Match Thread: vs Bolton (A)

[Somersall Ram]

On 02/09/2023 at 16:17, Kokosnuss said:

Only because he was an all-action defender in a lower mid table team at the time, so caught the eye. He didn't win it for the actual quality of his defending.

What an idiotic comment. Not only was he poy several times but each new manager picked him as a centre half …..  maybe you don’t understand …. A defender. Just count how many managers picked him and you obviously can’t judge any player 

[EnigmaRam]

Don’t think it’s just the red card that’s the issue. In isolation then you could argue it was a one off mistake. But when you factor in the non penalty as it was outside the box, blowing up before we scored, Bradley being dragged down for a definite penalty and NML not being awarded a own even though anywhere outside the box that’s a foul. 
 

He just got it all wrong and is totally inept at officiating a football match. Anyone else in any walk of life gets so much wrong in their job they’d be sacked. It’s more likely to get a Manager sacked though in football which is a tragedy imo

[ben_dcfc]

38 minutes ago, jameso said:

Not consistency of decision: consistency of whether you should give the benefit of the doubt to the alleged offender if you're not certain what has happened.

If he'd given us the penalty it should be because he saw the handball, otherwise he can't give it.

By the same token, he should have sent off Wildsmith because he saw him handball it, which he couldn't have.

He thinks Wildsmith has handled it though, it certainly looked like it on RamsTV from that angle. He speaks to the assistant with the better view, who obviously doesn't help him come to the right decision. He must feel pretty certain. There's been plenty of occasions in football games, where I've been certain that something has happened only to be proven wrong by replays.

Edited September 3, 2023 by ben_dcfc

[DavesaRam]

3 hours ago, jameso said:

I'll admit I'm being lazy and not instantly researching your claim but my first thought is that this leaves the situation wide open for a big mess.

My interpretation of that rule, given in your words, brings to mind a situation where it's an ongoing tussle, e.g. shirt-pulling which starts outside and carries on inside. In the case of Smith it was one attempted tackle; it didn't continue into the box even if Dempsey's well-executed landing did.

If I'm wrong and the Smith-Dempsey incident can count as "continuing into the box" then I expect to see situations where an attacker who is barely touched outside the box manages to channel his momentum into a hop-skip-jump-and-fall into the area and then the massive grey area about whether that counts. Even I can't believe the authorities would allow that, and for that reason I am skeptical that the Smith tackle and Dempsey's fall could possibly be given as a penalty under any rules... but I will check. Probably.

EDIT: I just checked. Is this the rule you're referring to? - "If a defender starts holding an attacker outside the penalty area and continues holding inside the penalty area, the referee must award a penalty kick."

In which case, surely doesn't apply in this case.

Absolutely right, Jameso! Tell me any recent rule changes that haven't opened the door to "a big mess"? EG what is a handball or what isn't handball? They have done the same with offside, a subject which they messing up for years. And yes it lumps more and more decisions into the area of subjectivity. And the cynic within me thinks that the greatest area of subjectivity is whether or not a specific team is " supposed" to win or not, giving rise to outrageous decisions. VAR springs to mind, for some strange reason. I can't think why. And no, the rule shouldn't have applied to Smith-Dempsey, but was made to. WAs that to suit an agenda? After all this was the guy who, as I mentioned, screwed us over at Plymouth. A poster wondered what the conversation between the ref and his assistant was. It wouldn't surprise me to fid out that he was confirming that the team in green was Derby County so that he could justify the red card, regardless of the offence or not. But then I am rather cynical of the footballing powers that be!

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, ben_dcfc said:

He thinks Wildsmith has handled it though, it certainly looked like it on RamsTV from that angle. He speaks to the assistant with the better view, who obviously doesn't help him come to the right decision. He must feel pretty certain. There's been plenty of occasions in football games, where I've been certain that something has happened only to be proven wrong by replays.

I hear you - but we're allowed to be wrong from where we are 😜

[angieram]

We are wondering how this affects the teams and managers but the referee is more likely to be wondering how it affects his career.

Would he get more hassle from PGMOL if he didn't send off Wildsmith if the video subsequently showed he'd handled the ball, than he will get for sending him off when it appears to show he didn't? 

I suspect he would. 

