Post by stevek192 on Dec 28, 2015 23:39:18 GMT
After a dire game on Saturday, today was the opposite extreme and a game of the highest quality with everything that Saturdays game didn't have with two teams with some exciting players battling for supremacy and lots of good exciting football and a good advertisement for League 2 and probably the type of game where you could query why anybody who attended (from Rovers point of view) would not want to turn up for the next game. One thing I will never challenge is the commitment of a DC side but todays performance contained a fair amount of skill in addition to the tremendous workrate. If I had to challenge anything today it would be the need to make any substitutions whatsoever. None of the players replaced really let themselves down and thankfully the substitutions did not affect the final result as they held out for the three points.IMO we went from a team that looked as likely to score a third as concede one to a team who were then set up not to concede but probably relinquished any chance of extending the lead. The result was the most important thing though and IMO it was a deserved victory against very good opponents.
Mildenhall 7.5 Had a very sound game. No chance with the goal and controlled his area well. Good distribution and only one punch was questionable. Came off his line well at a players feet and made a good save in the second half to a shot that was not as straight forward as some make out as I have seen Nicholls beaten with a couple of similar shots. I am not sure if he is the long term answer (by long term I mean till the end of the season) but on todays display there are other areas to strengthen the side which are more needy and certainly Mildy did enough to retain his place.
Leadbitter7 His pace really cleared up some situations today and he managed to get forward and defend when necessary. His crossing is very questionable which for me rules him out as a winger and it is a tough choice as to whether he or James Clarke is the better defender. It seemed strange to me that Leadbitter was picked at the start of the game as the football and his performance justified DC's decision which was after a very poor substitutes appearance on Saturday. For me it was stranger to substitute a natural winger with James Clarke and put him at full back to supposedly see out the last portion of the game in preference to Leadbitter who he pushed forward and then eventually replace him to!! Very strange but did it wortk? The result says it did but I am not so sure as we went frpm looking good for a win to hanging on a bit.
Brown 6.5 I didn't feel he had such a good game today and got caught a few times and required Montano to spend a lot of time going back particularly in the first half. Rarely actually passed the ball to Montano other than for him to play the old one two which to be fair to Montano he played well but he does not give enough possession to his winger who had to work hard to get the ball and actually received it more from Mansell,Sinclair and Easter or Gaffney. Brown looked better when he didn't have a winger.
Parkes 8 Did a good job especially in some tight situations when he passed the ball out well. Won the majority of aerial battles and really see no reason why he couldn't have performed in the same way on Saturday against Wombles. Is DC a genius in the way he swops players around or does he tinker too much? He will no doubt be criticised for tinkering too much when we lose or draw but get away with it when we win! Our defence again restricted the opponents (who were much better than a lot of the teams we have played) to very little in the way of chances and were first to the ball on most occasions. The defence aa a whole seemed to have a bit of a shambolic moment on the goal when they all as a unit appeared to be ball watching as a unit and the cross went past them all to an unmarked Simpson for an easy equaliser. Thankfully they regained their composure in the second half..
Lockyer 8 Outstanding at the back other than at the Goal where probably he allowed Simpson to e left totally on his own. That was the only blemish though on some outstanding defending where he often came out with the ball and brought it away from danger and tackled with a tenacity that cut short a lot of Orients attacks. Yet again he should have done better with his header which he put over when in all honesty it should have been 2-0 he could easily have had two goals from the last two games.
Montana 7.5 People have questioned why I think he should be playing but today I felt he showed again that he is a proper winger with a fair bit of pace and skill and the ability to get past his full back and whip in a cross. He is a clever player but does not get the sort of service from Lee Brown that he should . His best moments were when he received the ball from Easter, Sinclair and Mansell. there were a number of opportunities for Brown to play him in quickly but when Brown failed to release the ball Montano then had to go inside. He is not the worlds best defender but did work very hard to get back and won a fair amount of tackles. If the players can get the ball to him quick then I think he has the pace and ability to be a real asset in the second half of the season. Please DC give him a fair chance as he is a much more natural winger than either Bodin or Gosling. Even in the second half he used his pace well to bring the ball down the line and personally I would have taken Leadbitter off and moved Montano to the right when bringing James Clarke on.
