Alty_Ram

Obviously like many Derby fans I have a lingering slight annoyance at how him stringing us along helped to undermine our summer and the following season but I don't really wish the guy any ill. I do think though that once again we are seeing that one of the outstanding players of his generation does not a great manager make. The likes of Frank seem to get far more slack than less illustrious names though and what has he actually achieved in management ? Precious little really. Frank Smith the competent (and invented) ex Doncaster midfielder would be nowhere near these jobs. These celebrity appointments might get some initial slack from players based on their achievements as players but kicking a ball into a net a lot doesn't make you a great motivator or tactician.

Exeter 2 Rams 0 No RFGS

22 minutes ago, estinnes said:

Are season ticket renewals now open?

When I login, I can see "Season Season Ticket 2023/2024 is open! Renew your subscription now!" alongside the "Start Renewal" button.

I can't see any announcement?

I think the logic was that they are waiting until our fate is decided in terms of which division so wouldn't have thought that renewals would possible yet.

Hmm, well even with a slightly patched up United with no Rashford that looked comfortable. The worry if you are a Forest fan that in a home game there wasn't a single shot on target. The away form has been ropey so every remining home game is massive and they've never really got going and given themselves a chance.

All that said and despite several teams winning yesterday and pulling away, Southampton look poor, Leicester are really struggling and Leeds looked woeful last time out and got mauled at home by Palace. Leeds have Leicester then Bournemouth in a couple of games time so someone is getting points and Everton are determined to stay in trouble. It's still so tight but perhaps a diminishing pool of teams in trouble. This is far from over though. Everyone down there is thinking if they can just get one streaky win then it looks a whole lot better. Actually quite exciting !

1 hour ago, SamUltraRam said:

Comment by an MK Dons fan on their forum regarding their visit to PP "Our club could learn so so much from that ground in how to run our ground... for a new build it felt like a football ground... every time I see these types it makes me more and more embarrassed about ours tbh... and even more flabbergasted at those that defend it."

"I'm talking more what it looks like. More character. More feeling of an actual football stadium. You walk around ours when the football isn't on and it feels like what it is, a multi purpose stadium and not a football stadium. Very little signage. Very little to showcase its MK Dons that play there. Pride Park had it all. Old pictures in poster form all around the exterior of the ground of former players, memorable moments, seas9ns gone by. The board we have at the top of the Cowshed? They had similar outside their gate. About 8 burger vans, statues of legends etc. Ours is quite simply a big bowl with some black marble brickwork and an MK Dons badge plastered on the building in each corner. Once you get into the ground there's very little character. Very few quirks to make it feel like ours. Go to many other grounds and it's full of imagery of their club. Their proud moments. Ours is simple, plain black, round and characterless."

I've also seen many, many comments from visiting Championship fans over the years who think PP is the best of the 'bowl' stadiums

I think we underestimate ourselves and our facilities sometimes. This is very much in line with the conversation that I had with Bristol Rovers fans this season... they were genuinely really impressed with PP. In fact they started the conversation due to overhearing us talk about a slight surprise at their numbers and as I said elsewhere, they listed the stadium as one of the main reasons why they all wanted to come.

Sure, we can't compete with the top grounds and brand new stadiums but we make countless other ground look like tatty sheds. We're not in the top cluster any more but we've still got great facilities.

I think that's probably overstating it a bit, but obviously anything built currently is bound to look more shiny.

It is looking its age in some places but it seems fixable as the bones of it is still pretty impressive based on the comments by away fans, particularly this year. Some Brizzle Rovers fans I spoke to were waxing lyrical about it on the way back to the station and listed the stadium as one of the the main reasons why they wanted to make the trip.

I think the concourses perhaps look a little basic and I think the yellowing partly translucent screens at the back of the stands look a bit shabby but that's all fixable if the money is there to do it. Most of it is pretty cosmetic I'd say but no, we are not in the queue for tournaments any more as there are plenty of newer modern stadia choose from.

