Rovers v Royals

DONCASTER ROVERS

-V-

READING

Some of this article was written prior to the original date for this fixture. 


Do you know, I've had years of happy memories about this fixture for all the wrong reasons.  I have always thought that a mere duckling of 7 went to watch Donny for the first time in 1975, when we drew one-a-piece with the Royals.  Not so.  I wasn't there.  You see, when I look at that season, I see the following matches. 

• A 4-3 home win against Mansfield Town (who were crowned 4th division champions that season).
• A 4-7 (seven)   - call me the vidiprinter away defeat to Shrewsbury, who finished as runners-up.
• A 3-3 home draw to Exeter (a remarkable match which saw Rovers' 'keeper, Graham Brown carried off, injured with Rovers 2-0 down.  With the writing on the wall, Stan Brookes went between the posts and performed heroics allowing Donny to rescue the draw).

Nice though it would have been to say that I recollected these matches, I can only say that I have recollected the recollections of my elder brother.  His stories of these games persuaded me that I should be attending too.  And so, the next season, I did.  My first game being a 0-2 defeat to Cambridge United on the first day of 1975-76 season.  I have pinned it down further due to remembering witnessing a remarkable and unique achievement that happened at Donny a week or so later.

The late Chris Balderstone became the only man ever to participate in a 1st class cricket match AND a league football fixture on the same day.  He played for Leicestershire against Derbyshire and was 51 not out, when, at the end of play he drove up to Donny to don his boots and take on Brentford.  Remarkable!

Anyway, its a real shame that Reading were not, in fact, involved in my first ever experience of Doncaster Rovers.  This mistake has ruined my pre-match article.   I do apologise.

Tell you what, I'll get nostalgic about the fixture at the MadStad earlier this season.  A rare away match, let alone match for me these days.  A great day in the company of Canadian Rover, who, were it not for my intervention, would still be finding his way back home to Donny ;-)

DONCASTER ROVERS

 If we stay in the Championship we’re going to everything next season to be in the top six. - El Hadji Diouf

He's ducking mad!  But, I'll tell you what, when it comes to Donny, so am I and if Dioufy wants to join me in my madness, well, I bid him a warm welcome to Fuzzyland.  He can be my ambassador for sport.

The Rovers' revival has started.  We hope.  Unbeaten in four with one win and three draws.  OK, it should be unbeaten in 5 with at least three wins but I'm not going to let that detract from the last two outings.  We deservedly beat Forest at the City Ground and undeservedly left Upton Park with just the one point.  Belief and passion certainly seems to have been re-awakened in the Rovers squad.  Are we now playing the Dean Saunders' way, well, I think the jury is still out on that one but it's been better of late!


To some extent, we've been here before though.  Between November and January we notched up an unbeaten home run of 5 matches.  Southampton, Leicester and Barnsley were beaten while draws were notched up against Cardiff and Watford.  Not bad at all!  Admittedly, during this period, away form was terrible but we have had a little sunshine.


So why are we so hopeful now? Well, I think the first thing is that in the last four matches, Rovers have not been conceding like they were.  One goal a game in the last four compared with 1.7 prior to that.  We have also gone two games without throwing away points in the final minutes.  Yes, it got a bit close for comfort last Tuesday against Forest but we didn't and against West Ham, it was more likely that we would nick all three points towards the end than lose our hard-earned one.  


For me, that's the key really.  If we are to beat the Royals, there's got to be no stupidly deep defending without any outlets and no losing concentration in the last 10 minutes.  Then we just have to play well and its possible.

Reading

It's quite pleasing that Sharp has left because he's a good player. He's lively in the box and Southampton have made a good signing there - Alex Pearce

Going back to that early season game that I attended with Canadian Rover, I am certain he will testify to our hearing this.

We were made welcome by Reading fans and one of them definately said "If you can't beat us, you're in real trouble!".  Well, he was right.  We didn't beat Reading and we are in real trouble.  But by his rule, the same must be said for Bristol City, Middlesbrough, Burnley, Derby, Southampton, Palace, Birmingham, Ipswich, Peterboro', West Ham, Leeds, Brighton and Watford, who have all failed to beat Reading (sometimes twice) since we were defeated 2:0 at the MadStad.  Ironically, one of the teams who HAVE beaten the Royals is Nottingham Forest, who ARE in as much trouble than Rovers.  Aren't football fans funny folk?

Le Fondre - Is He Ex-Directory?

The match at the MadStad saw Adam Le Fondre score a debut goal, that must have been bliss for an ex-Miller.  Since then, Le Fondre has gone on to become the Royals' top scorer.  Adam was a player who was associated with a move to Donny for a long time.  What can I say, other than it seems that Willie McKay forgot to put Adam's number in his Nokia!


