Town got the ball down from the off but a rather lop-sided formation saw the ball constantly end up played through to the left flank with the Blackburn defence easily sweeping up each predictable move. Blackburn offered little attacking threat in the first 45 but Henderson came for and missed a couple of crosses which he got away with. Tommy Smith was dominant and between him and Chambers dealt with everything confidently, knocking it forward to N'Daw to get the ball down and set up another move. Throughout Town's movement was fluid. I was gobsmacked to see McGoldrick fail to chase a few through balls, never putting Kean under any pressure to make a quick clearance. McGoldrick lazily covered the entire field in the opening twenty minutes, wandering out left and right and back into midfield, his only contribution a poor cross from wide right into Kean's arms and for the most part he looked scared of the ball and fragile. McCarthy changed things around on the half hour bringing Murphy into the middle with McGoldrick and sending McLean out wide left. This instantly had an impact with Edwards and Murphy linking up well for some dangerous moves but it was a case of trying to pass the ball into the net with only McLean and N'Daw having a crack at goal pulling both their efforts well wide of the target. After the break Town opened well but at the end of a sustained period of pressure for ten minutes from Rovers Town finally buckled as the ball bounced off Henderson from a goal line clearance and into the net. In an even second half McCarthy made the inevitable changes far too late, dragging off McGoldrick and McLean and to their credit Town heads didn't drop and carried on playing excellent football, but it wasn't until Nouble replaced the tiring Edwards that Town looked like a real threat for the first time in the game, both N'Daw and Stearman coming within inches of bulging the Rovers net in the dying minutes. The entire game was hampered and marred by a horrific display from Kevin Wright and his officials, as clear handballs, bad tackles and touchline decisions were not spotted and every quick free kick was dragged back and stopped while he waited for the defending side to ready themselves. Most shockingly, Aaron Cresswell's free kick on the half way line was charged down by a Rovers player a couple of yards away with play allowed to carry on and McGoldrick was rugby tackled in the box just before he was hauled off. This probably didn't help Town's 'luck' but doesn't excuse our shortcomings on the day. Henderson 4 Stearman 7 Chambers 7 Smith 9 Cresswell 8 Edwards 6 (Nouble 9) N'Daw 9 Hyam 8 Murphy 8 McLean 6 (Wordsworth 7) McGoldrick 0 (Chopra 6) I've never seen anyone play as poorly as McGoldrick did today, hopefully it was just a bad day. Stearman did well but he seems better suited to centre back than right back which led to an imbalance when it came to attacking on the right flank. Nouble really looks an exciting prospect. How we will fare now is down to Mick McCarthy and his team selection. Loach should be recalled, the back and midfield left as it is with Nouble certainly involved. JET should probably be given a crack of the whip. If McCarthy can find an option to partner Murphy up front (maybe one of the wingers or JET) and use Wordsworth, Martin, Nouble and Edwards effectively to create danger from the wings then we have got a fighting chance, but having Stearman at right back is definitely causing a major problem when it comes to balance going forward.
Thanks for this report. I know he is not flavour of the month amongst us fans but maybe it's time to give chops a go. We all know he can score at this level and it's about time he gave something back to the club.
Agree...Got to be in with a shout for our Player of the Season if he continues to play and improve as he is...
Thanks for that DU......I am not sure about your 0 for McGoldrick though, he must have made at least some positive contribution to the game.!
There was a throw in on the edge of our box. McGoldrick came back to defend, he didn't have anyone to pick up, and I just thought "Please get back up front before you do something silly." His cross really was that hapless, we would've been better playing with ten.
We need to get rid of Chopra pronto. Good shout for Smith as captain, but with certain ultimatums. We make you captain, on the condition you stop flying off for meaningless international friendly matches in the middle of the week, and making yourself unavailable for what you are paid to do for us.
truth seeker you wanted him out of the club a couple of months ago. His international career is far from meaningless, it's made him the player he is now. I didn't give my thoughts on Chopra. He looks to be carrying a few extra pounds. Very easy on the ball, he showed a couple of times what a quality player he is and therefore just how little effort he puts in.
" I know he is not flavour of the month amongst us fans but maybe it's time to give chops a go. " No thanks. Twitter summed up what that idiot thinks of us, I would literally rather a fan play, Rory Fallon or even Adam Proudlock ( In his current state ) than play that absolutely horrible IDIOT. Has he apologised for his actions!?!? I haven't heard he has. He's causing issues behind the scenes. JET tweeted calling him a clown after, we really don't want this waste at our club. Also, he owes £££££ to bad nasty people that before we leant him quarter of a million. Apparently he has loads of ££££, so if I were the club, I'd say " you can hand that over for starters " . I really think them actions are perhaps as stupid as you can get as a human being. Would the club not have a case to sack him for gross misconduct without paying him off ?
I did indeed say that. However it is the international friendly matches which are meaningless, he is jetting off for matches, which arguably should not count in official records. This is having a knock on effect for us, he can not train with the other players to work on tactics, arrives back worn out, possibly missing the Saturday match, and arguably if he is selected there is the danger of him making mistakes and conceding goals, madness.