It's an omen ! Dreams shattered !😲

7 minutes ago, Steve Buckley’s Dog said:

If any player went down ‘injured’ and started to bang his hand against the grass as if death was imminent, I would authorise a sniper on the roof of the stand to conduct a mercy killing. I guarantee that after a weekend of this there would not be a single incident of this kind of behaviour again. 

Heads on spikes as you run out of the tunnel of any offenders from previous game? Time to have gone a bit stinky and had plenty of crow attention ?

1 hour ago, Tamworthram said:

You seem to be ignoring the point that a few of us are making. Time wasting isn't just about running the clock down which, as you say, would be pointless if the clock was stopped every time the ball wasn't live. It's also about disrupting momentum. How often do you see a player going down injured off the ball when a team is under the cosh? I'm pretty sure that if I was a manager of a team under pressure that got a throw in or a goal kick, I'd be telling my team to take their time in order to try and take the sting out of the attacks or slow the game down.

And if you have spent several minutes of desperate defending, throwing yourself in the way of shots against relentless pressure then it is knackering, so someone gets 'cramp' and the embattled defence gets a nice breather and a chance to regain shape, push out and move the defensive line up a few metres, pep talk from the skipper and pass on instructions on from the bench and the crowd stand around with their hands in their pockets for a few mins and the intensity of the atmosphere probably dips as everyone is just standing around waiting to resume, although as a South Stander, hurling abuse at he play-acting player can help fill the time..

Momentum in games is hugely important and these tactics are designed specifically to stifle it.

32 minutes ago, Tamworthram said:

Time wasting tactics isn’t just about running down the clock, it’s also about disrupting momentum. If a team is under the cosh, it will suit them to take a lot longer, with no fear of being penalised, over getting the ball back into play.

No, exactly, it's about disruption and loss of momentum rather than getting the time back in 1 minute chunks before yet another player just sits down and appeal for 'treatment' for their 'injury'.

Problem is that I just don't know how you could get around refs having to err on the side of caution and take injuries seriously. If they didn't then at some stage they'll get it wrong and it turning into an ugly legal wrangle for negligence as someone is genuinely injured. Remember Seth and the Wembley final - the WBA fans were convinced that he was faking it but he was badly hurt and that was basically it for him. I messed my knee up a few years back and tore my medial meniscus and all I did was over-straighten my leading leg while planting it as I walked down some uneven steps. Nobody with me could understand how I'd managed to mess myself up because I was just walking down some steps.

It'd be nice to think that if the refs weren't happy that an injury was genuine that say they'd double the time added on that the player was down or something but it requires a snap decision from someone (the ref) who has less medical knowledge than the physio so it'd never happen.

The best solution to this is obviously to be 5-0 up and not have to worry about opposition running the clock down on you 😉

I agree SBD. I think what is frustrating me most is the fact that with a combination of the seemingly endless substitutions and random players just sitting down for 'treatment' that the last 20 minutes of so many games are just so stop start that it kills any momentum and totally plays into the hands of the spoiling team. Just when you'd hope that the game was building to a big exciting finish it just ends up as an irritating stop-start anti-climax.

As you say, this isn't about this game and our inability to get the job done against MKD (for which we only have ourselves to blame) it's a general football point about the impact of blatant cynical spoiling tactics on games that lots of people are paying good money to watch.

4 hours ago, Red_Dawn said:

I think that’s it for us this season and probably our wonderful manager too. Injuries and poor January recruitment have sunk us. If Dane Murphy was still around I doubt he’d have approved the likes of Wood and Shelvey. 

I’d say see you next season but don’t have many hopes you’ll get to the playoffs let alone win them.. 

Without wishing to give you any kind of hope, I think there are many more twists and turns to come in the Premier League relegation fight. Teams at the bottom playing each other, opponents with nothing to play for giving some fringe players a runout etc. Leicester got a right kick in the nuts last night with a late winner conceded, Southampton look the poorest of the bunch and you have them at home where you are more or less competent. It's stupidly open... uncharacteristically so.