Along with Adam, there's Simon Church and Noel Hunt, players who have been performing at this level for years now.  Either one of them would probably get into the majority of championship teams.

Anyway,  lets have a quick look at what the third placed side in the league have to offer.


Well, with 8 runs in a row, Reading are the real form side at the moment.  Against Leicester, they used width really well, having a man over on either side of the attack on pretty much every move I saw.  Its a simple formula that requires good support of the frontmen from the midfield, never demonstrated better than by Mikele Leigetwood's great strike for Reading's first against the Foxes.  The use of wide-men means of course, that any over-hit cross or anything that goes across the area is coming straight back.  Very difficult to defend.


Against Portsmouth and it was more of the same.  So much of the trouble Reading cause comes from wide positions and stopping that from happening may be a key requirement for any team to succeed against them.  No way will that be easy though!


At the back? Well, Portsmouth hardly tested them and Leicester managed little more.  I saw David Nugent, who never struck me as the fastest of strikers simply run away from the right back so is there a question to be asked there?  Sadly for Rovers, that was seriously all I saw.


Big big ask for Rovers tomorrow evening as the Royals are beginning to rule the championship.

Boxing Day in Burnley

BURNLEY

V

DONCASTER ROVERS

Merry Christmas Everybody, and what could be more festive than Boxing Day in Burnley?  Its got a certain ring to it, I believe, and up in those hills, I doubt there will be any difficulty in finding a Shepherd.  Wise men could be more of a challenge in Lancashire, but by arranging for a visit of some Yorkshire men, that too can be ticked off the list. 

Doncaster have a good record against Burnley over recent seasons. Unbeaten in fact, although at Turf Moor, draws have been the order of the day.  This season, with Rovers hitting a bit of form and Burnley stuttering at home, the Yorkshiremen will be looking to go one better than that.  But something about Burnley's record makes me think that that feat will be far from plain sailing.

BURNLEY 

We are still still capable of making a run but it's going to be crucial now, the next few games as to where it takes us - Eddie Howe

Burnley have the 5th best away record in the league, but the 4th worst home record.  Its one way to end up mid-table while really frustrating your support. 

The first match I saw would warm the cockles of Rovers' fans hearts.  The Clarets struggled badly to a narrow 1-goal victory against a 9-man Brighton.  I can understand a side struggling to score against a 9-man side as they pack their defence.  But, if the 9-men stretch the defence of the 11-men unduly you have to wonder what is going on.  Brighton, in the end deserved at least a draw and, on what I saw, Burnley on that day deserved the igmony such a result would bring them.

The next set of highlights I watched saw Burnley lose out to a last minute route 1 goal.  Again, I can't rave about either team's performance and 0:0 looked fairer.  There were a couple of moves that showed what Burnley can do though.  Sam Vokes, Jay Rodrigues and Chris McCann showed how well they can combine in a great move early in the second half but I saw too much shooting from range.  Like they did against Brighton, the clarets struggled to find ways around or through the defence.

At the back, it looked very organised and Burnley certianly gave Pompey a puzzle to be solved.  Good movement got them in on goal on a couple of occasions but, more worryingly, there were a couple of occasions where brute force proved more effective than it should have done.

There was a better performance to be seen at Upton Park though.  Burnley's goals were far more typical of them.  Good balls into the box finished off by unstoppable headers.  The defence still looked disciplined but vulnerable to good movement, although they seemed more competitive in this one.

So, Burnley are organized and my prove difficult to break down.  But I didn't get the impression there was that much imagination to break opponents down.  There's work to be done before the run that Eddie Howe talks about is going to happen.

DONCASTER ROVERS

There's absolutely no point in getting the victories against Southampton and Leicester if we can't go away from home and earn a point and be hard to beat - Dean Saunders.

Absolutely correct Dean!  Unfortunately that's what Rovers have been doing - getting really good results against good teams and then falling down against teams who, if they are to get out of their current situation, they need to beat.  Still, things have been upwardly mobile at the 'moat over the last few weeks and Dean is clearly understanding why Rovers haven't made more progress.



It's rare that there is a quiet week off the pitch at Donny this season and this week has proved no exception.  First, the Chairman makes clear what we always knew.  Billy Sharp is up for sale.  The 3 Million asking price is a snip for a player who has 9 goals in 13 starts so far this season.   I think Rovers have been tentively trying to sell their star player since the end of last season.  That's not a criticism.  When you hear of plans to half the wage bill, its obvious the Billy's wages will be part of that cut.

We also learned of Dean's 8th, 9th and 10th signings as three Frenchmen (well, kinda) were signed from Greek sides Panathinaikos, Giannina and Panetolikos. 

Damien Plessis, a defensive midfielder is the only one of the trio to have enjoyed English experience before, playing for Liverpool.  The other two, Mamadou Bagayoko and Habib Bamogo are forwards who have played international football for Mali and Burkina Faso respectively.



