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On Monday Ian Atkins was finally unveiled as the latest manager of Bristol Rovers. As with most new eras in football, the appointment has brought with it a great deal of optimism and although we have been stung a few times lately when getting excited about managers, I too share the belief that there are better times around this particular corner. Even Atkins' embittered former chairman at Oxford, Firoz Kassam, describes the man as "an expert at bringing Third Division teams up into Division 2," adding that "he would probably have done it for us." The jokes about extra neck braces being required at the Mem next season have already been doing the rounds and while we may see less pretty football, this style of play hardly won us dozens of matches in the last couple of years. Unless you're Arsenal, it is very difficult to play total football and win trophies, and sometimes you will need to get results by playing ugly as Rovers fans well know from that unforgettable play-off defeat to Atkins' Northampton in 1998. When news broke of our interest in Atkins some weeks ago, Geoff Twentyman made the point that the much heralded Third Division Championship winning team of 1990 played a lot of direct football under Gerry Francis. It was a simple style which involved playing the ball up to 6'3" Devon White (or his understudy 6'4" Christian McClean) and feeding off the knock-downs, and Rovers did it to great effect, capturing a rare trophy for the cabinet. Alongside the giants in that legendary team we also fielded some tidy footballers too, such as Gary Penrice at the start of that season, then Carl Saunders, as well as Ian Holloway. And looking at Ian Atkins' sides over the past few years, for every Julian Alsop or John Gayle there has been a Steve Basham and a Carlo Corazzin in the team to compliment them. The five players brought in on Transfer Deadline Day have all been applauded in making our erratic bunch a better outfit and almost everyone is in agreement that Henriksen, Lescott, Gibb, John Anderson and Danny Williams are all decent players. I had a feeling at the time that Atkins had exercised an influence over the arrivals, as Ali Gibb had played for him before at Northampton, while Anderson was a no-nonsense defender of the type favoured by our new manager. He and Williams are importantly good headers of a ball too. Of the Rovers squad members out of contract at the end of the campaign, I think Adam Barrett has risen to the challenge sufficiently in recent weeks to deserve a new deal, whereas Paul Tait may not be so fortunate because Atkins prefers less subtle battering rams, and this despite scoring 18 goals in two seasons here. Nobody gets past Kevin Austin these days and if you consider the fact that his injuries seem to have cleared up, he should be the first to get a longer-term contract and a bit of security at last. Ian Atkins reckons he needs two years to mould his Rovers side into a fearsome force and judging by his previous restoration jobs at Oxford and Northampton, that sounds about right. He also has a tendency to draw big clubs in the Cup competitions too, and in particular Arsenal, with his time at Carlisle highlighted by a home tie with the Gunners and then he earned a trip to Highbury with Oxford last year. Ray Graydon's cup record was abysmal and we haven't rubbed shoulders with the big boys since we gave Derby a good stuffing at Pride Park.
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