Re us, yes, I suspect that you're right, unfortunately (just my opinion obvs..). Momentum is very much against us (Lost 4 of the last 5 and only beating a poor Oxford side) and even if we get there I can't see us beating whoever of the top 3 drops out or Barnsley who gave us a bit of a mauling recently.

In all honesty, if we are going to drop out of the top 6 then I'd would rather us have done it now than in some gutting last day of the season scenario. We might rally of course but we seem to have played our best football mid-season and though we've done OK with injuries so nothing really to blame there, we've just seemed to have suffered a loss of form for a number of key players and we haven't scored in the last 3 games.. not great timing. All that seems to have tempered expectation somewhat and it's out of our hands for the first time in a while. Maybe it'll take a bit of pressure off and we'll find some form... who knows.

Forest Green 1 Rams 1 FRGS Cashin

The key thing is that it is all so insanely tight at the foot of the EPL that you can stick with a manager a little longer to see how it goes, but it may literally be the last game before you know whether your gamble pays off. It's 9 teams for 3 relegation places realistically.

There are so many teams in trouble that anyone who strings any kind of patchy form together is going to give themselves a great chance because surely 2 or 3 teams are going to have a stinker of a last 9 or so games. I think much may come down to which teams play each other, like Leicester vs Bournemouth and Leeds vs Palace this weekend.

Having said how close it is, it wouldn't surprise me at all to see the current bottom 3 go down.

It's genuinely quite interesting though and I might actually watch a few games in the run-in and partially justify my Sky subscription.

Coming into the last few games it's all still in their hands and some of the more realistic ones might have taken that at the start of the season. It's just so hard to call and it's so ridiculously tight though. At this stage, a couple of positive results and suddenly it's looking a lot rosier. The Leeds game looks huge as they'll be a bag of nerves too.

The other factor to bear in mind is 10 games left with 4 at home and 6 away. They are the 13th best home side but the 20th best away side.  Forest have scored just 4 goals away and have just one win. That has to be a worry.

I wonder how significant that goal difference will be. Forest and Bournemouth are considerably worse than those around them. It's unbelievably tight this year (5 pts separate the bottom 8 clubs). Could be very fine margins that decide this. 

Yep, my original bad (see above)

Of course if I actually answer the original question re South not North Stand... South Stand at 76 mins when they score looks pretty much full. I guess the exodus happened after that. It was probably 7 or 8 mins of normal time to go when I noticed significant gaps around me. There were certainly several largish blocks or seats in the centre and right of the goal that seem to have been abandoned. I guess lots of folks just felt really deflated after it looked like we were going to make a game of it. I guess folks pay their money and its their call.

As a matter of interest, what is our actual realistic capacity these days? The stated capacity is obviously never hit due to security measures and segregation but how many do we lose from that ? There are certain blocks in North and North East that seem slow to sell but it rarely looks like more than a few hundred unless its midweek. Obviously there will always be a proportion of people who can't attend due to illness or bad planning or whatever.

19 hours ago, CBRammette said:

No its not but since the away fans moved the South Stand is the heart of match day especially during the troubled seasons. Anyone sitting (standing!) there should be incredibly proud of what it does on matchdays. But yesterday many left that stand really early not a couple of minutes and it noticeably hasnt been as loud for the last few matches.  As someone who sits as close to south stand as possible as I love the buzz but who cant stand up all match, I'd be really interested for anyone who sits there's take on it. 

Just looking at the highlights, this is grabbed from when their 2nd goal went in (couldn't find a wider view), so that was about 15 mins plus time added on and at that point it was obviously still only 1-0 so even just from this limited view, there's a lot of empty seats for an area that in theory is sold out. I know some of the young guys sometimes move around from allocated seats but if it is in any way representative of the whole stand then that's some big gaps for a game that was still in the balance. Did you get the impression that these people were there at the start but left during the 2nd half ? As you say, it wasn't like this was the last throws of the game with the result already decided.

