• 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.

League Two Rovers v Barrow

Match result

  • Rovers

    Votes: 8 72.7%
  • Draw

    Votes: 2 18.2%
  • Barrow

    Votes: 1 9.1%

  • Total voters
    11
  • Poll closed .
Rovers v Barrow
Posted by Ian
Prenton Park
Saturday, April 24, 2021 - 03:00 PM
Until: Saturday, April 24, 2021 - 05:00 PM
(Adjusted for timezone: Europe/London)
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Ian

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If we played the right way we would get more goals put of the squad than we have done.

We have failed to score in about 17 games this season and that frankly is not good enough regardless of the injury to Vaughan.
It is no coincidence that our form nosedived after Vaughan’s injury though. I do blame the system but I also blame the players who IMO aren’t as good as some people think they are. Feeney and Woolery have frankly been awful the last few months. If that solely down to KH?

On paper we have a very good team but it has fallen well short of the required standard from some players.
 

Boz

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I think that’s a bit harsh regarding Woolery, Ian. He was in some of the best goal scoring form of his career and playing out of his skin in the post-Jackson side. Kaiyne probably plays best coming from a deeper position and Vaughan’s absence has impacted him, being asked to play a more orthodox forward role at times. Thought he had a decent game v Barrow.

Feeney is a harder one to defend. If we go back to the Cambridge game, had his decent free-kick just before h/t been a few inches lower, we go in 2-0 up and things could be very different now. He didn’t have a good second half and in the games since, he’s looked jaded. In his handling, I think Keith does take some of the blame though. Why hasn’t he been rested once, while Lloyd/Morris have been in and out of the side and Kieron has looked fresher? It would also help if Keith made sure the responsibility for set-pieces was shared out more. Lloyd, Macdonald, Khan can deliver a decent ball into the danger area. There is no need for Liam to take them all and much easier for our opponents to deal with when he does.
 

ADD

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Actually , can someone explain what is meant by a top 3 team? It has been mentioned a few times. if it is based on funding, then I understand Tranmere are not in the top 3 in League 2 - in fact Salford are apparently paying almost 3 times Tranmere in terms of wages, so they are really underperforming, if money equates to success. Wouldn't it be boring if whatever it is that purportedly dictates 'top 3, top 6, bottom 3' always happened.
Not sure that can be? We had a salary cap introduced for the start of the season which was £1.5m excluding young players who didn't count toward the cap. It also capped the number of players excluding youngsters. We having been demoted had the benefit of an extar allowance due higher salary costs in L1 plus our existing 10 contract players such as Davies and Vaughan were counted at the average wage rather than their actual wage which effectively meant as I understand it that we and the other two relegated teams could spend more than all other teams in the division should we wish to.
The salary cap was I believe ruled illegal after the January window so how could Salford spend 3 times what we are spending unless most of their players were under contract already which I am sure wasn't the case? Surely we must have been top 3 spending wise or at least very close to it unless all the other teams had 10 or so youngsters on megabucks which I also doubt?
 

bigmart

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It is no coincidence that our form nosedived after Vaughan’s injury though. I do blame the system but I also blame the players who IMO aren’t as good as some people think they are. Feeney and Woolery have frankly been awful the last few months. If that solely down to KH?

On paper we have a very good team but it has fallen well short of the required standard from some players.
Morris for example can score a few goals and also assist but is hardly even been picked and usually out of position, cbt never plays it all except a few minutes here or there that's soley down to the manager.

We were never going have another player of Vauaghans level but to try to replace him with Lewis or Morris was never going to work and that was obvious from the start.
 

Boz

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ADD, from memory, the salary cap didn’t become operational until a certain date and players brought in before that date were deemed to be on the L2 average wage. Clubs like Salford, notlob and Port Vale who did their business early were able to benefit. By contrast think Rovers only brought in Jay Spearing before that cut-off point.
 

Ian

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We were never going have another player of Vauaghans level
That was my point from the start. Whatever team or tactic KH had chosen, we would have struggled to stay in the top three without Vaughan.
 
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aldo
at least the Lads will have had 3 days off so some of the jaded bodies and mindes will be rested and hopefully ready to go at weekend
 
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That was my point from the start. Whatever team or tactic KH had chosen, we would have struggled to stay in the top three without Vaughan.
I don't agree to be honest. It was always going to be difficult without Vaughan, but if we had picked up three or four victories from the recent run of nine matches when he was absent, rather than one, we would be going up automatically. That should have been perfectly possible given the other options in the squad, and / or if we had recruited sensibly in January, rather than ending up with Nugent as the sole alternative striker.

Our form should not have nosedived to the extent that it did when we lost Vaughan.
 

ADD

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ADD, from memory, the salary cap didn’t become operational until a certain date and players brought in before that date were deemed to be on the L2 average wage. Clubs like Salford, notlob and Port Vale who did their business early were able to benefit. By contrast think Rovers only brought in Jay Spearing before that cut-off point.
Fair point Boz - as you say it came in on 7th August so 5 weeks before season start so maybe Salford had pretty much finished their major recruitment by then? That said the transitional arrangements still gave us some potential advantage over most other teams in the League in terms of what our budget could be. Whether we spent up to it I don't know but I suspect we weren't far off in the end?
 

Ian

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Our form should not have nosedived to the extent that it did when we lost Vaughan.
Our form dipped when we lost Vaughan along with squad confidence. It had a knock on effect. I think a lot of factors contributed to the poor form but for me the major one was losing Vaughan. I agree regarding the Jan recuitment but I am just talking about the squad we had with that in my opinion did not step up to the plate. I do not believe KH is solely to blame. The players, especially the senior ones should have performed better and still need to as we look towards possible playoffs.
 
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The players rely on the manager for direction and organisation and I don't think we ever developed an effective pattern of play in the absence of Vaughan. The loss of one player should not have affected us to the extent that it did.
 

bigmart

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If we had played like we did in the second half on Saturday keeping the ball on the floor with good movement wouldve helped too but we launched it upfront only for it too come straight back agsin
 

Boz

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Fair point Boz - as you say it came in on 7th August so 5 weeks before season start so maybe Salford had pretty much finished their major recruitment by then? That said the transitional arrangements still gave us some potential advantage over most other teams in the League in terms of what our budget could be. Whether we spent up to it I don't know but I suspect we weren't far off in the end?
ADD, it's all very murky. I do recall Mark saying at one of the virtual fan meetings that Rovers were safely under the salary cap.
 
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We will never know the precise details, but I think it is reasonable to assume our budget this season is high by our historic standards. Players like Spearing, Vaughan and Woolery did not come here for peanuts.
 

Sparky

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Newport 3-0 up v Scunthorpe who we couldn’t score past recently, just coming up to half time. FGR 0-0 with barrow after 20 minutes.
 
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Exeter one up. We need them to win tonight so they still have something to play for at Bolton on Saturday.
 
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