Are we equipped if it's a relegation battle? ... The David Rawson Rotherham United Fan Column
IN fairness, the manager pointed it out in November. “Christmas is going to be tough. It's going to really test the squad. We're hopeful we should have some players back. I think if we can come out of it in a positive position then it's ‘game on’.”
Christmas has been tough. It has tested the squad. The squad failed the test.
We're not in a positive position. It is not 'game on'. We're back in the relegation reckoning.
At the start of the season, we were in the bottom four because we had half a team out, we couldn't defend and, although we played some tidy football, we didn't really make very many chances. You could see how it might turn, when the players returned to fitness, we tightened up and we got Sam Nombe back.
Some players did return to fitness. And now they're out again. We did tighten up. And now we're back to making basic, fundamental defensive errors.
Nombe is (sort of) back. That's pretty much what we're relying on to save us.
Only, that idea implies that we think there's something that we need "saving' from.
That’s not how we’re behaving.
There's still muttering about the play-offs in post-match player interviews. There's still no sense of jeopardy to our play. No-one is particularly bothered about closing down opponents (see Bolton Wanderers' first goal). No-one has any real sense of urgency (see Bolton’s second).
Another quote from the manager. “We don't want to be in the relegation zone, we don't want to be anywhere near it. But we are and we have to face up to that and get out of there quickly.”
I agree 100 per cent, but it shouldn't need saying. The players should have turned up at Bolton with the intensity of a team needing to scrap their way to safety. Instead, it was all careful containment and shape and structure, and barely a challenge or a press or any sign that things are on the brink of disaster. There’s no battle. There’s no “go” in us.
For the fourth game in a row, our opponents were more determined, braver in possession, faster and sharper. More bothered.
We might still have got a point, but we threw it away by the kind of carelessness that suggests we don't have a healthy enough fear of the consequences of our mistakes.
I don't want us to play fearfully. I do, though, want us to play like we realise that, if we're not careful, we won't be able to find four teams below us in the division at the end of the season.
We need to sharpen up, fast. If we don’t we’re in real danger of drifting blithely into a relegation battle. And I’m not sure I fancy our chances if that happens.