Obligatory ‘he’s scored’ post

[selby]

  Pleased for the lad, at the time Williams was a better fit for our first team Marquis was, and by his signals to the bench was not too keen on playing alongside him. and he got game time and didn't do a lot, that was my gripe at the time he was not as good as we had here at the time, lots of effort poor first touch and needed a second touch in a league you don't get the time for. has he improved?if he has well done.
  Whether he would do it here now is anyone's guess and he would not be the first prolific scorer at another club we turned into a non scorer I have seen arrive here.
   I hope he carries on doing well elsewhere, even does well enough to go higher and get that life changing move money wise he deserves. Would I take that chance on him? no.

[Bentley Bullet]

Some of us have an eye for a good player, some of us don't!



 

[selby]

  BB, the club are looking for volunteer scouts no doubt you would be an excellent fit and very welcome.

[EasyforDennis]

  Pleased for the lad, at the time Williams was a better fit for our first team Marquis was, and by his signals to the bench was not too keen on playing alongside him. and he got game time and didn't do a lot, that was my gripe at the time he was not as good as we had here at the time, lots of effort poor first touch and needed a second touch in a league you don't get the time for. has he improved?if he has well done.
  Whether he would do it here now is anyone's guess and he would not be the first prolific scorer at another club we turned into a non scorer I have seen arrive here.
   I hope he carries on doing well elsewhere, even does well enough to go higher and get that life changing move money wise he deserves. Would I take that chance on him? no.

Has he improved????
He has scored almost as many goals on his own than the whole of our squad.
If that isn't improvement I don't know what is.

[Dutch Uncle]

Just to put this in a bit of Rovers context:

In our entire history we have had 41 seasons at level 2 or 3 (non-regionalised, in my eyes Division 3 North was equivalent to Division 3.5). In those 41 season on only 5 occasions has anyone scored more than the 15 league goals Alfie has already this season:

1935-36 Reg Baines 19 in Division 2
1953-54 Kit Lawlor 17 in Division 2
1955-56 Bert Tindill 18 in Division 2
1984-85 Glyn Snodin 18 in Division 3
2018-19 John Marquis 21 in League 1 (tier 3)

And Alfie still has 14 games to go

A very rare achievement by Rovers standards.

[Bentley Bullet]

  BB, the club are looking for volunteer scouts no doubt you would be an excellent fit and very welcome.

I couldn't walk out on Cheltenham just like that!

[drfchound]

My tablet playing up .... I was going to add the way he took the first was a tremendous piece of skill

I thought his third one was the best one.

[BillyStubbsTears]

How on Earth can this be happening? We were told by umpteen posters on here that he'd be OK for League 2, but not good enough to score goals in League 1.

I'll bite/hold my hands up. At the point we let him go, whilst not saying he wasn't good enough for League One, I wasn't at all disappointed. He wasn't offering us much beyond energy... he never really looked like a player that could come off the bench in the league and change a game for us, so he wasn't a huge loss at the point he left. We had a joke among a few of us that he was the slowest fast player we'd ever seen.

He's obviously benefitted from going back down to League 2 and playing regular football at that level before making the step up with Cheltenham. And I'm delighted for him, because I love a non-league to pro story and he always seemed a good individual. But just because he's scoring goals at this level now doesn't mean he was destined to do it for us if he stayed with us.

Amen to every word. And as I've said before, the 12 months after he left us was one of our most successful ever in terms of points won in our entire history. So it's difficult to say releasing him was a bad decision. Unless you think we should retain every fringe player as insurance against being shit in 2 years time.

[Bentley Bullet]

It's called vision, Billy lad. Some of us have an eye for a good player, some of us don't!

[Bentley Bullet]

How on Earth can this be happening? We were told by umpteen posters on here that he'd be OK for League 2, but not good enough to score goals in League 1.

I'll bite/hold my hands up. At the point we let him go, whilst not saying he wasn't good enough for League One, I wasn't at all disappointed. He wasn't offering us much beyond energy... he never really looked like a player that could come off the bench in the league and change a game for us, so he wasn't a huge loss at the point he left. We had a joke among a few of us that he was the slowest fast player we'd ever seen.

He's obviously benefitted from going back down to League 2 and playing regular football at that level before making the step up with Cheltenham. And I'm delighted for him, because I love a non-league to pro story and he always seemed a good individual. But just because he's scoring goals at this level now doesn't mean he was destined to do it for us if he stayed with us.

Amen to every word. And as I've said before, the 12 months after he left us was one of our most successful ever in terms of points won in our entire history. So it's difficult to say releasing him was a bad decision. Unless you think we should retain every fringe player as insurance against being shit in 2 years time.

Are you sure about that? In the12 months after May left us we played 31 games, won 16, drew 4, and lost 11.
That would barely put us in a play-off place this season. Hardly the most successful 12 months in terms of points in our history?

