points worse off. His goals proved decisive in the games against Britol C (Penalty turned a defeat into a draw), Scunthorpe away (2 goals, one a penalty, in a 3-1 win) and at Bramall Lane (2 goals, one a penalty, in a 2-2 draw).

Other than those games, his goals have been in losing causes (Coventry, Leicester, Ipswich) or games where we won by more than his goal (Hull, Sheff Utd home, Scunthorpe home).

Just for the record, I'll point the inevitable howling throng to my previous posts, where I've said that Sharp is the best centre forward I've ever seen play for us.

But it's still a legitimate question to ask whether it's been the best use of resources to buy him and leave us so stretched in the other 10 positions.

Especially when his goals have not really been phenomenally decisive in games this season.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Billy doesn't like Billy since he usurped Heffs from the team ergo he will always be the reason for our lack of strength in depth on the budget.
Personally I agree with you in that without Shsrp; we would already be swimming with the fishes.

I couldn't have timed it better could I?

Apologies Hoola for asking the hard questions. I had already factored into my post the inevitable childish response from you.

Me, I rejoice when people throw facts and/or controversial opinions into a discussion. It's how we get to the truth. Why do you find it so objectionable?

You'd make a good 16th century Pope. THIS is what we beleive, and anyone who contradicts it is the Anti-Christ.

[BobG]

Go on Billy! I love the angles you find. They do make me think!

Cheers

BobG

[BillyStubbsTears]

For God's sake BST, lighten up.
You're starting to really depress me.
We're a relatively small club punching above our weight in the Championship. You are picking over our current bad run like a crow picking over road-kill.
What is your agenda? Who do you blame? Have we got the wrong manager, or the wrong board of Directors? Or are we just fighting like hell to stay at a level which is considerably higher than that which is our accepted norm?

If we stay in the Championship this season, as far as I'm concerned the dream lives on.

Give it a rest for God's sake.

And the point of posting/reading here is?

You don't like what I post, then don't read it. It couldn't be simpler.

I'm as f**ked off as the next fan that our season has imploded and we may yet be going down.

I find it hard to reach inside myself and find the inner Happy-Clapper who thinks that everything will be nectart and honey when Sharp, Stock and Hayter are fit.

So I ponder on what has gone wrong, and what we might need to do to make it better.

What do you do after a week like this?

[hoolahoop]

Billy doesn't like Billy since he usurped Heffs from the team ergo he will always be the reason for our lack of strength in depth on the budget.
Personally I agree with you in that without Shsrp; we would already be swimming with the fishes.

I couldn't have timed it better could I?

Apologies Hoola for asking the hard questions. I had already factored into my post the inevitable childish response from you.

Me, I rejoice when people throw facts and/or controversial opinions into a discussion. It's how we get to the truth. Why do you find it so objectionable?


You'd make a good 16th century Pope. THIS is what we beleive, and anyone who contradicts it is the Anti-Christ.

So do I because you fancy yourself as the font of all wisdom. We had your ' Heffs this, Heffs that' diatribes for most of last season.
You're just a smartarse and you're again undermioning and being generally rude SPARRA. Your condescending attitude to other folks opinions pisses me off.

Personally I wasn't having a dig at you but adding to the 'supposed' open forum we have not 'Billy's forum'........you ignorant t**t.

Bob G you disappoint and anger me too.

I'm childish..........think you two need to have a long hard look at yourselves and your general pompous attitudes to both me and other contributors on this supposed 'open' forum.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Billy doesn't like Billy since he usurped Heffs from the team ergo he will always be the reason for our lack of strength in depth on the budget.
Personally I agree with you in that without Shsrp; we would already be swimming with the fishes.

I couldn't have timed it better could I?

Apologies Hoola for asking the hard questions. I had already factored into my post the inevitable childish response from you.

Me, I rejoice when people throw facts and/or controversial opinions into a discussion. It's how we get to the truth. Why do you find it so objectionable?


You'd make a good 16th century Pope. THIS is what we beleive, and anyone who contradicts it is the Anti-Christ.

So do I because you fancy yourself as the font of all wisdom. We had your ' Heffs this, Heffs that' diatribes for most of last season.
You're just a smartarse and you're again undermioning and being generally rude SPARRA. Your condescending attitude to other folks opinions pisses me off.

Personally I wasn't having a dig at you but adding to the 'supposed' open forum we have not 'Billy's forum'........you ignorant t**t.

Bob G you disappoint and anger me too.

I'm childish..........think you two need to have a long hard look at yourselves and your general pompous attitudes to both me and other contributors on this supposed 'open' forum.

Every once in a while, you need to calm down Hoola.

We're all pissed off at the current situation. Much as it may surprise you, even those of us who question whether the sun rises out of O'Driscoll's rectum, and whether Sharp really IS the son of Mohammed still love this club deeply.

As for condescending attitudes, you are quick enough to give it out on here. You've called me stuff on here that would have led to a clip round the ear ole in real life. Either take it back when you do so or keep your trap shut.

And finally, who the f**king hell are YOU to tell other people what they can and cannot discuss on here. If you don't like what I post, either ignore it or rebut it with some grwon up discussion.

[coventryrover]

Bloody bell.  We need sod to sign bst and hoola.   At least we'd have a bit  more fight

I think we are all a bit f**ked off about out plight.  The meek defence, the shot shy front line, that pecking injury list and the league table below us.

But the big positive is that we are still 8 points from the relegation zone.  We need to fight every minute and maybe the points will start to come.  The current starting eleven do not have the skills, but they can have the tenacity, will and workrate to see us through this.

It would be.a crying shame if we went down due to injuries but not the end of the world.

Go for it at carrow rd, shoot from the halfway line if better have to. They have
to be positive.