ROVERS FANZ VIEW COLUMN
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I think Geoff Twentyman put it perfectly last week when he said Rovers were "drifting". At the moment the team is neither blowing the opposition away nor falling to pieces in panic-button freefall mode. Had it not been for some charitable defending up at Cambridge the other week, then we would have completed a full house of five 1-1 draws in a row. What a record to be proud of. As it stands, the four one-all draws from our last five games have seen us throw away the lead three times and come back from behind once, and such situations can cause quite a dilemma for the fan. The general consensus is that taking the lead only to lose it is extremely disappointing, while on the other hand fighting back to level is very much a positive result. At the end of the 90 minutes the score ends up the same, yet it is strange how one 1-1 can feel so different to another. One dissenting voice in the crowd last week was even suggesting that our curious run of jackpot draws was somehow a conspiracy among our recent referees and linesmen to win big on the pools. What might give you more generous odds of a big payout is to put money on Rovers to score two in a match, regardless of how many go in at the other end. We've only managed it once since early October, when we beat Hull with a late winner, and the other instance in January surely doesn't count because Rochdale scored one for us in our 2-2 draw at Spotland. Our goal of the week last Saturday certainly looked more like a goal of the season as Paul Tait picked up Lee Matthews' flick, cleverly dinked the ball over two defenders before lobbing the Southend goalkeeper majestically. The pair had combined in a similar fashion during the previous game away at Leyton Orient and Tait seems to have overcome his injury problems to hit a purple patch on his return to the starting line-up. Nine goals is now a personal best for the sky-scraping striker after he surpassed last season's tally of eight and hopefully he can break well into double figures before the campaign comes to a close. The last two games have also been notable for the performances of Kevin Miller in the Rovers goal. He was having a bit of a dodgy spell about a month ago and then was forced to sit out of the Huddersfield fixture because of breathing problems, but he has been in fine form recently. His saves kept us in the contest at Brisbane Road when we were defending with only ten men and then he made some eye-catching stops against Southend too, including one late in the game where he clawed the ball out of the bottom corner. Both Tait and Miller have been patients in physio Phil Kite's overcrowded knee rehabilitation unit this season and there were two new admissions last week as Danny Boxall and the conspicuously absent Wayne Carlisle booked in - which hopefully scotched rumours of the latter having a bust-up with caretaker boss Phil Bater. Boxall's lay-off, coupled with the three-match suspension of Ijah Anderson gives Bater big problems over the two wing-back positions for the next couple of weeks. Rob Quinn is definitely not the answer after Saturday's commendable attempt to fill the gap on the right, and I reckon Neil Arndale should be given a go myself. Meanwhile, our left side is completely open and this could be the opportunity to try a more attacking player out there like Williams or Hodges.
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