Tomorrow lunchtime Rovers play their 37th league game against Chesterfield, having won 19, drawn nine and lost eight of the previous 36 meetings.
Whilst our home record against Chesterfield is very good (won 14, drawn four) our away record reads five wins, five draws and eight defeats.
Tomorrow will be the first meeting in the league since 2016/17 when both sides recorded home wins, Chesterfield winning 3-2 in November 2016 and Rovers 2-1 in March 2017.
Rovers, as we know, lost both of their opening league games against Harrogate Town and Fleetwood Town and were dumped out of the Carabao Cup by Cambridge United.
Chesterfield, meanwhile, have won both of their opening league games, against Barrow and Cheltenham Town, though they did suffer a 2-0 home defeat against Mansfield Town in their midweek Carabao Cup Tie.
Darrell Clarke has brought in defender Kacper Lopata on loan from Barnsley and it will be a surprise if he doesn’t start tomorrow. How many more changes he will make to the side that started last week’s game at Fleetwood remains to be seen.
Darrell said many things in his press briefing ahead of this game, including this comment; ‘I’d like to think things will change quickly. I can’t guarantee that, but what I can say is that we will basically get there and that’s the best way I can describe it to be honest.
‘I think we should have got more from the first two games of the season, but we didn’t, so there has been a little bit of unrest. I have a clear understanding of where we need to go, where we have to be moving forward.’
Defender Macauley Southam-Hales said this; ‘The bare minimum as a professional is to give 100% to give the fans something to get behind. It’s obviously not nice getting the reception now and again but sometimes it’s deserved and it’s on us as players, and as a club, to give the fans something to get behind.’
Chesterfield boss Paul Cook, one of the game’s characters, said this of tomorrow’s fixture; ‘I’ve played against Darrell’s teams a lot. I think he is probably a very similar manager to myself. I think they will be a threat come the end of the season. Going into the game tomorrow, they’ve got very good players, no doubt.
‘Like most teams that get relegated there’s always a hangover from the disappointment but whatever game they bring it will be a very tough game, I know for sure. He likes attacking football so let’s see what type of game he brings tomorrow with Bristol Rovers.’
Kick off tomorrow is 12.30pm and we wish all travelling Gasheads a safe journey to Chesterfield and back.