[May Contain Nuts]

46 minutes ago, Somersall Ram said:

What an idiotic comment. Not only was he poy several times but each new manager picked him as a centre half …..  maybe you don’t understand …. A defender. Just count how many managers picked him and you obviously can’t judge any player 

Bit of a weird post to pick out from a match thread the next day, but hey, whatever.

tbf though I did misremember the years he actually won POTS, so I take back the claim he won it for being active in a mid table team while at Derby.

Nevertheless, he was a good footballer but his defending really wasn't all that much cop, as could be seen pretty much any time we were operating with a less than ideal balance in midfield. Curtis Davies was twice the outright defender (and person) Keogh was, but Keogh had other strengths which better suited the style of play we decided upon for most of the time he was here.

In his first 2 season here Jake Buxton was the better defender, and at times even had more consistent passing. Keogh did improve over the years but never lost that propensity toward a calamitous f*** up, the unique ability to spread his own panic to his teammates and he still struggled against attackers who were anything more than decent in the air.

Pulling out the "well loads of managers picked him" stuff is a right load of BS, whatever the case. Plenty of very very average and even poor players 'get picked' by multiple managers, it's not an automatic stamp of quality.

There were a few half-hearted attempts to 'replace' Keogh but they mostly failed because the way the defence and midfield was set up was specifically tailored Keogh's playing style, no replacement ever really had the time to settle into anything.

He was the captain , we'd built the defence (which constantly failed when put under any sustained amount of pressure, over a number of years) and to a degree our attack on his specific skillset. He'd also made himself 'kingpin' of the dressing room.

We hired and fired managers at a rate of knots. When a new manager comes into a well established dressing room, who do you think they lean on to get the low-down on the squad? Hello Mr Captain. 

The only time someone didn't do that he went running to Mel to get him sacked (Pearson).

In some way he was as much a part of the problem behind the scenes as he was an asset, which was evident in his lack of leadership and organisational skills on a number of occasions on the pitch and even spread to his life off it, on one particular evening...

 

Edited September 3, 2023 by Kokosnuss

[Guest]

11 minutes ago, angieram said:

We are wondering how this affects the teams and managers but the referee is more likely to be wondering how it affects his career.

Would he get more hassle from PGMOL if he didn't send off Wildsmith if the video subsequently showed he'd handled the ball, than he will get for sending him off when it appears to show he didn't? 

I suspect he would. 

It's a good question but I keep bringing it back to the law/legal system: is it better to wrongly convict an innocent man or to fail to convict a guilty one?

Whether PGMOL has any interest in things like laws and the law, I have no idea 🤣

[Ram-Alf]

9 minutes ago, angieram said:

We are wondering how this affects the teams and managers but the referee is more likely to be wondering how it affects his career.

Would he get more hassle from PGMOL if he didn't send off Wildsmith if the video subsequently showed he'd handled the ball, than he will get for sending him off when it appears to show he didn't? 

I suspect he would. 

The assessor will have seen him(if they still have assessors at games)and will have taken notes on his performance, If the performance wasn't up to standard they'll make contact with him either through the phone or a meeting, If an assessor is there...who assess the assessor 🤷‍♂️ they may be looking at the official all the time but from a fare distance away 

We all know that Refereeing standards are at an all time low...you should have seen the one at Belper Town yesterday...wow it was bad, Lots are being fast tracked from lower leagues as there seems to be a shortage of officials so he'll get a game but where...who knows 

[Somersall Ram]

41 minutes ago, Kokosnuss said:

Bit of a weird post to pick out from a match thread the next day, but hey, whatever.

tbf though I did misremember the years he actually won POTS, so I take back the claim he won it for being active in a mid table team while at Derby.

Nevertheless, he was a good footballer but his defending really wasn't all that much cop, as could be seen pretty much any time we were operating with a less than ideal balance in midfield. Curtis Davies was twice the outright defender (and person) Keogh was, but Keogh had other strengths which better suited the style of play we decided upon for most of the time he was here.

In his first 2 season here Jake Buxton was the better defender, and at times even had more consistent passing. Keogh did improve over the years but never lost that propensity toward a calamitous f*** up, the unique ability to spread his own panic to his teammates and he still struggled against attackers who were anything more than decent in the air.

Pulling out the "well loads of managers picked him" stuff is a right load of BS, whatever the case. Plenty of very very average and even poor players 'get picked' by multiple managers, it's not an automatic stamp of quality.

