City extended their unbeaten run to seven games on Saturday with a hard earned point away at Bristol Rovers, but it could’ve been three with the Gas equalising late on.
There were some surprises in the team news that raised a few eyebrows. Lukas Jensen kept his place in goal after his penalty heroics on Wednesday night. Sean Roughan and Alex Mitchell were joined in the back three by Adam Jackson, with captain Paudie O’Connor still missing with tonsillitis. Jack Burroughs and Lasse Sorensen continued on as our wing-backs with Jaden Brown missing out. There was a change in system, which saw Ethan Erhahon and Ethan Hamilton joined by Ali Smith, who was making his first league start. Tyler Walker and Ben House have both picked up injuries, so the attacking threat was left up to Reeco Hackett and Danny Mandroiu, who started as a front two.
Going away to Bristol Rovers was always going to be a tough encounter for City. It’s a really tough place to go, and Joey Barton’s teams are always difficult to beat. We have a few problems of our own going into the game too, the biggest being the lack of senior strikers available for selection. Tyler and Ben are two of the best centre-forwards in the league and to have neither available was a blow to us yesterday and hopefully they’ll be back in action following the international break.
We also have to consider the impact of the game on Wednesday, it was an extremely short turnaround to the game and on top of that all the emotion following the penalty shootout would have taken a lot out of the players. It was disappointing to concede so late and not secure three points, but when you consider the circumstances and take away the manner in which we conceded, you’d be very happy with a point on the road.
The first half saw Bristol Rovers dominate possession and probably have the better of the chances. Two chances came in quick succession for the hosts, both from Aaron Collins. The first saw him break away in midfield and strike from range, Lukas saw it late and luckily it flew past his post. Collins was causing problems for City’s defence, and he found himself in-behind but a great save from Lukas kept him out and got the Imps out of jail.
Playing with no striker was causing us some issues – as you’d imagine. Danny was roaming and dropping deep to pick up possession as he does, but that was isolating Reeco and causing us some issues once we got into the final third. Jack and Lasse were working hard on either side, but we needed to get some players further up the pitch.
We weren’t in the game really in the first-half, but after how much we put into the game on Wednesday, it was no surprise we looked slightly lacklustre. Mark and Danny Butterfield must have said something right at half-time because we came out much better in the second-half, with a lot more energy and drive. Ali was pushing up more in midfield and getting closer to the front two of Reeco and Danny, which was helping us get forward with some more conviction.
We soon got our rewards for upping our game early in the second half. A long throw on the left was recycled by Erhahon. The midfielders cross was poorly defended and it bounced off Reeco at the far post into the path of Jacko, who was able to tap it home for his first goal of the season. Remarkably, he is our ninth goalscorer of the season, goals all over the pitch are important and we’ve said it for years, we’ve finally got the ability to score goals from everywhere and it’s certainly helping us pick up points.
We had another chance almost directly after the goal. Lasse has been going from strength-to-strength so far this season and he found himself through on goal after his usual run in behind from the right hand side. Lasse broke from halfway, creating a one-on-one for himself, but he couldn’t find the finish past Matt Cox.
Bristol Rovers got back into their groove shortly after that, controlling possession and looking for an equaliser. They failed to make Lukas work in the City net though and as we went into added time, we were comfortable but there were obviously still nerves around the away end as you can imagine. The first time Lukas had to make a save saw him parry the ball out for a corner, the resulting set-piece led to a goal and it meant we had three points snatched away from us in cruel fashion, although it was probably the deserved result.
Lasse had another chance right at the death. He could’ve squared it to Hamilton, he didn’t and went for the shot, which was well saved by Cox. The game ended in a draw, and on the grand scheme of things, it’s an exceptional point away from home against a good side. You could tell at the end of the game how tired the lads were and we got so close to securing three points and they looked gutted when the equaliser went in. At the final whistle, we probably all felt a bit deflated, but we’ll probably look back at this result as a really good one when May comes around.
In the last week, we won convincingly at home against a top side in our division, then we went away on Wednesday night to Premier League opposition, took them to penalties and came out on top with incredible celebrations at the end between players and a packed out a packed out away end. We’ve ended the week with a hard earned point away from home against a good side, if we were the ones scoring late we’d be extremely happy and I think we should still be really pleased with the result.
7 unbeaten going into the international break and honestly if someone offered us that after our loss to Bolton we all would’ve taken it. There are so many positives from the past few weeks, and I can sense something really special brewing this season.
AllLincoln MOTM: Adam Jackson