Come on please Azza, Zigger, Hound. Lanzo, Donaldo, and others, let us have a full and frank discussion as to what has gone wrong at our beloved club.

Please don't let us get into slanging matches and name calling, but those who go to games see more than those of us who love the club but live thousands of miles away.

Where has it all gone wrong? Who is to blame? Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

We can discuss the owners all day but I do believe their lack of enthusiasm has spread through the club from top to bottom.

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On the field we all have our favourites and pet hates.
On the whole I don't believe we should be relegation fodder.
Stuckman is not the reason we are in this mess.
Shot stopping he is championship standard.
Positional sense and organisation wise probably conference.
I do think we have been let down by 2 very poor mangers.
Dickoff was no ones choice when he was appointed.
Ferguson however was a popular choice and I for one thought he must have been promised funds and support for him to take the job on.
It would appear I was very wrong

Lanza, I wasn't going to do a thread but then thought we need to speak our minds in the hope that people at the club actually look at these sites.

Some will blame thew owners, some the managers and some thew players. It will be interesting to see what everyone does think.

Several players have left themselves down.Keegan Chaplow yo yo Evina.and others.
Several players are just poor..
The way we have set up in recent weeks has been confusing.
Lund as a wing back i ask you.
Not the lads fault but he has been at fault for a few goals and just looks lost.
Ferguson knows more about football than I ever will but some of his moves baffle me.
We have been desperate for a pro centre back all season and the problem still has not been addressed

When you look at the boards vision set out at the start of the season YOUTH was constantly being mentioned and bringing lads through. That happened fair enough but at the expense of loosing high earning experienced players in the process I.e Jones and Wellens and to some extent Forrester. All 3 players were of the highest earners at the club and all 3 have now gone on. Whether people think it's down to Fergie or not I doubt it will have been his sole decision if so and certainly not being put in a position where he has the final say.

What I do know is that at the start of the season we had a competitive and one of the best budgets in the division, yet I can't seem to recall us paying a fee for one player?? I could be wrong. Therefore it would be freebies and money for wages.

The signings on loan have been very disappointing Connor Grant aside and have offered hardly anything to the squad. Is this down to scouting?

The failure to strengthen the defensive department will run on forever but I also feel we don't have a nasty and or creative midfielder in the middle of the park. Keegan and chaplow for all there experience are poor. Which leads me on to Wellens. Rumour has it and I say rumour is that we wouldn't offer him another year due to his age and also he felt it was getting to much to travel over here. We haven't had a better player in my opinion than Wellens since we've been back in the league maybe stock on par. On his day he was the best passer, the most creative in thebleagur and had a nasty side to him. Sadly something we don't currently have.

Another department where I feel we've failed is the strikers. At the start of the season Tyson and Williams were poor then they picked up round November to January and now back to where they were. For 2 players of there type they should both be aiming and hitting 20 goals a season.

Overall there's sole blame at everyone's feet. The board the manager and certainly the players. They all take the plaudits when things are going well so they all deserved to get slated when things aren't. Losing so disgustingly yesterday just shows there's no fight and battle within us. There's enough names and leaders on the pitch. The goals we concede are always similar. Sloppy passing giving the ball away resulting in half hearted attempts to defend and resulting in us conceding. Twice in 2 games we've gone ahead and twice ended up losing. That's down to concentration, a captain to keep the troops in check and also a manager who had the power to change style tactics and formation. Sadly again has all been missing.

I was very taken by the analysis of Fergie as a manager posted last week by the Peterborough supporter. He started here playing a 3-5-2 pressing game and had quite a few good wins but it was always heart in the mouth stuff as it depended on us taking our chances and the opposition missing clear theirs. He was lucky. Then one or two players lost form, the chances and goals dried up and he started to make wholesale chances in personnel and formations. All the failings that the Posh bloke mentioned came to pass. Slow to deal with players and formations that clearly weren't working. Over-complication. No speed down the flanks and no penetration through the middle. Add in a stream of loanees in midfield and you could see any belief in the players just draining away. I believe that he now doesn't know what to do. He has tried everything and it hasn't worked. Why wait. It is perhaps time to bring in another manager to build a side to get us out of Div 2.