There were a few half-hearted attempts to 'replace' Keogh but they mostly failed because the way the defence and midfield was set up was specifically tailored Keogh's playing style, no replacement ever really had the time to settle into anything.

He was the captain , we'd built the defence (which constantly failed when put under any sustained amount of pressure, over a number of years) and to a degree our attack on his specific skillset. He'd also made himself 'kingpin' of the dressing room.

We hired and fired managers at a rate of knots. When a new manager comes into a well established dressing room, who do you think they lean on to get the low-down on the squad? Hello Mr Captain. 

The only time someone didn't do that he went running to Mel to get him sacked (Pearson).

In some way he was as much a part of the problem behind the scenes as he was an asset, which was evident in his lack of leadership and organisational skills on a number of occasions on the pitch and even spread to his life off it, on one particular evening...

 

I can not remember a more unbalanced post ever. I suppose he played lots of international matches as he couldn’t defend. He looked ungainly but make no mistake I would love keogh back here in his prime. 

[May Contain Nuts]

36 minutes ago, Somersall Ram said:

I can not remember a more unbalanced post ever. I suppose he played lots of international matches as he couldn’t defend. He looked ungainly but make no mistake I would love keogh back here in his prime. 

It can't be that hard, your own post is far less balanced, for a start. 

It's not my fault you can't distinguish between his actual defensive qualities and his other attributes.

Put Keogh in a team which is expected to control possession, be the dominant team in most games and not face sustained periods of pressure and you're onto a winner (unless he puls out one of those horror passes!)

Put a better defender (Davies) next to him to do the organising and a compact midfield infront of him (ala Rowett) and he'll do well too.

Place him in a team who are up against it most weeks, or don't go out of their way to offer a high level of protection to the defence and watch the chaos ensue, because actual defending when some composure was required often didn't/doesn't hold up to scrutiny - he'll run around a lot looking committed, diving into last ditch tackles, but that isn't really good defending.

His time at Huddersfield alongside Stearman where they had one of the worst defensive records I've ever seen at Championship level showed this.

Even in his prime he'd be little use in Warne's system, possibly moreso than than Bradley because at least he had pace, but that's not saying much at this stage.

Edited September 3, 2023 by Kokosnuss

[1of4]

Yes I could have allowed the the ref's performance to cloud my take from the game.  Even with him awarding us a pen, I thought the ref was a bit of a homer. Did he or didn't he get the red card right? That's now a mute point. 

What again really concerned me from yesterday's game was the inability of our better, so called to good for this division, players to have any impact on the game.  This problem wasn't isolated to the Bolton game, it's been evident not just this season, it was a problem in many of the games last season.

While on paper we supposedly have a good squad of players. To often we are losing out to "lower" teams. While these teams may allegedly not have the skill levels as our players, or so people tell us.  They appear more capable of competing physically for possession of the ball, the desire to get to the ball first. To often we don't win the second ball. Meaning any attack breaks down and we are put under pressure by the opposition.

I've read all the posts regarding  quality of our last season's hastily assembled squad compared to this season's squad. Both old and new squads both lack the aggressiveness I believe a team needs, if it wants to get out of this division.

So if I want to find fault with Warne's player recruitment, is that he hasn't  found a couple of players that could instil the steel into the side, more specifically the midfield, that I think we need.

[DavesaRam]

1 hour ago, 1of4 said:

Yes I could have allowed the the ref's performance to cloud my take from the game.  Even with him awarding us a pen, I thought the ref was a bit of a homer. Did he or didn't he get the red card right? That's now a mute point. 

What again really concerned me from yesterday's game was the inability of our better, so called to good for this division, players to have any impact on the game.  This problem wasn't isolated to the Bolton game, it's been evident not just this season, it was a problem in many of the games last season.

While on paper we supposedly have a good squad of players. To often we are losing out to "lower" teams. While these teams may allegedly not have the skill levels as our players, or so people tell us.  They appear more capable of competing physically for possession of the ball, the desire to get to the ball first. To often we don't win the second ball. Meaning any attack breaks down and we are put under pressure by the opposition.

I've read all the posts regarding  quality of our last season's hastily assembled squad compared to this season's squad. Both old and new squads both lack the aggressiveness I believe a team needs, if it wants to get out of this division.

So if I want to find fault with Warne's player recruitment, is that he hasn't  found a couple of players that could instil the steel into the side, more specifically the midfield, that I think we need.

