Joey, we’ll start with John Motson because there aren’t that many figures in the game, certainly those who are not ex-players who haven’t had the impact he’s had.
He’s iconic, isn’t he? Watching cup finals as a kid, Match Of The Day and all the great stories, John’s voice is overlaying it and adding to it as well.
It’s not only the players and the skill set out there, you do need that commentator’s voice. It can add a completely different dimension when somebody is as good at what they do.
I’ve met John loads of times and the amount of detail he had, the questions he would ask you preparing for a game that is in two, three, four, five weeks because you’d played with somebody that he is going to commentate on.
He wanted snippets of information and he would take notes and then when you see him do a big game and you listen to him, you realise that hasn’t happened by chance and he’s a true master of his craft.
The games of football you watch now, no matter how good the commentators are, the football world will be a lot worse off for not having John’s great voice and poise running through it.
It wasn’t that long ago that you saw him last because even towards the end he still took a lot of interest in watching as much football as he possibly could.
Whenever you’d do games, you would end up bouncing into him and you would chat.
I was fortunate enough to meet him multiple times over my career and last time I saw him was at Stadium MK when we played MK Dons away. He came in after the game and we were having a good chat and catching up and it was just really nice to see him. He looked absolutely fine there and at 77 he looked like he had a lot more years left.
I’m really pleased I got to see him before he passed on and you only have to look at the outpouring of sentiment from the football world from everybody whose life John has touched with his brilliance.
Thoughts are with his family and his friends; he was a true master of his craft and he will be sadly missed.
Absolutely, and much more prosaic matters with football which continues beyond all of us. This weekend, you should have a stronger squad. Is that the way you are looking at it with Sam Finley back from suspension and Lewis Gibson, is he in contention at least?
Yeah, they have trained this week, so they definitely improve the group and give us a couple of different options in there. They bring a lot more maturity.
The way both of them play, you want them in your group and your team, especially when you are in a tough moment like we are now.
Confidence is something we talked about after the last match and, obviously, it’s not going to be at its highest. Is there any way you can go about trying to, little by little, build them back up again?
Yeah, results and work on the training pitch. Confidence comes from good preparation and at the minute, we can prepare superbly but at the weekend, if we don’t get that result, confidence levels take a hit or they gather, based on the outcome.
For us, you have to dust yourselves down and learn the lessons. Review, reflect on it and then come in for the next day of training and prepare superbly again and give it your absolute best.
If you keep doing that, eventually you get success. If you feel sorry for yourself or you’re slack in your work or you drop your standards, you get in the habit of getting used to getting beat because the only way out of a funk is getting together, working very hard as a unit and forcing something to happen on a matchday.
We’ll have a good week of training again this week, but confidence comes from good results and good performances when the acid test is there at 12.30pm on Saturday.
Hopefully, the lads can build on what has been a good week this week and get that much-needed win.
Do you look at taking things back to basics and trying to get a result however it comes, or do you stick to your guns and say ‘This is how we play, we are just going to do it better’?
That’s the problem, we’ve stopped playing how we play. It’s tough, we go 1-0 up in a game and you’re thinking ‘Let’s settle and get the ball down and play’, but we don’t, we get caught up in their game.
It is tough and you have to give the opponent credit, you can get drawn into fights that aren’t suited to your group and, certainly when you’ve got a young group, they do struggle to reset a bit.
This weekend, we have a chance to put more men on the pitch, people with experience and knowhow. Age isn’t just a given on that, it can be about your character and your personality. The two lads coming back into the group help with that.
For us, we don’t feel we’re a million miles away, although we do feel a million miles away if that makes sense. We’re not getting snotted by anybody, but we’re not firing on all cylinders and we must improve that.
So playing another team that is going through a similar issue, does that help?
They are actually worse off than us. They were a side that was expected to be top eight based on what they do. They have always had a decent side there and produced promotion-chasing teams, so they are the outlier when you look at the table.
You look at the team that won our division last season, Forest Green, they are anchored at the bottom. Port Vale, Exeter and us are much of a muchness with a couple of points between the rest of us.
Because of the run we’ve been it, it almost feels worse. If we had been sitting with 14 to go and 38 points, probably everybody in a quartered jersey would have snapped your hand off for it at the start of the season.
But it’s the momentum we have got and in our case it is the negative momentum, so probably the best game we can play at this moment is against someone with a similar type of momentum.
Oxford will be feeling the squeeze even more because they would have been thinking about getting out of the division at the start of the season.
There is an opportunity to put a bit of space between ourselves and Oxford. Of the teams we have played near the bottom, they are a team that want to play football and we tend to play better against those teams as opposed to the chip and charge teams, which cause us lots of problems.
