Wycombe at Home ..

..I watched a team get roundly applauded off the pitch last saturday after a stirring comeback that almost rescued a game that looked long gone in the 60 th minute .

Contrast that to the atmosphere online since then and the overall negativity . It’s like chalk and cheese.

Perhaps it’s because the people who spent good money and travelled to Peterborough are so invested in the club and want us to succeed that they gleefully jump on every crumb of good news. We had reason to celebrate and it felt good to come away from a match feeling some reason to be positive..

Maybe it’s also because we got a glimpse of what a free flowing Bristol Rovers can look like and I really hope that we build on that .

It wasn’t coincidence that the fight back started as soon as Grant Ward took to the pitch and I haven’t seen anyone else mention that . His presence highlighted a problem that exists when he is not around .

Until he came on , the forward play was long balls up to Promise and relying on his knockdowns . Our forwards were isolated as we have seen in so many games this season .

We have a number of young inexperienced midfield players who are good at receiving the ball and quickly moving it on but we lacked a general , someone with maturity who will slow things down if necessary to hold the ball and direct play. There is more to controlling midfield than simply being someone who is good at linking up play.

Ward was suddenly using class and experience to find space for himself , drifting to the back of the pitch if necessary and working the ball either side left and right with shorter passes to wingbacks rather than the hopeful punt through the middle . We were pushing forward as a unit pressing the opponents and supporting the attackers. We looked good.

I think that Kamil Conteh is looking a much better player now that when he first joined us simply because he has grown with experience but he is still a work in progress . Hopefully both Shaw and Hutchinson will develop quite quickly , confidence will grow and both will have the sense of presence that Grant Ward brings.

For now however we are over reliant on Wardy and that is just how it is. We just have to hope that we get enough minutes out of him on the pitch to take us up the League and soon we hope someone will emerge to fill the gap left when we lost both the professionalism of Finlay and the drive of Anthony Evans.

So onto Wycombe.

I hope that we have done our homework and know whether we are better off with Connor Taylors aereal dominance or perhaps we should see if Michael Forbes offers us something that is more suited depending upon Wycombes style of attack. I was really impressed with Forbes when he first played and he must be itching to get on the park.

Confidence is a brittle thing but if we can build on how we finished last week then we may still surprise a few people . They may be our bogey team but everyone said that about our inability to win the first game of the season and that fell by the wayside.

Am i optimistic ? I am not sure for today but i do feel that this group of players has spirit and can perform a lot better than we have seen so far.

Onwards and upwards

My opinions are my own- who else would want them? UTG