It may have been the same result, with the same scorer from the spot, but with a different manager in the dugout the same three points we won this time felt so much sweeter. Although Wayne Carlisle only had to take his penalty once against Carlisle United last week, he proved yet again that he could hold his nerve to win the match for us under the weight of everyone's expectation. When Wayne's twice-taken spot-kick secured victory over Scunthorpe for Ray Graydon three weeks ago, it was only our second home win from eight at the Mem since beating Cheltenham in September. Most people were happy to see us triumph that day but it merely papered over the cracks as far as Graydon's tenure was concerned. After so many false dawns had left us stumbling around in the dark during Ray's eighteen months in charge, I had started greeting each of his team's victories with a degree of caution, knowing that we were more likely to lose the next match than win it. It is this inconsistency that has plagued the team this season and caused such frustration for the fans. We were the first side to take a point off Oxford at the Kassam Stadium in late October and then knocked Hull City off the top with a spirited display at home, yet we lost to mediocre outfits like Bury, Northampton and Kidderminster. In some games we have shown that we can match the best and beat them but we have also played poorly against some of the worst sides this league has to offer and not even competed with them. The squad of players we have here at Rovers were more than capable of disposing of a Carlisle team that had lost eleven of its thirteen away fixtures and under the stewardship of Phil Bater we did just that. Had Ray Graydon been in charge, I'm not sure we would have won. Already we have heard little snippets of information from the players regarding some of the changes that have been made since Ray left. Danny Boxall said that training now starts at a regular time, whereas Graydon apparently organised his sessions at varying hours throughout the day. Like you and me, these players do have personal lives and I expect they would rather have a routine and know when they can go and plan things than be left in the lurch from one day to the next. Another unnamed senior player revealed: "a lot of the lads were unhappy with the way training was being handled. It got so bad recently that the players actually organised their own training session one afternoon because we didn't feel we were getting the sort of work we needed." Bater wrote in his programme notes last Saturday that "the art of good management is to have good people around you. These days, a manager needs to get the best out of individuals and to delegate." It is therefore refreshing to hear that experienced pros like Graham Hyde are now helping to take training. This senior player also said that Graydon's principles about discipline sometimes went a bit too far and in his words were "treated like naughty kids". How could we forget Ray's outburst about taking Paul Tait's house off him after a red card at Darlington last season. Aside from the training, Boxall also stated that Bater has shown he is more tactically aware than Graydon and he's only been in charge for two weeks! Phil took a defender off and went with three strikers to rescue a point at Rochdale in his first game, while Ray only ever seemed to make defensive substitutions and often these would cost us points. The caretaker boss seems to be getting the best out of Junior Agogo too, as his nightmare against Macclesfield was soon forgotten when he headed a super equaliser at Spotland. © Chris Chappell - Friday 30th January 2004 Back to Index