Time to forfeit yourself Steve. Enough is enough.

 

I love midweek games, always have done. It dates back to my days as a schoolboy, unaffected by financial pressures and fatigue, happy to watch the Rovers every living day of the week. School was notoriously crap, the girls would sooner fight you than look at you and there wasn’t much else going on. Come to think of it, as an adult – nothing much has changed, well, apart from the financial pressures bit.

The illumination of the floodlights, the mystical magic in the air, the atmosphere and intensified excitement, breaking the working week up and more poignantly, allowing an immediate opportunity to make up for a Saturday defeat. Unless you get dicked again that is.

Yesterday’s trip to Cardiff proved to be exactly that, comprehensively outplayed for the third time in succession – leaving a bitter taste in the mouths of 1,000 foolhardy fans. A frosty evening in Cardiff was interpolated by sporadic outbreaks of rain and hail, though it was the shower on the pitch that caused most concern. Unlike the weather, poor performances and poorer results are becoming more predictable by the day, or night.

I see Kean’s been at it again, reinforcing stereotypes about footballers and managers - well, some of them - being essentially brain-dead, spouting the usual clichés and nonsense, only to contradict himself twenty-four hours later. ‘I WON’T SACRIFICE CUP SUCCESS’ boasted the headline of the local rag on Tuesday, while Wednesday’s edition offered the contrast of ‘LEAGUE COMES FIRST’ and the alarming admission that Kean had ‘forfeited’ the match through his equally alarming team selection and tactical ineptitude.

We’ve grown accustomed to Kean talking bollocks, or at least attempted to, but this latest line is one giant slap in the face to the travelling fans who rebuilt their hopes, piece-by-piece, after a mauling at Stoke, embarrassed by Wigan a week earlier, making the 400 mile round-trip on a bitterly cold Tuesday night.

In testing economic times, capping off three away trips in nine days and with an expensive festive season on the horizon, the much-maligned manager has gained yet more enemies with his latest PR disaster. Witnessing it was bad enough.

In reality, a place that Kean appears to have completely disconnected himself from, and considering that both Olsson and Samba aren’t fully fit anyway - this was his current first-choice defence that shipped their 8th goals in 3 outings, the 38th of the season so-far and the 73rd of one of the worst years in recent history.

One of his key summer signings, Simon Vukčević , – a winger deemed ‘not-yet-fit’ for the Premiership – was overlooked for a player who is evidently not fit for League One in Blackman. Mauro Formica looks like he’d be more comfortable in front of a roasting fire, while the rest of team would be more comfortable with a roasting fire up their arse.

A goal-down at the interval and still in with a shout, we were expecting changes at half-time. We really should know better. They didn’t come of course, not after the second calamitous goal went in, not until the 70th and 80th minutes. ‘Too little, too late’ – never mind key players, it’s the fans that need a rest.

A manager increasingly showing the strains of pressure, Kean spent most of the game patrolling the technical area in his mackintosh. A bag-of-tosh would be more fitting.

Seeing as the action on the pitch was non-existent, unless you were a Cardiff fan – who themselves appeared sympathetic to our plight – I spent a lot of the second-half observing the manager’s body language. He demonstrated a disconnection to his own bench, a lack of unity and support perhaps, flailing his arms around as Real Madrid, sorry, Cardiff forged another frenzied attack on the Rovers goal. Paul Clement eventually had a word in his ear, the first signs of movement from the bench all night. I don’t know what Paul said – but I hope it was something along the lines of: “Steve, you’re shit”.

By the time his team had recovered possession and had bored the living daylights out of each other with the sideways passing speed of a tortoise carrying a piano up an extensive flight of stairs, Cardiff had predictably re-organised. Defending as a unit, attacking as a unit, picking their way through static opposition – Premiership? We’re not exactly having a laugh, but the team would appear to struggle at Championship level, should the increasingly inevitable threat of relegation loom. Key players won’t be available for selection at all next season, so the dynamics of last night’s selection would be the same.

Plan B was to launch a series of balls ten-yards over Goodwillie’s head – cutting a frustrated and forlorn figure at the blunted spearhead of a toothless attack. We can’t even play the long-ball game these days.

The team lacks leadership, a motivator, a Robbie Savage to have a word and pick them up. By his own admission, Savage wasn’t the best player – but that was his greatest impact and compliment – rousing the players when the going got tough, berating mistakes and congratulating a good tackle or play, setting the tempo of the last great Rovers side under Mark Hughes. Samba tries his best, but much like his fitness and fidelity, we can’t rely too much on the big man.

Like most of the season, Kean was tactically outwitted by his counterpart, this time by a manager who has barely more experience. Every time Cardiff won possession, there were three or four bodies asking for the ball. They were organised, passionate and completely deserving of a one-sided victory. The 20,000 who paid their respects beautifully to Gary Speed would have been expecting a stern test against higher-level opposition, although it was the home team that appeared superior in every position on the pitch. In truth, it was as easy a victory as they’re likely to experience all season.

So where to now? Can we beat Swansea on Saturday? On recent showings, the answer is particularly blunt. Enough is enough. The team is going down, a shock win on Saturday or not; shock being the key word. Fearing the visit of Swansea tells its own story. Realistically, we need to take nine points from the next four games. Can we see that happening? Kean probably can and he’ll probably follow it up with more excuses.

Individually, we’re not that bad – we can all see it – but collectively, as a team, we’re a disaster and the buck has to stop with one man. The football is getting worse, the results speak for themselves and the baby-steps taken against Chelsea and Spurs are but a distant memory. Patience has been abandoned and the protestors were right all along.

It’s time to unite and up the ante, it’s time to make that voice heard all the way to India. Venky’s, we’re pleading with you, crying from the stands: it’s time to put your money where your mouth is, get your fingers out and try and salvage something from this mess while there’s still time. Cardiff are laughing at us, B*rnl*y are laughing at us and the powder-keg of emotion is exploding all around us. You don’t need to be a football expert to come to the very real conclusion that it’s not working. It’s not getting any better. It won’t get any better. We’re embarrassed and we’re hurting, lying in the gutter, angry and dejected. It’s time for the axe to fall. Steve Kean: get your mackintosh - it’s time to go. We are the Rovers.