[LincolnDonny]

How on Earth can this be happening? We were told by umpteen posters on here that he'd be OK for League 2, but not good enough to score goals in League 1.

I think you spelt a word wrong ..

The word I believe is NOT Umpteen ...

Its NUMPTY .............

[drfchound]

How on Earth can this be happening? We were told by umpteen posters on here that he'd be OK for League 2, but not good enough to score goals in League 1.

I'll bite/hold my hands up. At the point we let him go, whilst not saying he wasn't good enough for League One, I wasn't at all disappointed. He wasn't offering us much beyond energy... he never really looked like a player that could come off the bench in the league and change a game for us, so he wasn't a huge loss at the point he left. We had a joke among a few of us that he was the slowest fast player we'd ever seen.

He's obviously benefitted from going back down to League 2 and playing regular football at that level before making the step up with Cheltenham. And I'm delighted for him, because I love a non-league to pro story and he always seemed a good individual. But just because he's scoring goals at this level now doesn't mean he was destined to do it for us if he stayed with us.

Amen to every word. And as I've said before, the 12 months after he left us was one of our most successful ever in terms of points won in our entire history. So it's difficult to say releasing him was a bad decision. Unless you think we should retain every fringe player as insurance against being shit in 2 years time.

Are you sure about that? In the12 months after May left us we played 31 games, won 16, drew 4, and lost 11.
That would barely put us in a play-off place this season. Hardly the most successful 12 months in terms of points in our history?

Indeed BB.   But yeah……..

[The Beast]

No doubt he’s improved massively but most of the time I saw him play for us he was a mile off. No pace, no presence and a poor touch for such a small player, maybe it was confidence from being a bit part player. He only really scored in the cup games against part time opposition.
Personally I was more disappointed with Mandeville leaving but obviously his attitude wasn’t right.

[Bentley Bullet]

No doubt he’s improved massively but most of the time I saw him play for us he was a mile off. No pace, no presence and a poor touch for such a small player, maybe it was confidence from being a bit part player. He only really scored in the cup games against part time opposition.
Personally I was more disappointed with Mandeville leaving but obviously his attitude wasn’t right.

Of course, you're entitled to your opinion, but it wouldn't do for all of us to be right, would it?

[roversdude]

Irrespective of if he’d have been a fit here I’m chuffed to bits for him, he was a brilliant clubman always had time for fans top bloke. However hope he has stinker in a couple of weeks time

[The Beast]

No doubt he’s improved massively but most of the time I saw him play for us he was a mile off. No pace, no presence and a poor touch for such a small player, maybe it was confidence from being a bit part player. He only really scored in the cup games against part time opposition.
Personally I was more disappointed with Mandeville leaving but obviously his attitude wasn’t right.

Of course, you're entitled to your opinion, but it wouldn't do for all of us to be right, would it?

You think he was impressive when he was here?

[Bentley Bullet]

No doubt he’s improved massively but most of the time I saw him play for us he was a mile off. No pace, no presence and a poor touch for such a small player, maybe it was confidence from being a bit part player. He only really scored in the cup games against part time opposition.
Personally I was more disappointed with Mandeville leaving but obviously his attitude wasn’t right.

Of course, you're entitled to your opinion, but it wouldn't do for all of us to be right, would it?

You think he was impressive when he was here?

Yes, I thought he was very impressive, especially when he was given his one and only decent run in the side. During that period he was the top scorer and getting better by the game until injury sidelined him. Either side of that run he was made the scapegoat in games by being the first one to be replaced in many of the few games he actually started.

As everyone surely knows, a striker needs a decent run in the side to play to his full potential and knowing his departure is imminent unless he plays a blinder is a f**king impossible situation. I wonder how Marquis, for instance, would have impressed had he been subbed as often as May?

[BillyStubbsTears]

How on Earth can this be happening? We were told by umpteen posters on here that he'd be OK for League 2, but not good enough to score goals in League 1.

I'll bite/hold my hands up. At the point we let him go, whilst not saying he wasn't good enough for League One, I wasn't at all disappointed. He wasn't offering us much beyond energy... he never really looked like a player that could come off the bench in the league and change a game for us, so he wasn't a huge loss at the point he left. We had a joke among a few of us that he was the slowest fast player we'd ever seen.

He's obviously benefitted from going back down to League 2 and playing regular football at that level before making the step up with Cheltenham. And I'm delighted for him, because I love a non-league to pro story and he always seemed a good individual. But just because he's scoring goals at this level now doesn't mean he was destined to do it for us if he stayed with us.

Amen to every word. And as I've said before, the 12 months after he left us was one of our most successful ever in terms of points won in our entire history. So it's difficult to say releasing him was a bad decision. Unless you think we should retain every fringe player as insurance against being shit in 2 years time.

