THE GAME
At last, after the 28th time of asking, Rovers finally put in a performance we have all been craving since the start of the season; their best home performance by far saw them brush aside Peterborough United by three goals to one.
Head Coach Inigo Calderon once again made six changes to his starting XI and on this occasion his selection paid off and lifted the mood amongst supporters inside the Memorial Stadium.
Visiting keeper Nick Bilokapic kept out an early effort from Isaac Hutchinson, while Josh Griffiths made two routine saves from Chris Conn-Clarke before a poor backpass from Grant ward set up Gustav Lundgren with a superb chance to open the scoring though, thankfully, he fired wide of the target.
It was a costly miss as Rovers took the lead after 15 minutes when Matt Butcher swung in a corner which James Wilson fired home from five yards. It began a period of dominance from Rovers as Hutchinson hit a shot wide and, from another Butcher corner, Bilokapic almost punched the ball into his own net.
Griffiths saved again from Conn-Clarke before the interval and Luke Thomas was denied a goal when his effort was ruled out for offside.
Griffiths was again called into action early in the second half when he touched away a shot from substitute Malik Mothersille. The second goal of the game was scored by Rovers, though. On 62 minutes Ward chipped the ball over the Peterborough back line, finding Hutchinson, who chested the ball down before beating Bilokapic with a shot that went in off the post.
Griffiths touched a shot from Conn Clarke on the crossbar as the visitors attempted to reduce the deficit, but a third Rovers goal sealed victory with eight minutes remaining. A delightful flick on by Chris Martin found Ruel Sotiriou sprinting down the left. The striker cut inside before hitting a superb right foot curling shot past Bilokapic.
Peterborough managed a late consolation when Ricky-Jade Jones backheeled the ball into the net following a goalmouth scramble. Whilst it was disappointing to conceded at the death, there were many positives to take from this Rovers performance, not least the form shown at right back by Jack Hunt, who has been sorely missed.
THEY SAID WHAT?
‘I tried to take a bit of pressure off the players because I said that it’s not going to make any change if we had lost today, we would be in the same situation. Now we have won, we are in the same situation. It’s true that you want to win, and especially I think the way we did today. It was really good because I think we started to show a better version of ourselves with every game.
‘I think today was really good. We defended better. When we defend it is not the defenders, it is everyone on the team. I think we pressed higher better; I think we defended our goal better, and after with the ball, we had good spells. I think overall, it was the best performance we played so far.”
‘Having different scorers is good for the team and the way we score goals. That is great for the boys because, for example, we were talking about the set pieces that we didn’t score before, and we were working on it this week a bit more. I’m really, really happy with the boys today and the way we played consistently during the 90 minutes.’ (Rovers Head Coach Inigo Calderon)
‘It’s been a tough week. Obviously, we had a good result last time we were at home, and we wanted to back that up as we didn’t manage to do that last week. We’re really happy with the result today. We got a lot wrong as well that we need to work on, but it’s because we’re trying to change the way we play and do different things.
‘I think, hopefully, people can be patient with us, and we can start picking up more points. We’re just going to get better, hopefully, so we’re really happy today.
“It was a great ball from Matt Butcher that led to my goal. We’ve been working on getting in good areas and trying to arrive. I thought we were close on a lot today. I thought the set pieces were really good, so I was really happy to get the goal. I’m really glad Matt is here. He’s a good friend of mine. We had some great times together, so I knew what kind of player he was and what he could bring to the team and I think he showed that today in his first game.’ (Rovers defender James Wilson)
‘Clearly, the table does not lie. After 30 games, we have not been good enough. We are miles away. To be where we are is not acceptable. At the moment, none of us are doing the job to the level we expected. I have to make sure relegation doesn’t happen. That is my remit until the end of the season. I don’t think it will happen. I think we will have enough but we need to show more than what we are at the minute.
‘We were not good enough away from home again, it’s as simple as that. It was a very winnable match, but we’ve conceded three poor goals. We’ve conceded from another set piece. It was so easy, and we don’t get goals like that. We are so easy to score against; it is so disappointing.
‘We tried to change it at half time to get a bit more quality, but we didn’t get it. We had so many good opportunities as we nicked the ball off them quite a few times in the first half. Conn-Clarke was good, but the rest were nowhere near what we need. I went to apologise to the fans after the game. It was the least they deserved. They obviously criticised me and the team, which you would expect. You have to take that on the chin, we are not going to be getting plaudits at the moment.’ (Peterborough Manager Darren Ferguson)