Yankee: This is very thought-provoking and I will contribute further when I have got all my thoughts together.

I must say that what I saw yesterday rather shocked me. No one really seemed to know what to do or what the rest of the team might do or should be doing; like a bunch of players who had never seen each other play before. So there was a tendency to hope that a one-touch pass, (very often not properly brought under control first), might find a colleague and it usually didn't.

Consequently those recent arrivals whose heads were not full of the systems preached to them over the past dozen games were the most decisive. Rowe was an effective tackler, Matthews was in command of his area and McSheffery was a very incisive presence up front (in the first half certainly). He also showed the same make-you-wince aggression as a Wellens or a Stock and yet managed to escape formal admonishment.

When you only have long balls as your attacking strategy they need to be controlled, but this rarely happened with Tyson badly out of touch and yesterday at least short of the skill to get on the ball and keep it. Copps did not seem to want to hold the ball and steady things; indeed there was not much evidence of anyone looking around and judging what would be the best pass.

Possession football when you are in your own half and the opposition is allowing you space is bad enough, but there were times when Colchester had the ball in the final third and were weaving in and around our players interchanging passes like PL vs Conference. It was truly embarrassing.

It reminded me of that team which was known as "The Arsenal of the North". I can't remember who that was now...

Yankee, before I say my piece I have to challenge you on something you wrote in the opening post.
Dickov did not suffer a long run of defeats, he lost two of the opening six games.
What is going wrong was the question.
We now have a manager who we were happy to have but even though we won a few games early on we were lucky to have done so and I sensed that there were flaws in his style.
I wrote about it and was pilloried for doing so.
DF only appears to know about attacking with very little attention being given to the other end of the pitch.
He also appears not to want strong outspoken characters around the place and so Wellens and Jones had to go.
Butler said his piece and missed four games for doing so.
We have all known that we need a Jones type defender but the manager has not brought one in.
It is worth remembering that our players are L1 players and as such are likely to make mistakes and be less consistent than the players we see on match of the day.
However they still need leadership and we are sorely lacking a couple of outspoken and strong characters on the pitch.
When RW and RJ went and also Forrester it was supposedly to free up money to bring players in.
At a time when things were going well I was quite excited about who we would be signing.
Maybe my £1500 bet might come in??
Instead we got a string of kids making their league debuts and the outcome was where we are now.
This run makes SoDs run of one win in nineteen look decent.
If we win another game this season I will be surprised, and that comes from me, as you all know, someone with a very positive attitude.
Fergies post Colchester comments will in my opinion, turn the players against him(if they already aren't)and I resent him making them.
As for club doncaster, well as you know, I have always been vehemently against it.
I love my team but dont give a monkeys about the Dons or the Belles or community awards.
This bringing them together doesn't do anything for the Rovers.
Azza, without wishing to start an argument, it it unreasonable to expect two strikers in the same team to get 20 goals in a season, it is a very rare thing in English football.
Tyson missed most of the first dozen games and his return to the team coincided with DF's arrival.
Funnily enough, Tyson got injured in January along with Coppinger and that is when this horrendous run started.
As for Stuckman, I think he is just an ok L1 keeper and no better or worse than keepers at other clubs.
The "fantastic saves". he has made are only the same as ones made by opposition keepers.
Our recent decline probably began with the departure if JR.
For all his posturing and love of the limelight he was RTID like the rest if us whereas Brammall and Watson and Co appear not to give a fig about the football side of things.
When did any of the board last make a public statement about the Rovers apart from in the pre prepared confines of meet the owners meetings?
Yankee, I remember only too well your dislike of my former schoolmate Dave Morris but can you honestly say that Baldwin is any better?
Overall there is a serious malaise within the club and if it continues I foresee us struggling to stay in L2 next season.
Our better players will probably have relegation release clauses in their contracts.
I recently watched the L2 section of the Ch5 football programme the other week for the first time and the quality of players in that division makes L1 look like the PL.
They will be the type of players we can look forward to seeing signing for us.
I remember writing in January that Fergies decision not to bring strong defenders in was a very bad one from a business perspective.
Sadly it looks like I will be right.