It doesn’t matter how good our midfield is/could be if our tactic consists of “whack it upfield and see what happens, lad”, which is all we’ve got at the moment.

I believe that our midfield are playing to strict instruction re getting the ball into the channels. There are hints, for example several times Hourihane has “channelled” the ball and then slowed to a stop with a hacked off look on his face as though he isn’t enjoying life in midfield. Almost as though he knows he could do better if he was allowed to.

[Rampant]

Nice while it lasted but over to someone else to hopefully go on an unbeaten run.

[Mick Brolly]

5 minutes ago, Stockport Ram said:

The mark of a good player is that they learn from their mistakes. Keogh never, ever did. His “brilliant last ditch” saving tackles almost always resulted from appalling positioning which was a feature of his game. His basic defensive decision making was regularly schoolboy level.It was never “his” fault.  I am embarrassed that he somehow was POTS twice, because he was a walking accident waiting to happen. It was obvious from before the Mac season, and my opinion has nothing to do with the Zamora incident - it sadly is the lowlight of something almost inevitable which continued for years afterwards. He lead Coventry to relegation and was a rushed buy forced on Nigel by circumstances. He was the common thread throughout a decade where we consistently failed to ensure that the team equalled or exceeded the sum of its parts. Joinergate and subsequent events have pretty much proved that only one thing matters to him - and that’s RK. 

I’ve never booed a Ram but will always be embarrassed and perplexed that he is still held in such apparent high esteem as a player, by some.

Rubbish 

[i-Ram]

14 hours ago, angieram said:

Are you saying I'm a turkey? 

Well, you’re no spring chicken x

[Rammy03]

3 hours ago, Stockport Ram said:

The mark of a good player is that they learn from their mistakes. Keogh never, ever did. His “brilliant last ditch” saving tackles almost always resulted from appalling positioning which was a feature of his game. His basic defensive decision making was regularly schoolboy level.It was never “his” fault.  I am embarrassed that he somehow was POTS twice, because he was a walking accident waiting to happen. It was obvious from before the Mac season, and my opinion has nothing to do with the Zamora incident - it sadly is the lowlight of something almost inevitable which continued for years afterwards. He lead Coventry to relegation and was a rushed buy forced on Nigel by circumstances. He was the common thread throughout a decade where we consistently failed to ensure that the team equalled or exceeded the sum of its parts. Joinergate and subsequent events have pretty much proved that only one thing matters to him - and that’s RK. 

I’ve never booed a Ram but will always be embarrassed and perplexed that he is still held in such apparent high esteem as a player, by some.

He was excellent in his last full season with us

[IlsonDerby]

8 hours ago, Stockport Ram said:

The mark of a good player is that they learn from their mistakes. Keogh never, ever did. His “brilliant last ditch” saving tackles almost always resulted from appalling positioning which was a feature of his game. His basic defensive decision making was regularly schoolboy level.It was never “his” fault.  I am embarrassed that he somehow was POTS twice, because he was a walking accident waiting to happen. It was obvious from before the Mac season, and my opinion has nothing to do with the Zamora incident - it sadly is the lowlight of something almost inevitable which continued for years afterwards. He lead Coventry to relegation and was a rushed buy forced on Nigel by circumstances. He was the common thread throughout a decade where we consistently failed to ensure that the team equalled or exceeded the sum of its parts. Joinergate and subsequent events have pretty much proved that only one thing matters to him - and that’s RK. 

I’ve never booed a Ram but will always be embarrassed and perplexed that he is still held in such apparent high esteem as a player, by some.

at the level we were playing at there wasn’t many centre backs at all who performed as well or as consistently as he did. He won POTS for us how many times? He won it the seasons before he joined us with his previous teams. 
 

Yeah sometimes he’d have a rush of blood to his head or his positioning wouldn’t be perfect but if those two things weren’t holding him back he’d have been a premier league player. All championship players have faults hence they’re championship players.

[QuitYourJibbaJivin]

Whilst we started slow again on a Saturday, we did the same at potash to be fair. To be on the wrong end of 4 game deciding decisions is really tough to take. I dread to think what we meltdown would have been like if we had missed the pen after the mix up around our first goal. 
 

We just keep conceding really poor/freak goals this season, it’s the penalty epidemic of last season, if we didn’t have bad luck we’d have no luck at all.

[MadAmster]

20 hours ago, sage said:

Different incident

I'm talking Wildsmith....