Mansell 7 Those who say that players cannot play two games in 3 days need look no further than our Captain. In the twilight days of his long career he battled superbly again and looked so much better with the equally hard working Sinclair and seemed to always be available to receive the ball and win tackles. He should have at least got his shot on target when he was set up by Gaffney but he didn't need to be told and cursed himself. He really is a leader of men and was always talking and driving on the troops.
Sinclair 7 So glad to have him back again and it was a welcome surprise as I had visions of his lay off of last season when he came off against Dagenham. The trouble is that when he comes off you fear the worst because he is so committed that he has to be pretty badly injured to come off at all. Orient players must have been fed up of the sight of him hustling them at every opportunity and then reaching the ball just in time to play short passes to both Montano and Bodin and the forwards as well. He rarely gave the ball away in a good all action performance..
Boden 6 Again showed lot of skill without reaching the heights with his overall performance but he is always dangerous and capable of bringing the ball inside and getting a shot away.
Easter 7,5 I was not as surprised as many to see Easter selected but was probably surprised it was at the expense of Matty Taylor having thought after Saturday that he would be selected in place of Bodin and played just behind the front two.IMO he fully justified his selection and worked tirelessly for the cause using all his experience against some very experienced and tough physical entre backs and he ,like most of rovers players were not helped by a referee who managed to miss so many unfair challenges he could almost be accused of being bias. He had a very good shot that was saved by the keeper and many times kept the ball under pressure and held off players with ease. Some people still ask if he is fully fit..of course he bloody is and this performance showed that. Again with the substitution he didn't appear to be struggling and was still troubling the defenders with his clever running.
Gaffney 9 MOM His best performance since arriving. He led the Orient defence a merry dance from start to finish. Cleverly holding the ball up against strong defenders and forming a terrific partnership with Easter as they both worked their socks off to hold on to the ball and also to prevent Orient doing much building from the back. This is before mentioning two superlative goals both of which could go down a a contender for goal of the season. If he is not in the team of the day then I will be very surprised as it was the best centre forward performance I have seen in a long while. How many times did the crowd shout shoot as he weaved his way magically past defender after defender and producing a fierce finish for the first and then another tremendous shot on the volley for the second,he was even unlucky not to pick up the match ball with another tremendous shot that the keeper saved.
Subs
Taylor 6 Not on long enough to really make a difference other than one wayward shot.
Clarke J 6 Was he brought on to tighten the defence? Again I suppose he was and to be fair to him he did a good job defending whilst he was on but not convinced that Leadbitter was doing much wrong.
Clarke O 6 Didn't really have long enough to do a lot but was obviously brought on to tighten up the midfield. It is difficult to judge if he did this because we did seem to go deeper and sacrifice territory but the result was 2-1 so probably he did just that.
Ref 5 Missed far too much and seemed on many occasions to penalise us for nothing. I wondered at times if he had us down for a score draw!!
Orient 7 Second time I have seen them this season and on both occasions I have felt they were a very competent side with some quality players. On this performance I can see both teams staying in or around the top. The referee seemed to favour them and make our task more difficult but the right team deservedly won.
Crowd 9 Not far off 10,000. Absolutely tremendous and a good atmosphere at times and it was good to see such a big crowd rewarded with a good game of football and three points. So often this has not been the case and the masses have left the stadium having witnessed a below par performance and no inclination to return in such numbers. I will be very disappointed if we don't see a similar number for the Luton game-maybe we can even reach the magical 10,000.
