ROVERS v Preston N. E. August 19th 2014

Surely people don't think anyone who wants to contribute to a forum like this "revels" in the team's struggles which I think are far from over.

Hound may see the Board as a barrier to securing the future of the club and I agree that they are implicated. I don’t expect he revels in that. My focus though is the manager’s methods and I cannot see how he can disassociate himself from the poor performances which history suggests will happen again.

Fighting spirit may have secured a point last night, but reports tend to confirm the impression that there is not much foundation on which to build an effective and efficient attacking force. Dickov is not leading a bunch of street-fighters. Structure, strategy and skill need to be added to “pride” and all the pugilistic qualities that pepper Mr Dickov’s footballing philosophy.

If he can turn it round I will revel in the success and say I’m sorry that I got it wrong.

albi wakefield has numerous chances to cross the ball from wide positions and put the ball out of play or crossed poorly.
robinson was shocking.
messi doesn't aim at the keepers throat.
but as I said I thought 26 did well

The thing is donaldo, there was structure, strategy and skill in the performance last night as well as fighting spirit.

You have a very obvious "downer" on the manager and do take every oportunity to have a go at him, unjustifiably in the opinion of myself and some others.
Going over the old ground of us struggling to compete in the Championship because of our financial inequalities and the missing of scoring opportunities that would surely have kept us up would be boring but relevent when i ask what else could have been done to improve our season last time around.
So far this season we have won at Yeovil with astrong team, won at York with a weakened team, lost at home to Port Vale and then ground out a point against one of the much fancied sides in our division when we had again a much weakened team.
That doesn't sound to me like a team that is being lead by a manager who doesn't know what he is doing.
One of your traits don is to ask questions of PD but not offer much in the way of answers apart from your regularly stated "he seems tactically unaware" and such like.

This season will give us a chance to see how PD does against teams which are more equal financially to us in the main.
Perhaps he will have the lack of backing by Brammall to make life difficult for him (look at the lack of quality and experience on the bench against PNE for evidence of that) but maybe he will do well.
Just give the bloke a chance and stop having a pop at him all the time.
Your comment about the substution was thrust back at you big time on Tuesday night but i didn't see anything from you saying that he got that right.

Hound: You seem to consider that you have every right to express your opinions. Why tell me I should not express mine?

If I am so wide of the mark that will be recognised by astute observers like you and my comments will be disregarded.

Yes, it may be that you see me as asking questions of the manager. These are for him to respond to by providing consistent performances on the pitch. We are still waiting.

When you ask me to give Mr Dickov a break it sounds as though I am harassing him directly. Obviously I am not, although it clearly upsets you.

Has it occurred to you that those who persistently defend him might irritate people like me? And unless several people have changed their minds unexpectedly I may not be as isolated as you would have me believe.

However I have no wish to deny you your right of free expression. If you are perceptive, you might have detected attempts on my part in certain situations to go some way to accommodate the views of others with whom I may not agree completely. In doing this I believe that it shows that my mind is not closed to opposing arguments.

But I am not compromising because you effectively order me to do so.

1. I have never told you that you should not express an opinion.
2. There are very few managers, if any, who consistently get their sides to play well every week.
3. Why would i think that you are harassing PD directly, i doubt very much that he will read 606 and by the way, it does not upset me in the slightest.
4. I didn't say that you are isolated.
I did say that myself and some others consider that you are unjustified in consistently putting him down.
5. Can you find a single instance of me ordering you to do anything?

Hound:
Perhaps you do not realise how some of your posts come over and perhaps you do not intend to be abrasive at all.

My answers to your points are:
1. You say "I have never told you that you should not express an opinion." I agree that you have not said this explicitly, but in your earlier post you attacked, not my opinion, but me personally, saying "donaldo is now doing what bally used to do, that is waiting for things to go wrong and then revelling in having a go at the lads and the team." Whilst 606 is largely a free-for-all in terms of the Rules of Debate, this does disappoint me and implies not only that you do not respect my opinions but that I am irresponsibly malevolent.
What you say here is linked to your number 5. You ask "Can you find a single instance of me ordering you to do anything?” My answer is that I actually said “effectively ordering". You said “Just give the bloke a chance and stop having a pop at him all the time." If someone tells me to "Stop" doing something it is not a request and I think "order" describes it perfectly.

2. You say "There are very few managers, if any, who consistently get their sides to play well every week." I did not say that we should expect that. I called for "consistent performances".

3. You say "Why would i think that you are harassing PD directly, i doubt very much that he will read 606 and by the way, it does not upset me in the slightest." We agree that he will not read 606, but I refer you to your statement at 1 above; "Give the man a break" which is a colloquial term for requesting that someone stops harassing someone else.

4. You say "I didn't say that you are isolated." And I very carefully did not say that I was. I simply objected to your implication that I was. I said "I may not be as isolated as you would have me believe."

5. Please refer to 1.

You may not accept it, but I do try to be objective. If PD was new to the job, I would be more tolerant, but I set my views in the context of past performances. He may prove me wrong, but DRFC cannot afford another season of mediocrity. As you say all things are more equal as against the rest of those in this League. We cannot wait for ever for the manager to get it right though and it is the team’s success that is paramount.

I hope that you accept that I do not want to fall out with you or anyone else on here, but that we all have to be tolerant.

I have no desire to fall out with anyone on here.
For the sake of everyone else i won't bother continuing to respond to this particular debate.

Thanks Hound, hopefully you and Donaldo do not end up like Alex and I did. Let's all get behind the team, irrespective of who the manager is, and at the moment PD is in that position. However, it does not mean people cannot be constructive in criticism.

Thanks Newyankee. I'd love to be able to attend all the games, the home ones at least, because the experience of being there enables you to express your emotions, good or bad, there and then rather than reacting to the commentary (which can make it worse) and immediately recording them all on here straight from the heart.

Exactly Donaldo, I and several others are even worse off than you, we HAVE to resort to the Biltdown man and his stuttering oppo. It's aalso difficult to find time to watch all the complete games on player especially when you get 15 minutes in and the damn thing freezes.

I got so heated with the Alex thing I let my emotions get the better of me. You nad Hound seem able to check them before they go from bad to worse. Whether in Doncaster, in Britain or anywhere else in the world we are all Rovers supporters.