I was there on saturday an have to agree and disagree with what you say deleteduser. I agree that when murphy was put up front we looked a bit more threataning, smith was very good and the ref was cack! otherwise i've got to disagree... we didnt get the ball down from the off we persisted with long ball all afternoon to very little avail (we had no shots on target). McGoldrick wasn't great but not many of the others were other than smith, chambers and murphy. to give him a 0 and say you havent seen anyone play that badly before is pretty laughable. N'Daw a 9? yes he was alright and nearly scored late on but a 6/7 at tops. Hyam a 8? not for me, ran his heart out and made a few good tackles but other than that he was part of a pretty dire team IMO who offered next to nothing going forward. I have to say Edwards needs to be dropped. I am actually starting to agree with Paul Jewell when he said that Edwards was much better coming onto the ball from a full back position and although I wouldnt put him back there he offers very little out wide. I can't remember any crosses, dribbles, through balls, running in behind and for me we need some fresh legs out there. All in all I thought we were pretty rubbish on Saturday. I can't undertand Mick moaning saying we should have had a point when we had no real chances until the last 5 minutes. Although we beat Boro 4-0 I'm starting to get a little bit nervous about the rest of the season, 2 big home games next which is a must 4 points at least.
I wish I was but unfortunately I was there... which parts do you not agree with? surely to give someone a 9 means he must have had the game of his life, which n'daw certainly didn't and for someone to get a 0 they must have been diabolical in every department, which mcgoldrick wasn't. One thing I do know is that a strike partnership of mclean and mcgoldrick is not good enough, there is a reason why mclean has scored very few goals in the last few years and why mcgoldrick was known as mc 'goaldrought'. murphy has to start up front, he was our best player at ewood park.
From the games I have seen this season, and Sats wasnt one of them, Portman Pauls account sounds very similar to most of our home games. I would also agree that you dont lose 1-0 with 2 players getting ratings of 9 and 3 eights (not unless you have just lost 1-0 to Barca). I missed the commentary on Saturdays game but heard parts of the phone in and most people were in agreement that it was a poor game which most wished they hadnt wasted time or money in attending. Each to their own opinions but PPs seem to tie in with what I was expecting to see on here.
Having listened to Brenner's commentory of the game on Suffolk I would say that no one deserved above a 7 and that is being generous! Alex Mathie basically said that Town were the better side but both sides were piss poor!
Can't argue with a 7/8 for murphy or smith, otherwise your right the rest of them were probs a 4 or 5 with a couple of 6's (creswell and chambers).
I'm very concerned about where our goals are going to come from. No doubt MM has made us much harder to beat but it's shows how poor we are upfront and creatively when Murphy is seen as our most creative player and probably our biggest goal threat. It's a complete role reversal to how we were at the start of the season when going forward I thought we looked pretty decent could've done with a better striker to finish off the chance we were creating, but we seemed to have a fairly fluid midfield who created a load of chances. Now the defence looks fairly solid with the majority of the same personel but the midfield and strikers look pretty uninspiring, all huff and puff and no real quality. I really think Mick needs to start changing it up, getting back to basics was what got us the points when he first came here but we need to do more than that now. We need to bring in more creative personel, more quality and not simply field 11 players who will put in a shift. I knew JET wouldn't be to Micks taste but to not even have him on the bench is ridiculous!! Mick brought in too many average strikers to replace DJ and Scotland, whilst he inherited a difficult situation it could turn out to be very poor management, especially IMO getting in McLean and letting Scotland go!! I can't see the point of McLean, I mean he's tries hard enough but he's very limited and him and McGoldrick upfront are a very unbalanced frontline. Add to our poorly balanced midfield it doesn't make good viewing!! I do like the look of McGoldrick, he's clearly a decent intelligent footballer but what does he actually offer the team? To me he's a bit like the striker version of Martin, good on the ball, looks promising but what does he offer the team when it boils down to it?? You have some strikers who are the target man, who hold the line and attack the crosses as they come into the box like Lee used to, you have strikers like counago who hold the ball up and create for others, then you have the players who like to play on the shoulder of the last defender and score the goals in the penalty box like Chopra or DJ to me McGoldrick doesn't fit into any of these and tbh none of the strikers Mick has brought in do either, although I have been fairly impressed with Nouble in his fleeting appearences. To me Murphy and Chopra look like the most likely partnership to score the goals and be balanced!! Looks like it's going to be a long hard slog and it isn't going to be pretty. Whilst as I've said I think Mick is a good manager, his rigid approach is at the moment IMO making it harder for us than it should be!!
What i don't understand, is why the partnership of Murphy and McGoldrick that looked so promising isn't being stuck with. But even considering our form I'm not worried yet, just like we had a resurgence and have leveled out again so should Bristol's and Barnsley's and there is still plenty of time for us to find a run of form of our own again + surely not every result can go against us every week. It will be a long and hard battle but I remain confident we'll escape the trap door. My current prediction for the drop Wolves Bristol P'Brough
