Rockford's Love Child
Member
- Joined
- 15 Mar 2010
- Messages
- 13,905
- Player
- Jason Koumas / John Morrissey
- Manager
- John King
It is decision day for Rovers as we need a point to secure a play off place. I should be full of anticipation ahead of this game, but due to events in recent weeks I feel strangely flat.
My gut feeling is that we will make the top seven. As poor as we have been recently, this is as kind a fixture as we could have chosen for the final game, although Colchester's form has improved significantly in recent weeks under Hayden Mullins. I am also not convinced that Exeter and FGR will both win their games. However, whether we have any chance of progression if we do make the play offs, and whether we can even produce a performance to be proud of, is moot.
I was concerned by the manager's rather rambling pre-match interview. He seemed to imply that we will be setting up with a cautious mindset, happy to protect a point and then react to scorelines coming through from elsewhere. He even seemed to suggest he has specific changes in mind for this eventuality. That sounds to me like a potential recipe for disaster, and I would much rather we were positive and proactive from the first minute; go two goals up early on and other scores become irrelevant.
We played our only decent football in recent weeks in the second half against Barrow, with Nugent up front and Kahn wide on the right. However, we used similar tactics at Forest Green to no real effect, and if we do play that way Kahn has to be sufficiently high up the pitch to make an impact, and Nugent has to receive some decent service.
Hill said in his interview that Lewis will miss this game and will probably be out for the rest of the season, but Vaughan will probably feature in the play offs. I would replace Lewis with Morris, but I am unsure the manager will agree.
My gut feeling is that we will make the top seven. As poor as we have been recently, this is as kind a fixture as we could have chosen for the final game, although Colchester's form has improved significantly in recent weeks under Hayden Mullins. I am also not convinced that Exeter and FGR will both win their games. However, whether we have any chance of progression if we do make the play offs, and whether we can even produce a performance to be proud of, is moot.
I was concerned by the manager's rather rambling pre-match interview. He seemed to imply that we will be setting up with a cautious mindset, happy to protect a point and then react to scorelines coming through from elsewhere. He even seemed to suggest he has specific changes in mind for this eventuality. That sounds to me like a potential recipe for disaster, and I would much rather we were positive and proactive from the first minute; go two goals up early on and other scores become irrelevant.
We played our only decent football in recent weeks in the second half against Barrow, with Nugent up front and Kahn wide on the right. However, we used similar tactics at Forest Green to no real effect, and if we do play that way Kahn has to be sufficiently high up the pitch to make an impact, and Nugent has to receive some decent service.
Hill said in his interview that Lewis will miss this game and will probably be out for the rest of the season, but Vaughan will probably feature in the play offs. I would replace Lewis with Morris, but I am unsure the manager will agree.
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