Football Barton promises fans that Rovers will improve next season
JOEY Barton admits a 17th-place finish feels like “failure” for Bristol Rovers in the wake of a 3-2 defeat to Bolton Wanderers at the Mem on the final day of the League One season, but he believes the Gas can replicate their opponents’ success if they follow the same “blueprint”,
writes Sam Frost.
Rovers made it seven games without a win to round off a season that saw them comfortably avoid relegation, but a disappointing second half of the campaign left them well short of contending in the top half of the division.
Yesterday’s defeat to the Trotters encapsulated some of the flaws that have hampered the Gas across the season, with poor defending from set plays and long balls giving Bolton the upper hand as they cemented a fifth-place finish in the third tier, setting up a play-off semifinal against Barnsley.
Barton believes Rovers’ performance in the 46th and final game showed they are good enough to compete with the league’s top teams but they commit too many mistakes to be consistent.
He feels the Gas are on a similar path to Bolton having followed them out of League Two 12 months later than the Trotters’ promotion in 2020. He says Rovers can look at Bolton’s example as inspiration.
He said “They were in a similar position to us. They had a slow start in League Two under Ian (Evatt) when he first left Barrow. They managed to close that space really quickly and get promoted. They then consolidated last year and they finished a bit higher than we did and they have kicked on again and got in the play-offs. With Plymouth and them, there is a route map, a blueprint for us to follow, but we’ve got a lot of work to do in the off-season and today we’ve seen the small margins that decide games and their players, in my opinion, are just that little bit ahead of ours.”
A steady season may have been what Rovers needed after two chaotic years with relegation in 2021 followed by promotion 12 months ago. But it is not the campaign that Barton wanted.
“It feels like failure this season, it feels like we’ve failed because we’re not getting promoted,” he said. “I know that’s probably not rational to think that way, but it does feel that way.”
He added: “This season’s done now and we’ve to get cracking and we’ve already made a fist of getting started with next season. My promise to Gasheads is building a team that’s capable of getting them in the Championship in a short period of time. This season, your ambition is to get out of it and I do feel like I’ve failed not getting out, but also I want to be getting promoted next season. This season’s done and next season has already begun.”