El-Hadji Diouf.  Another 18 months?

Rovers added to this news with word of an agreement in principle that El-Hadji Diouf will stay for another 18 months.  Intersting one that is.  Undoubtedly good for the Rovers as there has been little to contradict Dean Saunders ascertion that Diouf is the best player in the championship.  But how does it stack with the shop-window experiment working for the players that it brings in?  Do the players Rovers are bringing in really want to end up in Donny for a couple of years? 

My guess is they won't think of it in this way.  More they will think that if Donny is good enough for Diouf, its good enough for them.  The more I think, the more I believe Diouf is seen as very important to the success or otherwise of the McKay experiment.  

Jeckyll and Hyde v Hyde

IPSWICH TOWN
V
DONCASTER ROVERS

During our last meeting the Tractor Boys effectively ploughed up the Keepmoat and the Rovers with it, as probably the most threadbare Rovers team put out in many-a-year was trounced by six goals to nil.  

For that game, Rovers were unable to field a recognised striker and so faced an impossible task.  Famously, Sean O'Driscoll threatened to walk out of the post-match press conference if anybody asked a stupid question and, when he received his second question,  "So Sean, how do you feel?" he duly followed up on the threat.

As some kind of indication how weakened Rovers were that night, the mid-winter freeze of 2010/11 season resulted in the home and away fixtures with Ipswich being only seperated by 4 other matches.  At Portman road, just 3 weeks before the massacre at the Keepmoat, Donny were unfortunate to come second in a five-goal thriller, which included a mad spell with 3 goals in 3 minutes.

This season, remarkably Ipswich have also conceded more than any other team but with 19 goals for, aren't so bad going forwards.  Donny's record is a little more balanced.  No team has scored fewer goals than the Rovers and only Ipswich have conceded more.  0:0 doesn't look a wise bet tomorrow.

IPSWICH TOWN

I got on well with the supporters and the manager [Sean O'Driscoll] at the time and I really enjoyed myself there. I have some great memories from my time at Doncaster  - Jay Emmanuel-Thomas

Looking at Ipswich's results so far this season, it would seem they are either very good (3:1 victory against Brighton, 3:0 against Bristol City and Coventry) or really bad (1:7 against Peterbrough, 2:5 versus Southampton and last week's 4:1 away defeat by Millwall).  If Paul Jewell follows the instructions of the fans, he's stuck in the Portman Road revolving doors.

First video up was that game at the New Den and the defending was as shocking as you would think.  Centre-backs stayed in the middle and I have no idea where the full-backs were for two of the Millwall goals.  It was simply a case of an attack finding a man in acres of space in the inside right or left position.  A good shot was fired in, parried and the rebound could not be dealt with.  Millwall were using those inside positions all game.

Against Palace, Ipswich lost 0:1 and it was another very poor goal.  A really poor Palace free-kick that should have been eaten up by any decent defence was half cleared and then a lot of ball-watching occurred as Palace took their opportunity.

Portsmouth, and here I saw a slender Tractor-Boys victory, but all in all I'd have to say that I've gained more hope from watching the frailties of their defence than I've gained fear from watching their attack.  Jimmy Bullard pulls the strings in midfield and I did see a few snappy strings of passes involving Bullard and Lee Bowyer.  Now they are two names that also bring a lack of nonsense to mind!

The other player I liked in an attacking sense? Carlos Edwards.  Against Portsmouth he had a couple of forays down the right flank that looked difficult to deal with.

There's hope for Donny in this one.  That defence is as bad as I've seen, with one unfortunate exception.

DONCASTER ROVERS

I can see it coming together here. The pace of training has gone up massively from testimonial to world cup final standard. - Dean Saunders

Well I am sure there wasn't a dry eye at the Keepmoat on Tuesday evening as Billy Sharp showed us all what love, heartbreak, pride and professionalism mean.  How could he play through such pain? In Billy's words, "that's what my little man Luey would have wanted.

Well, Billy, you gave Luey one fantastic present.  

Rovers lost the match but that's in many ways a trivial detail.  There were positives.  For the first 30 minutes, Rovers played one of the promotion contenders completely off the park.  El-Hadji Diouf did not look as unfit as I suspected he was, indeed it looks as though he and Billy could form a brief but happy relationship.

But the problems at the back remain very obvious.  

Billy Sharp's family have received a lot of support from the Martin House Children's Hospice during this very sad time for them.  The Viking Supporters cooperative have set up an means of donating to this very worthy cause.  If you would like to make a donation, you can do so my clicking here.  Alternatively you can send a donation by SMS by following the instructions below (clicking on the image will take you to a page with all terms and conditions)

Thank you.