I can’t see Karl going away from what has been his philosophy, which has been controlling the ball, but who knows? They are desperate and they need points as well so we’ve got to be prepared for everything on Saturday and make sure we have got the antidote for it so we can get a positive performance and result and get our season back on track.
Joey, going back to John Motson. For a player of your generation, what was it like hearing him say your name on Match Of The Day?
It was almost like déjà vu, if that makes sense, because you dreamt about it as a kid. The amount of times in our garden or in the street and you’re on your own and it’s raining and everyone has gone in, you’re taking someone on and you slam it in the top corner, it’s Motty saying your name and his commentary that is running through your mind.
When it happens in reality, it’s like it’s happens loads of times but it is a surreal experience. It’s what every kid of my generation dreamt of; it was a special moment when you heard it because you knew the iconic players he championed as well.
Ten World Cups, 24 FA Cup finals – just think of the talent he has assessed and commentated on and just to be in that same company was a childhood dream. Hearing and watching that on Match Of The Day was a pinch-yourself moment that you had kind of made it because John was commentating on you and one of your games and he would say nice things about you.
It was just bizarre because he was a larger-than-life character. There are not many commentators that are famous and are recognised. Commentators cam walk down the street and nobody would know who they are, but John Motson couldn’t.
Everybody who knows football, he was as famous as any big player and deservedly so because he was a master of his craft who will be sadly missed.
Back to more trivial stuff, but the return of Lewis Gibson; I suppose if you are talking about playing your way, he is the sort of player who in the difficult moments gives you that poise to get the ball down and settle down after conceding a goal?
He’s a leader. He is mature beyond his years and he is a real leader; he leads with his performance but also he leads the team with his communication and his tactical understanding of what the team is trying to do.
He has been a big miss, him and Jordy Rossiter. They have been a huge miss for us and that happens in a football season, there are going to be seasons when the leadership types are out and when the tree is chopped down, it gives a new sapling a chance to grow into it.
At this moment, that hasn’t happened at the level we would like it and we haven’t had the results to allow that to happen, so it is really pleasing when you get a player of Gibbo’s quality and leadership qualities back in your group.
I’m not expecting you to tell me your tactics, but does it open up a back three again for you? Does having that left-footer make that a more realistic option?
A left-footer in there obviously helps, but I think James Gibbons has done alright when he’s played there. We haven’t played enough with him in there, but he’s done alright.
It gets you a lot quicker ball if that’s a left-footer. It means the players is on the outside of him get a better ball which means their defence has to alter to that and it means the players on the inside get slightly different looks.
You’re always searching for that symmetry and balance in the team and a left-footer on the left side will definitely help.
You alluded to it at the end of Saturday’s game, but you said Jordan Rossiter was most likely out for the season. Is that fully confirmed?
It isn’t, but it’s looking that way. It depends how it settles down, he might get back with four to spare. That would be a bonus.
We are planning on the worst-case scenario and if things happen quicker than that, it will be a bonus, but just now, with the space between his injuries, he is probably going to need a mini pre-season to get him up to matchday speed.
The end of the season might close in on him too quickly for that to happen so it would be stupid of us to rush him, and it will be about building him in pre-season to start the season smartly next year.
Obviously, you were unhappy with the goals you conceded and the manner they came in on Saturday. This is obviously a very different opponent, but when you are training to address things, do you ever go so far back to basics that it’s ‘We’ve got to deal with goal kicks better’, or is it ‘You are a professional and I trust you to get that right next time’?
We do practice but I wouldn’t go back out and get one of the keepers to kick the ball as high as he can out of his hands and how we’re going to deal with it because that should be a given.
We’re making basic errors at the minute. I do trust in youth, but one of the downsides of youth and young players is they go through a learning process and they have to make these errors.
The problem is when they are 20, 21 or 22, remember when you were that age and you thought you knew everything, so they don’t really like to accept criticism because they want to be superhuman.
They don’t see that they are making mistakes and the defence mechanisms go up. Sometimes, you just have to reset them and luckily for them, telling the truth is one of my great qualities. People don’t always like it.
But I wouldn’t go on the training pitch and go over scenarios with somebody, particularly when it is such a basic error because that usually takes you out of the side and gets you dropped from the team. You have to explain to them that this is not the youth team, this is real men’s football and you are going to cost people wages and cost the fans that are paying to come and see you the happiness of their weekend when they have spent hard-earned money.
Youth team, there are two men and a dog there watching and it is part of your learning and you can come back next week and be better, but in men’s footy, they will shout abuse at you, you’ll get nailed on the radio, you’ll get nailed in the papers and your teammates will nail you because you are costing them money and a chance of being successful.
It’s a markedly different position for them to be in and, as I say, young people don’t like criticism. I didn’t when I was 21 or 22, I felt I knew everything and I had all the answers. Sometimes you have to make mistakes in order to grow and get better.