DC- For me he got the Team Selection pretty well right and had a side out that was balanced between skill, quality on the ball and a hard working ethic. Not convinced that we should have been making 11 changes over the two games but he certainly got it right today. Personally I did not see any need to make any substitutions as at the stage he made them I felt we were on top and standing a good chance of scoring another. We will never know but none of the substitutes let us down and the three points were ours so I would say that was mission accomplished and the three points today made Saturdays draw a satisfactory Xmas holiday.
I look forward to a rare unchanged team against Luton but what chance is there of that? UTG
Mildenhall 7.5 Had a very sound game. No chance with the goal and controlled his area well. Good distribution and only one punch was questionable. Came off his line well at a players feet and made a good save in the second half to a shot that was not as straight forward as some make out as I have seen Nicholls beaten with a couple of similar shots. I am not sure if he is the long term answer (by long term I mean till the end of the season) but on todays display there are other areas to strengthen the side which are more needy and certainly Mildy did enough to retain his place.
Leadbitter7 His pace really cleared up some situations today and he managed to get forward and defend when necessary. His crossing is very questionable which for me rules him out as a winger and it is a tough choice as to whether he or James Clarke is the better defender. It seemed strange to me that Leadbitter was picked at the start of the game as the football and his performance justified DC's decision which was after a very poor substitutes appearance on Saturday. For me it was stranger to substitute a natural winger with James Clarke and put him at full back to supposedly see out the last portion of the game in preference to Leadbitter who he pushed forward and then eventually replace him to!! Very strange but did it wortk? The result says it did but I am not so sure as we went frpm looking good for a win to hanging on a bit.
Brown 6.5 I didn't feel he had such a good game today and got caught a few times and required Montano to spend a lot of time going back particularly in the first half. Rarely actually passed the ball to Montano other than for him to play the old one two which to be fair to Montano he played well but he does not give enough possession to his winger who had to work hard to get the ball and actually received it more from Mansell,Sinclair and Easter or Gaffney. Brown looked better when he didn't have a winger.
Parkes 8 Did a good job especially in some tight situations when he passed the ball out well. Won the majority of aerial battles and really see no reason why he couldn't have performed in the same way on Saturday against Wombles. Is DC a genius in the way he swops players around or does he tinker too much? He will no doubt be criticised for tinkering too much when we lose or draw but get away with it when we win! Our defence again restricted the opponents (who were much better than a lot of the teams we have played) to very little in the way of chances and were first to the ball on most occasions. The defence aa a whole seemed to have a bit of a shambolic moment on the goal when they all as a unit appeared to be ball watching as a unit and the cross went past them all to an unmarked Simpson for an easy equaliser. Thankfully they regained their composure in the second half..
Lockyer 8 Outstanding at the back other than at the Goal where probably he allowed Simpson to e left totally on his own. That was the only blemish though on some outstanding defending where he often came out with the ball and brought it away from danger and tackled with a tenacity that cut short a lot of Orients attacks. Yet again he should have done better with his header which he put over when in all honesty it should have been 2-0 he could easily have had two goals from the last two games.
Montana 7.5 People have questioned why I think he should be playing but today I felt he showed again that he is a proper winger with a fair bit of pace and skill and the ability to get past his full back and whip in a cross. He is a clever player but does not get the sort of service from Lee Brown that he should . His best moments were when he received the ball from Easter, Sinclair and Mansell. there were a number of opportunities for Brown to play him in quickly but when Brown failed to release the ball Montano then had to go inside. He is not the worlds best defender but did work very hard to get back and won a fair amount of tackles. If the players can get the ball to him quick then I think he has the pace and ability to be a real asset in the second half of the season. Please DC give him a fair chance as he is a much more natural winger than either Bodin or Gosling. Even in the second half he used his pace well to bring the ball down the line and personally I would have taken Leadbitter off and moved Montano to the right when bringing James Clarke on.