1 hour ago, CBRammette said:

No its not but since the away fans moved the South Stand is the heart of match day especially during the troubled seasons. Anyone sitting (standing!) there should be incredibly proud of what it does on matchdays. But yesterday many left that stand really early not a couple of minutes and it noticeably hasnt been as loud for the last few matches.  As someone who sits as close to south stand as possible as I love the buzz but who cant stand up all match, I'd be really interested for anyone who sits there's take on it. 

Obviously its something that is probably easier for folk in other stands to see but yesterday even I noticed a lot of empty seats immediately behind me in South Stand with several minutes of normal time to go and it was so noticeable that I pointed it out to the mates I sit with.

I thought the noise level was generally reasonable 2nd given the way the game was going and it inevitably hit a peak with some of the decisions by the officials but yet, it finished pretty flat. I really don't think the endless 2nd half substitutions help things. You get any kind of momentum going and someone on the opposition 'gets cramp' or whatever and then as soon as they are on their feet someone is subbed. Also, why do they do that one at a time and it almost seems like we're waiting for the announcer to do their bit? Just hold the board up, wave 'em all on and then let the announcer summarise the changes.

0-2 No RFGS

56 minutes ago, Sparkle said:

I really like knight - he either signs for longer than the extension or I suspect he will absolutely be sold to raise funds this summer - we do have bills to pay even before we start considering signing players 

Quite. While we may not be obliged to sell in the same way that we have over the last couple of years, (i.e. prize assets being picked off by the vultures for peanuts just so we can keep the lights on) but we do have to sell if he won't extend or he will be end up being worth nothing and just walks away. I like him and wish we could keep hold of him but I think it's been the widely accepted belief that if we don't go up then he'll be off and that is looking increasingly likely as our form has nose-dived.

Expecting any more than low millions is just fantasy I'm afraid and might depend on multiple parties being interested to even get that. Sadly we will probably have to get what we can while he is still worth something as an asset rather than a free agent. We'll badly miss his energy in this team as it stands though.

Hopefully we have tied him up for another year but I can't see that he will want to stay if (as seems likely) we continue drift out of promotion contention. If that's the case then we just have to do what we can to get a fair fee. We may not be in massive steaming pile of financial do-do's these days but we are not going to be able to turn down any half-decent offer due to his contract situation. We absolutely cannot allow him to just walk away for nowt. I'd really really like him to stay but we need to get something in the bank for developing him as a player, even if we are not allowed to spend it yet.

Peterborough 3 Derby 0 No RFGS

3 hours ago, Alpha said:

Hated it less because I like Lewis more than Max/Horner

But you need two teams to tango otherwise it's even less exciting than who's gonna win the PL hype every football season. 

Max first world title was exciting. Last year was just boring and this year is gonna be even worse. He'll win em all unless something out of his control stops him. With his talent and that car I don't think he'll even break a sweat. 

Same for me really. Whatever you make of events surrounding Max's first win, and whoever you support, it was undeniably exciting because it was close. Last weekend Max starts in 15th and strolled (see what I did there) back into 2nd without ever really needing to do much more than point the car down the track and he was ultimately only thwarted by another unbelievably quick Red Bull. Even after the safety car they just drove off into the distance. The gulf is absolutely vast at the moment and it's just not that entertaining for anyone who isn't a Verstappen devotee.

Is this different from another team dominating ? No, clearly not, but whoever our favourite drivers and teams are I'm assuming that we can probably all agree that we'd like to actually see some properly competitive racing occasionally. Unfortunately we've just swapped one period of complete dominance for another. I don't even mind if it isn't Lewis and Mercedes, I'd just like to see a real battle at the front not this current procession. God knows what Ferrari are up to...