I fully agree with you Hound, you , like most on here have covered the points everyone else has. My point about Dickov referred to his TIME as Rovers Manager, not just this season. If you read what I said I did say that many of us wanted him gone at the end of last season.

As for Dave Morris I had no time for him at all, the difference between him and Baldwin is that the latter has proper business qualifications. Unfortunately he, like the owners has NO football experience and business and football are two different entities.

The other thing is that but for Stuckmann we would have lost more games by bigger margins due to the lack of defensive quality in the team. Now he is not doing as well we are being found out.

As you have. Said Yankee, some of us go to the matches.
Stuckman is no better or worse than most of the keepers in the division.

I can only go by the commentaries and highlights Hound.

As i said he's not the reason we are in this mess.
What is now very obvious the players are not happy

Agreed Lanza.
My guess is that there have been some big differences of opinion between DF and some senior players which have resulted in bust ups.
The knock on is an unhappy dressing room.

In any business, no matter how big, it starts at the top and filters down. Football nowadays is a business end of. This board have undone all the amazing things that's happened on the pitch over the last 10yrs. Shame on them. One of the biggest budgets in this league! What for..... loan players.
FERGIE. He was my choice and I've backed him from the start, but today is his D-Day. Last chance saloon.
The players. In my opinion they should be fined a year's wage. A total n utter disgrace. How they can claim wages for turning up, because there's nothing else on the field that warrants payment, no passion, no balls, no nothing.
As for me, I hope to be here next season and the season's after even if we're back in the conference.

Born a Zigger. Die a Zigger.

R.T.I.D.

When JR made his public split with the Board at the Barnsley match, opinion was divided. I actually sat on the fence, but it now seems that everyone backs him. He did choose Dickov though, let's not forget.

But on a practical level we have to recognise that no one will want to buy the club and JR won't come back, so the only dim light in the tunnel of gloom is a strong informed voice for DRFC on the Board.

Would the takeover have been the right choice after all?

Driving back from north Yorkshire for the game weather atrocious Why?

Just another Bank Holiday. Same old weather.

We died a death on Friday. Can we rise from the dead today.........

Could this be the start of the great escape.


Or are we just p!ssing in the wind.

Zigger I feel like we will be pee!ng in the wind but hope not. I put more effort and concentration when I am sat on the toilet than the players have lately

Morning all.

Thanks for all your views on the present situation, it appears that no one is satisfied with things, but there are many options as to why things have gone bad.

I just thought it would give us all something to get our teeth into whilst waiting for today's game of the season. So called because if we don't win today then the big fall awaits.

Today's team to follow, what changes can DF make that might make a difference from the debacle at Colchester ? Who should come in and who should be left out ? Will it make any difference if as some think the players have their own agenda.?

Not many here. Let's hope it's not a sign of things to come.

Today's team

Matthews

Lund, Alcock, Butler and Taylor-Sinclair.

Coppinger, Middleton, Calder and Rowe

McSheffrey and Williams

Subs

Stuckmann, Evina, Tyson, Mandeville, Chaplow

Longbotttom and Stewart.

I am sorry, but we have virtually the same side as Friday, two changes only, Keegan and MacKenzie are out of the 18 and Lund and Longbottom are in.

Look for us conceding in the first fifteen minutes and playing catch up. If we score first we need a second very soon after to give us control, one is not enough.

The teams are coming pout, Rovers in Red and White hoops, Blackpool in Navy blue with Tangerine piping.