Rovers positivity proves infectious
BLUE-EYED BOY & OLD BLACKBURNIAN
I’VE got no way of proving this scientifically but I’m prepared to bet that if you’d given all 8,000 Rovers season ticket holders a questionnaire in July asking who would be top of League One on this day and which two sides would be unbeaten the longest, I reckon you’d have got 8,000 nought out of tens.
Football, as Danny Baker says, is chaos and none of us know anything about it worth sticking more than the odd quid on the fix odds on.
Rovers ended one of those unlikely unbeaten runs to leap-frog Scunthorpe and if they do the expected business against Wimbledon on Saturday they will take their flourishing reputation, with three consecutive away clean-sheet wins, to the New Meadow, home of even-moreunlikely thus far undefeated pace-setters Shrewsbury Town.
Four league wins in a row, the first such instance in ten years, has had the stattos seeking even better sequences and my ever dependable pal Brian Clarke has come with a six-game run of victories in late 2000 as Rovers began their charge to promotion which culminated at Deepdale the following May.
Emulating that would of course still leave a hard winter ahead during which there will certainly be pitfalls and disappointments, shocks and setbacks amid the triumphs and highs.
But for the first time in many years there’s definitely a spring in the step of long-suffering fans and you can even imagine a few last-minute season tickets being shifted this week (Rovers have offered to refund anyone buying one the cost of any home league games they have already attended) as, at least temporarily, protests and boycotts are only maintained by the most obstinately joyless waspsuckers.
As my co-writer this week Old Blackburnian points out we have been something of an “Ikea team” – all the components are there but Tony Mowbray seemed to have lost the instructions at the outset and was assembling the unit by trial and error early on.
But at Spotland on Saturday I looked at our list of substitutes and their side and thought, goalkeeper aside perhaps, that Keith Hill would have picked every one of our bench in his starting line-up...and he is probably one of several managers in the division who’ll feel the same in coming months.
Whether you feel our present status is beneath you, or us, or what, it was undeniably a great Rovers away day – a huge, largely well-behaved and goodnatured following roaring encouragement throughout in response to a fine performance.
Positivity is infectious and the players can’t fail to be inspired by backing like they got during a clinical display which got better by the minute.
It was so comfortable that another font of Rovers knowledge, John Pittard, text me at one leisurely juncture to point out that Rochdale sub Oliver Rathbone was almost certainly the first player to play against Rovers whose dad and granddad both played for us.
Glanford Park rises to greet you as you depart the nearby motorway, with all the architectural splendour of a run-down DIY superstore.
The only clues as to its true purpose are the floodlight pylons rising in each corner and a few posters by the home turnstiles, but it was here that Rovers needed to find steel to match the Iron.
The opening half demonstrated why Scunthorpe started the evening above Rovers, they were vibrant, physical, hungry & played a simple game plan of pass & move which they executed with precision and enthusiasm.
The finest compliment I can pay is that Rovers’ fans current darling, Richie Smallwood, was consistently outmuscled and Corry Evans looked distinctly off the pace as he was hassled and harried into errors. There were more lost balls than in one of my golf rounds as desperate clearances continually cleared the low roof.
The chances that came fell largely to Scunthorpe and old boy Josh Morris looked exactly like the replacement for the injured Craig Conway that Rovers needed.
Young Harper showed some nice technique but a “welcome to League 1” tackle early on quietened him down and it was no surprise when Dack replaced him at half time.
Rovers were much more urgent and much more competent after the interval.
Perhaps this Rovers incarnation is secretly a footballing Ferrari needing 45 minutes to ensure everything is in order and sufficiently lubricated before getting cracking.
The winner came from some fine wing play by Bennett and a tidy, close finish from Antonsson, who seems to be developing a happy knack of scoring without ever really truly seeming to play well. He is a busy player, he works hard and the goals seem to be a fair reward for that endeavour.
Graham & Chapman both came on as Rovers switched to 4-5-1 to strengthen the midfield. Graham soon had a chance to seal the win but struck his shot straight at keeper Gilks, when it really was easier to place it anywhere else. There were many times when it looked like that could prove to be a costly error as Scunthorpe pressed hard for an equaliser.
It is pleasing to see points now being won in these contests rather than the supine surrender we saw against Doncaster.
A lot of Labore, not much Arte just at the moment, but as long as the points are collected, I for one will not complain.