Millers Mullered vs Rotherham (L2)

It was back home to the East Stand for me. Two away games and a trip up the north face of the South Stand had meant that I'd been away for a bit. The day was bright, dry and (especially after Gillingham) thankfully windless. The team was changed a bit with Midson coming back in for the slighty-injured-but-on-the-bench Craddock and Heslop replacing the slighty-injured-but-on-the-bench-as-well Clist.

I heard the team news as I was sitting in my car in the east stand car park. Determined to get a space (getting out of the main car park winds me up something rotten!), I'd arrived at about 1.45 and managed to nab just about the last free place. Whatever are we going to do when (not if, but when) we are in the Championship? Parking will be impossible. The only answer is that we'll all have to move and live on the Leys! I decided to go and inspect the chip van, since I needed something to drink during the match. The chips looked OK, so I risked it. They were lovely. Life is full of little surprises. Of course I know I'm only being built up so I can be knocked down again, and it will be a different story next time!

On to the match. Rotherham were a bit of an unknown. When we went to their place (the one where you can hardly see the pich, it's so far away), our team was in a bit of disarray, with Futcher being our great midfield hope. The highly touted Le Fondre scored two goals, and it wasn't really very good. This time around, they had also signed Omar Daley from Bradford - who had also scored twice against us in our match up there. So it was a certainty that they'd be dangerous up front. But, they hadn't won away for a while, losing at 3-1 at Gillingham in the week. Daley didn't start this time, but was on the bench instead.

We won the toss again, and were kicking towards the Fence End first half as preferred. The first ten minutes were fairly even, with perhaps the honours going to the away team. But then we found our passing game a little, and started to exert a bit of pressure. The first real chance fell to Constable after a quarter of an hour, but his shot found the legs of the grey haired Millers keeper, Andy Warrington. But it looked like a goal was coming and a few minutes later we took the lead. Some very good work by Midson down the right (including avoiding a rather nasty challenge, for which the ref played an excellent advantage) lead to him pulling the ball back to Heslop who made no mistake. The ref should probably have booked the Miller's player after the goal, but didn't.

We were now well on top, with all of our forwards causing the Rotherham defenders to nearly wet themselves every time we got the ball. Some concerted pressure over the next quarter of an hour lead to no goals though, and we were (as always) looking a bit open down the flanks in defence. Omar Daley (who had come on after 15 minutes or so to replace the injured, and quite impressive, Ryan Taylor) then slotted through a lovely pass to Nicky Law, who pulled the scores level with a nice finish. I'll have to watch this when the clips become generally available, but my first thoughts (and those of the peple round me) were two things. Firstly, Daley had been given far far too much room and secondly, Ryan Clarke seemed to be caught in no man's land. Maybe he could have done better? I'll reserve judgement.However, it was actually a lovely goal, if against the run of play. That's the thing about us at the moment, we can be well on top, but still look capable of letting one in at any time! 10 minutes to go until half time, and it was pretty even until the ref blew, and the teams were clapped off. The ref was booed off because of a penalty claim for Beano that he igonored. I can't honestly say that I saw it well enough to say one way or the other, but perhaps it set a seed in his mind for the second half...

Crossbar challenge. Boring. Think we ought to knock it on the head really. Not entertaining, badly organised. People with long hair this time. Some of them errm, didn't have long hair.

The second half started with no more substitutions and the yellows going forward, but chances were hard to come by. Then Jack Misdon (who had held the ball up well, worked hard and made our goal) went off, the be replaced by Simon Hackney for his home debut. Hackney had looked good in his two sub appearances at Southend and Gillingham, now he had 35 minutes or so to impress. And impress he did. He immediately added a fresh impetus into our attack, his crossing being threatening in a way that we haven't seen from a winger recently. Beano got on the end of one for the Miller's keeper to make an amazing save down by the foot of his left hand post. He managed to get his hand down on instinct to deny us the lead.

Then the turning point of the match. The excellent Steve MacLean was fouled in the box by a Rotherham defender when clean through. The ref was about three feet away, and promptly gave a penalty and sent the player off. There were few complaints from the other Millers players, it was an obvious offence. MacLean stepped up to take the penalty and blasted it to the goalie's left. Not for the first or last time in the afternoon, the Millers octeganarian keeper managed to get something behind it. Agonisingly for him - and brilliantly for us - it span across the face of the goal and into the net by the far post. At last! A bit of luck! MacLean was following up however and I am sure he could have prodded it home if it looked like it was going to miss.

So 2-1 up with 25 minutes to go, against ten men. Now those who have been to a match recently when we have played against ten men (for much of the home match against Torquay springs to mind) will know that we find it difficult to do so for some odd reason. Rotherham made it more difficult, confusing our players by doing almost exactly what they did before (occasionally looking threatening in attack) and ignoring the fact that they were one short in defence. Which made their originally creaky defence look as threadbare as the windscreen washer tubes on my dad's motor after the rats that got into their garage ate them! That's true. The bloke at the garage said ' no wonder your washers aren't working, there's no tubes'. And they ate half the cover on the positive terminal of the battery as well. Little buggers. Rat man in next day - no more rats. Mess with my dad at your peril, vermin.

Sorry, I've digressed. Anyway, Constable, Maclean, Hackney and the newly introduced Potter (on for Hall) terrorised the defence (especially their no 6, who completely fell apart in the latter stages of the game), and should really have added to our total. While at the other end Le Fondre had a couple of chances, one eventually stopped by a hesitant Ryan Clarke (who seemed to wait an age before deciding to come off his line, the other stopped by a tackle that the Rotherham fans were desperate to be a penalty. It wasn't. We spent the last few minuted determined to give the corner flags in the Rotherham half as good a look at the ball as possible. Even the the extent that MacLean was clear in their penalty area near the goal line. Instead of trying to set someone up and kill the match stone dead he turned around and headed for the corner!

Eventually the (generally decent, if a bit inconsistent) ref blew for time. A quick dash back to the car... and it took ages to get out of that car park as well. Hmph.

Today's words of wisdom (??!!):

Hackney is an exciting addition to the squad.
All the teams in the playoff places above us today either lost or drew, with only Shrewsbury of all 7 teams in promotion/playoff places managing a win. So we have caught almost all of them up a little and are just two points off the playoffs.
There's a fine line between being patient in keeping posession of the ball and buggering about with it for no good reason. Sometimes we cross that line!
Midson did some good work today (as did everyone, to be fair).
I don't think that Constable missing a couple is a problem.
Our corners are a bit better, but still not good.
The less said about our throw-ins the better.
We need fear no team in this division, home or away.
Rotherham's keeper is only in his thirties. I reckon playing behind that number 6 is what's turned his hair grey!


Stevenage on Tuesday. They'll be big and physical, sending crosses into our box. Could be tricky. See you there.