Are you sure about that? In the12 months after May left us we played 31 games, won 16, drew 4, and lost 11.
That would barely put us in a play-off place this season. Hardly the most successful 12 months in terms of points in our history?

You need to check your numbers spadger.

In the exact 12 months after he left us (he signed for Cheltenham on 3 Jan 2020 but was clearly out the door on 1 Jan because he wasn't in the squad for the game that day) our record was P32 W18 D5 L9. That equates to automatic promotion form.

Hands up though. I should have said 12-ish months because I was actually thinking of the period to early Feb 2021, when the wheels came off. Over that 13 months, our form was P37 W23 D5 L9. That is 2 points per game, or the equivalent of 92 points over a full season. I believe we have only bettered that over a full season in 1946/47.

The point being that, whatever you think of May (and I did like him as  a player and I'm chuffed that the lad has done well) we clearly didn't miss him in the immediate aftermath of him leaving.

[Bentley Bullet]

We didn't miss Marquis, Billy Sharp, or Alick Jeffrey for that matter, but they would still have been handy to have around, and who knows, we might have been promoted with their input.

[idler]

I don’t think that you could possibly match Alfie with those three though.
By the same token we took Tommy Tynan, Justin Jackson and Carl Alford aboard and the three of them struggled to score at all while here.
Sometimes players play for a manager or in a system that really suits them. They move and can’t replicate the form that got them the move.
If Alfie moves and continues scoring at this rate then he will have proved his point. I liked him as a person and a player but I think that he would have struggled in the Rovers team this last year or so.

[Michael Shaw]

Good luck to Marquis and May. I hope they score plenty. And if it comes back to bite us in League One or Two, it serves us right.

[Sammy Chung was King]

It shows how far the quality of the players has deteriorated ,that we are talking about Alfie May and missing him, as back then he was a fringe player.
We had a lot of options back then.

In hindsight all he needed was time to adjust to league football and be given the games to gain confidence. He had a lot going for him ability and a good attitude. Sometimes the move is needed to bring the form out of him. A good player.

[LincolnDonny]

Good on ya Alfie


Its Not like much has happened from our home grown players..

looks like we got the dregs with our lot.

[Bentley Bullet]

It shows how far the quality of the players has deteriorated ,that we are talking about Alfie May and missing him, as back then he was a fringe player.
We had a lot of options back then.

In hindsight all he needed was time to adjust to league football and be given the games to gain confidence. He had a lot going for him ability and a good attitude. Sometimes the move is needed to bring the form out of him. A good player.

The question is why was he a fringe player?

[The Beast]

It shows how far the quality of the players has deteriorated ,that we are talking about Alfie May and missing him, as back then he was a fringe player.
We had a lot of options back then.

In hindsight all he needed was time to adjust to league football and be given the games to gain confidence. He had a lot going for him ability and a good attitude. Sometimes the move is needed to bring the form out of him. A good player.

The question is why was he a fringe player?

Because we had better players. If Fej hadn’t been swallowed up by the Bermuda Triangle nobody would be talking about Alfie, Fej scored more goals in half as many appearances.

[Reg of the Rovers]

I think some of the frustration with the Alfie May / Max Watters situation is that many of us envy the Peterborough / Barnsley model of developing players and selling for profit. Both came from (relative) obscurity and it seems (in hindsight) that if we'd have been more patient with both they may have become an asset either on the pitch or on the bank balance. It is immaterial now I suppose.
 
Plus Alfie was very likeable so there is a natural interest in his progress more than most, just because the majority of us want him to succeed.

[Bentley Bullet]

It shows how far the quality of the players has deteriorated ,that we are talking about Alfie May and missing him, as back then he was a fringe player.
We had a lot of options back then.

In hindsight all he needed was time to adjust to league football and be given the games to gain confidence. He had a lot going for him ability and a good attitude. Sometimes the move is needed to bring the form out of him. A good player.

The question is why was he a fringe player?

Because we had better players. If Fej hadn’t been swallowed up by the Bermuda Triangle nobody would be talking about Alfie, Fej scored more goals in half as many appearances.

Fej wasn't in a side that had everything targeted towards John Marquis.

[BillyStubbsTears]

We didn't have Marquis for May's last 5 months with us. May was rarely looking like a key player in that period.

He made 7 league starts, 7 sub appearances and 4 times didn't make an appearance. He scored one league goal.

[Bentley Bullet]

Out of those league starts, how many times was he taken off? As I said, he was only allowed to be a fringe player and was only given one fair run in the side, and he responded by being the top scorer.

Had Darren Moore not preferred the likes of Rakish Bingham and  Kwame Thomas maybe there would have still been a place for May now.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Go have a look BB. And ask yourself why he was taken off.