ROVERS FANZ VIEW COLUMN
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All good things come to an end, and we saw our unbeaten streak abruptly halted after a mammoth ten days with defeat at Hull's new Kingston Communications Stadium. Lovely though this ground looks, and I'm sure both City and Rovers fans would readily swap theirs for one of these, it is yet another instance of big companies getting their names emblazoned on stadiums. I doubt Hull fans are too bothered seeing as it is an infinitely better place to watch football than Boothferry Park, but the fact is that Kingston Communications could one day go out of business for whatever reason and then you have got a ground named after a bankrupt and therefore non-existent local firm. There's the McAlpine up at Huddersfield named after the people who built it, and the Reebok Stadium because they make Bolton's kit. The Cellnet Riverside Stadium at Middlesbrough seems to have shrugged off the corporate label since the sponsors have now been taken over by somebody else but Bournemouth's Dean Court was renamed the Fitness First Stadium when they turned the pitch round and built three new stands. Leyton Orient have played at Brisbane Road since 1936 but recently they have been trying to call it the Matchroom Stadium without too much success. While Reading's Madejski Stadium is a bit of an ego-trip for the chairman, at least the name has something to do with the club's history seeing as he was the one who orchestrated the move from Elm Park, and if Rovers ever get any slack from the Council I personally wouldn't mind the Dunford Silverdome, although some of you might. The worrying thing about Hull's new home is that it is already being shortened by the media and on the road signs to the 'KC Stadium' and perhaps this sounds a bit too much like a savoury snack for comfort. Regarding matters on the pitch, and we are again hearing sound bytes about going in the right direction, even if that direction appears to be down the table again following Carlisle's win on the weekend and another point for Boston on New Years Day. Ray Graydon managed to dodge the microphones once more by staying in bed on Saturday, but judging by how little we have seen of him recently, perhaps he has been in bed since even before Christmas. On the plus side we seemed to have stopped conceding so many goals in the last few games, and Richard Rose has been a steady performer at left-back. Anwar Uddin's return should see a bit more pace at the back and hopefully we will tighten up even more. The five goals at Shrewsbury have been helping our goal difference at the bottom of the table in so much as being worth almost an extra point, but the big defeats to Wrexham, Oxford and Cambridge have nearly erased that advantage. One more thing is that the substitutes seem to be constantly changed around, and there are two ways to look at this; on the one hand it is giving everyone a sniff of a game, yet I am more inclined to say that it doesn't help certain fringe players by giving them twenty minutes one match and then leaving them out completely the next. For instance Kevin Gall came on at Swansea and did as much as anyone else to preserve our lead with a long stint on the right wing, but for the next game with Boston he was in the stands. Instead Mark McKeever and Dave Gilroy were given surprise berths on the bench and both came on, with Gilroy impressively determined during his forty-five minutes. Gilroy signs a new contract in the week and what happens? He's out of the frame for Hull with injury victims Uddin and Grazioli patched up as subs, and Kevin Gall returning. It may be Chelsea-style squad rotation, but surely a good performance deserves the reward of another chance in the very next game when the player is in form? It cannot be good for their morale to be mucked around, especially when the likes of McKeever need a lot of confidence to play to their best capabilities.
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