Mansell 7 Those who say that players cannot play two games in 3 days need look no further than our Captain. In the twilight days of his long career he battled superbly again and looked so much better with the equally hard working Sinclair and seemed to always be available to receive the ball and win tackles. He should have at least got his shot on target when he was set up by Gaffney but he didn't need to be told and cursed himself. He really is a leader of men and was always talking and driving on the troops.
Sinclair 7 So glad to have him back again and it was a welcome surprise as I had visions of his lay off of last season when he came off against Dagenham. The trouble is that when he comes off you fear the worst because he is so committed that he has to be pretty badly injured to come off at all. Orient players must have been fed up of the sight of him hustling them at every opportunity and then reaching the ball just in time to play short passes to both Montano and Bodin and the forwards as well. He rarely gave the ball away in a good all action performance..
Boden 6 Again showed lot of skill without reaching the heights with his overall performance but he is always dangerous and capable of bringing the ball inside and getting a shot away.
Easter 7,5 I was not as surprised as many to see Easter selected but was probably surprised it was at the expense of Matty Taylor having thought after Saturday that he would be selected in place of Bodin and played just behind the front two.IMO he fully justified his selection and worked tirelessly for the cause using all his experience against some very experienced and tough physical entre backs and he ,like most of rovers players were not helped by a referee who managed to miss so many unfair challenges he could almost be accused of being bias. He had a very good shot that was saved by the keeper and many times kept the ball under pressure and held off players with ease. Some people still ask if he is fully fit..of course he bloody is and this performance showed that. Again with the substitution he didn't appear to be struggling and was still troubling the defenders with his clever running.
Gaffney 9 MOM His best performance since arriving. He led the Orient defence a merry dance from start to finish. Cleverly holding the ball up against strong defenders and forming a terrific partnership with Easter as they both worked their socks off to hold on to the ball and also to prevent Orient doing much building from the back. This is before mentioning two superlative goals both of which could go down a a contender for goal of the season. If he is not in the team of the day then I will be very surprised as it was the best centre forward performance I have seen in a long while. How many times did the crowd shout shoot as he weaved his way magically past defender after defender and producing a fierce finish for the first and then another tremendous shot on the volley for the second,he was even unlucky not to pick up the match ball with another tremendous shot that the keeper saved.
Subs
Taylor 6 Not on long enough to really make a difference other than one wayward shot.
Clarke J 6 Was he brought on to tighten the defence? Again I suppose he was and to be fair to him he did a good job defending whilst he was on but not convinced that Leadbitter was doing much wrong.
Clarke O 6 Didn't really have long enough to do a lot but was obviously brought on to tighten up the midfield. It is difficult to judge if he did this because we did seem to go deeper and sacrifice territory but the result was 2-1 so probably he did just that.
Ref 5 Missed far too much and seemed on many occasions to penalise us for nothing. I wondered at times if he had us down for a score draw!!
Orient 7 Second time I have seen them this season and on both occasions I have felt they were a very competent side with some quality players. On this performance I can see both teams staying in or around the top. The referee seemed to favour them and make our task more difficult but the right team deservedly won.
Crowd 9 Not far off 10,000. Absolutely tremendous and a good atmosphere at times and it was good to see such a big crowd rewarded with a good game of football and three points. So often this has not been the case and the masses have left the stadium having witnessed a below par performance and no inclination to return in such numbers. I will be very disappointed if we don't see a similar number for the Luton game-maybe we can even reach the magical 10,000.
DC- For me he got the Team Selection pretty well right and had a side out that was balanced between skill, quality on the ball and a hard working ethic. Not convinced that we should have been making 11 changes over the two games but he certainly got it right today. Personally I did not see any need to make any substitutions as at the stage he made them I felt we were on top and standing a good chance of scoring another. We will never know but none of the substitutes let us down and the three points were ours so I would say that was mission accomplished and the three points today made Saturdays draw a satisfactory Xmas holiday.
I look forward to a rare unchanged team against Luton but what chance is there of that? UTG
