• Nigel Adkins has been given the Tranmere job on a permanent basis signing until the end of the 25/26 season. Continue the discussion here.

Rovers 1, Magpies 1

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Alan King, Barry Dyson
I couldn't believe the report. Two more injuries, both early in the match. A shame we couldn't hold out. Missed another great chance to go back to the top. Waiting for the SWA reports. Do you think we would have won with Robbo and Goody?
 

drwhoman

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MAGPIES GAME

I agree with you BBTC - more injuries. Sorry if I sound like a grump but when will they ever be able to defend a 1-0 lead? Not since they lost Gibson that is for sure. I was following the game on the net and the equaliser was no surprise. On an unrelated point, I see that the Wellington Phoenix coach has resigned (they are bottom of the Australian A League) and Chris Greenacre will be in charge until the end of the season. However, I think it unlikely that he will get the gig longer term so he will probably be looking for a new job!
 
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Probably a fair result against a County side who played the better football for the majority of the game, but who perhaps had less of a threat up front. The result is not disastrous given the other scores tonight, but the additional injuries unfortunately could be.

Cole had a much better game than recent matches, but we really missed Sidibe's ability to hold the ball and bring our midfielders into play in the opposition half. I thought the midfield pair showed nice touches at times but really struggled to make an impression on the game, failing to win enough 50-50s. Corry in particular is having to do too much chasing and harrying on the edge of his own box, rather than hurting the opposition. The centre of midfield has been a problem area for us for a while, but hopefully Palmer's return on saturday will make a big difference in this regard.

I thought O'Halloran had a decent game, but Ash was probably our man of the match again. Once Daniels came on the back four seemed to get the jitters again and Fonners stupidly raced from his goal in the second half almost in a repeat of the Swindon game.

The result is not terrible, but you have to wonder how we are going to get enough points for play-offs or better with Robbo and Goody added to the injury list. It looked like Robinson pulled his hamstring, which could mean he is missing for 3-6 weeks from a midfield already without Wallace and McGurk.
 

SonkORLY?

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Corry in particular is having to do too much chasing and harrying on the edge of his own box, rather than hurting the opposition.

That reflects him too though. He was hardly incisive when he had the chance to get his foot on the ball, and he is not good defensively. He's alarmingly lacking in mobility for a tall 22 year old. If you play in a midfield 2 you have to be willing to do a bit of everything. I actually thought Power played really well. I thought he, Ash and Zoum were our best players. O'Halloran surprisingly caused problems, his whole 'running with the ball at 99mph in random directions' thing seemed to cause more problems from a deeper/wider position. And he was instrumental in the goal.

Can't argue with the result, but we conceded after probably our best spell in the match. From a set piece, again. There is no real justification for the problems we're having defending set pieces (although i know OFW doesn't help) and Ronnie should have sorted that out by now. Teams will be targeting us on it at this point.

As it happened, I think the injury to Goodison was more of a problem than the injury to Robbo.

Other results were favourable but not entirely so. Doncaster opened up a 2 point gap on us, still with a game in hand to play, and Brentford look likely to overtake us in the near future after their win. I'm very relieved that Yeovil have stopped winning though.
 
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I think Corry just looks really raw at the moment. I think he has got a great left foot and better vision than the majority of midfielders at this level - he fed a couple of lovely balls in to Stockton's feet when most would have just hacked something into the box - but does not impose himself on the game. He has, however, still got time to develop the physical side of his game, but this probably won't happen quickly enough to benefit us.

I maintain that both he and Power will beneift when - or if - Sidibe is back in the team as he effectively does a lot of the physical work they don't really relish, higher up the pitch.

I agree that Max is playing well at the moment and I would imagine he will start with Palmer on Saturday.
 
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Other results were favourable but not entirely so. Doncaster opened up a 2 point gap on us, still with a game in hand to play, and Brentford look likely to overtake us in the near future after their win. I'm very relieved that Yeovil have stopped winning though.

Doncaster look menacing now that Hume and Syers are back from injury. They have Hartlepool at home on Saturday and play their game in hand next Tuesday, so we just have to hope they haven't pulled well clear of us in a week's time.

The Yeovil game looks slightly less difficult than it did a week ago, but that might be balanced by the quality of the side we are now able to put out.
 

Boz

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While agreeing that a draw was probably fair, it was very frustrating that we conceded, after seeming to have weathered the storm.

While, I agree the nerves set in when Goodi had to be replaced by Daniels, he wasn't, by his own standards that bad in this game. His heading seemed to have improved, getting more distance, while he played a few decent balls out of defence. I'd agree with RLC, that it's the negative effect on team-mates Daniels has, which is of concern.

Midfield, my first sighting of Corry and he was disappointing. Very little of the positive creativity Owls fans talked about on tonight's showing. Max Power did well and took responsibility; time for Ronnie to look at extending his deal.

Up front Akpa Akpro was very quiet, little of the creating himself chances, which he was able to do at the start of the season. O'Halloran did well, but on the time when he did shoot himself, showed why he was better creating for others. Stockton did ok, at times perhaps needed to see if a team-mate was better-placed to try for goal.

Some misgivings about Ronnie's final substitution. Bell-Baggie was fading a bit, in part this could be due to getting the ball so deep. However, putting Black on (who started with a terrible free-kick) and pushing Zoum up didn't seem to work.
 
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Backayogo
As usual Ronnie has it spot on and has said how it is/was. Thought our midfield were absent and could not aggree with Power being MoM. Also think that Stockton is quite useless. He is a big lad, why doesn't he put himself about a bit? Quite ineffective, I think.
Fair result against a side who could have won it. A good point.
 

Higgy

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Power was industrious, although I think Corry showed some nice touches of class and did is best to chase and hassle the opposition. It must be difficult to show full repetoire when you witness the appalling movement and lack of options when we have the ball. Nobody really breaking forward to give options when there was a break on, so a lot of dinks down the chanels for Stockton et al to chase......boring stuff. Thought AA did not look fit and was rusty. Stockton had a great chance to play AA in after he bust a gut to get there, but just shot poorly at goal.

Thought Daniels did ok and looks like he could develop quickly, which will be needed given rate of injuries.

Thought Black looked tidy when he came on and did show some good movement in tight spots. May not be as quick as Zoum, but does display better quality perhaps.

Summary - short on quality now Robbo out.
 

bigmart

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A draw was certainly a fair result, i feared the worst when we lost robbo & goodi but with such a youthfull & inexperienced team we did ok.

Corry looks a decent passer but is very lightweight and easily knocked off the ball, palmer will take his place in the team on saturday. MOM for me was Taylor just ahead of O'Halloran who had a decent game
 

Ian

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Losing Robbo meant we lost creativity and we struggled from that point. I thought we sat back to much and allowed them time on the ball. At least we didn't lose!

Desperately need someone decent to partner JLAA.
 
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