It was a real pleasure watching Chris Lines knock in what turned out to be the winning goal – if only because an few idiot six rows behind me spent the full ninety minute berating the midfielder for no good reason. Thus, this so-called fan ended up looking like the moron he had sounded like all afternoon.
My clipping from this morning's copy of The Sun
The Sun’s football website: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/football
I have never understood why fans think that slagging off the players they have paid to ‘support’ is going to do the player or the team any good, but fortunately for the rest of the Gasheads, Lines is the type of guy who responds in the right way. His first league goal of the season turned out to be the winner.
The Bristol-born midfielder is arguably the best technical player Rovers have and at some point in the next couple of seasons will move to a bigger club. In the meantime, I'd suggest that the fans make the most of his talents and if they hear idiots slagging him off, they should tell them to pipe down.
He's a decent lad who appeared as uncomfortable taking questions from a bunch of middle-aged hacks as he looks comfortable on the ball.
Lines, 24, needed to show the discipline asked of his manager, Paul Trollope, and said:
“People are entitled to their opinion, but to be honest the more they moan, the more likely I am to try and get to the other end and score a goal. that’s pretty much what’s happened today. I’ve just got to aim for double figures again as I did last year and that would be pretty good for a central midfielder.
I set high standards last season and I’m quite happy to try and live up to that. Sometimes I have to be disciplined though because we can’t all bomb forward. I don’t like sitting back, but sometimes you have to do that for the team and perhaps people don’t quite see that.”
I enjoy visiting the Mem – not least because of the passion and loyalty of their supporters – but prats like the ones behind me acting like drunk five year olds must spoil the experience for every other fan who can hear them.
Dale striker Chris O’Grady typified his side’s have-a-go mentality. The northerners could well have taken the step up from the bottom flight in the summer and tried either a kick-an-rush style or even a kick-the-opposition style, but they have continued to try and play football.
Even die-hard Rovers fans couldn’t have begrudged them a point on their first half performance alone. Rochdale hit the woodwork twice in the game and O’Grady said:
“Since we came up from League Two we’ve found that we’re up against a lot more sides who like to play good football and that suits us. If we carry on playing the way we are we’ll win more games than we lose.”
More quotes from the game on tomorrow’s blog from Paul Trollope, Chris Lines and Rochdale boss Keith Hill.
Song artist: Jim Page
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