The problem that they are happening in our team at the moment and it really annoys me, but it’s par for the course. It’s part of my learning as a coach and the challenges of taking a younger group; there is an upside and a downside.
It’s a huge part of my learning. I am here at Bristol Rovers to learn lessons and this is another huge learning curve. You don’t learn that much when you’re winning, when football is easy.
It is in the adversity and the tough moments that you really and truly find out about yourself and your character but also the characters that are connected to you.
We’ve got some great characters in the building here but there are some moments we need to improve and get better.
They care. The lads care about the jersey and that is a great start point for me. If you care about h people you are doing it with and for, everything else can be pretty much learned.
We’ve got a good group. We’ve got some young ones that think they know more than what they know. Most of them when you sit down and show them the data and explain it, you can’t escape it because it’s on the video screen and luckily we have camera angles from everywhere.
That’s part of the evolution and you have to accept it, as frustrating as it is, and it’s not just the young lads. It happens to 30-year-olds lads as well.
I say to them, my job is to tell you the truth. Your wife won’t tell you the truth, your girlfriend won’t tell you the truth, your mum and dad won’t tell you the truth, your mates won’t tell you the truth, your agent won’t tell you.
I am pretty much the only person in your life that tells you the truth. When you’re good, I’ll tell you you’re good, but when you are not so good, I have to tell you and there are some interesting conversations that take place.
It’s part of the job of coaching people and managing people and helping them get better. You don’t just linearly improve and take off on an upward trajectory. There are peaks and troughs and with young players, you have got to work them through it and not let them get too down and lose too much confidence.
You have got to keep them believing, but sometimes you have got to be really truthful with them and explain to them some of the decisions they are making and how they could do them differently to make them a better player.
Karl Robinson, you have the bragging rights over him, what do you make of what's gone wrong for Oxford this season?
For me, I've got enough on my plate with Bristol Rovers. Karl's a more experienced manager than me. He's produced multiple play-off chasing teams over a long, long period. He'll be hurting like we're hurting because nobody enjoys not winning games of football.
They'll see us as an opportunity to kick-start their season in front of their fans, we've got to see it as an opportunity, out of the pressure and the expectation of the Mem, to do what teams have done to us at the Mem; frustrate them and make it difficult for them and hopefully we'll have an end product and a sting in the tail.
It's going to be two sides lower on confidence than what I'd like and what Karl would like but I think it'll make for a really good game because we're two usually attacking sides who want to score and create goals and I think both of our problems are keeping clean sheets and being a bit more frugal.
If it's 5-4 to us I'll take it, and I'd imagine Robbo will take 5-4 to them. It's about getting maximum points - we're two wins from 11 - and your season can quickly turn on its head with a couple of results, as we've found out, and we have to make sure we flip it back to looking up the table and all the optimism that was around the football club.
I know you're forward-thinking, but it was two years ago this week you were named Rovers manager, what are your reflections on that time?
A rollercoaster. I just think back to how far we've come. Where we were walking in, not just the infrastructure and the facilities, but as a group and a team, yes, we're in a tough moment at the minute but even the support that's with the lads in defeat - we've lost to MK and Burton at home and the fans have stayed with the team.
There have been a few shouts, which is natural, but on the whole they've supported the team. We're getting decent crowds at the Mem and that's been quite consistent in the year. We've got a young, vibrant group, assets in the team developing to possibly move on to higher levels.
Barring the performance on the pitch, which is ultimately what matters, I think the rollercoaster of my two years here has been - the first year, we had a tough first six, seven, eight months, second part really good. And now we're back in the dip a bit.
We've just got to make sure that's not as negative a spiral as when we first came in. And with the group we have got, I'm confident that won't be the case because there are a lot of principles and work that's already in those boys that will pay us back in dividends as we get into the latter stages of what is a marathon in this 46-game season.
On the highs and lows of that rollercoaster, where do they rank in your career?
It's tough, isn't it? You have highs and lows and every other club, you have to keep it relative to the club you're at. The lows were low here; we'd turn up just to keep the score down in that League One relegation, it was really tough. You know your players aren't capable of lasting 90 minutes, players are getting injured left right and centre, culture, morale, if you were rating it out of 10, it'd be in the negatives in some regards.
Then the highs, of last year and certainly the early part of this season when we're riding at the top 10 of League One, going to give Sheffield Wednesday a game and winning threes and fours at Cheltenham. Okay, could we go again here? Back-to-back promotions, which was pretty much beyond everyone's wildest expectations.
But the humbling. I've learned so much in the two years, it feels a lot longer as a manager. And I came here to learn. Was out of work for six weeks at Fleetwood, learned a lot there, came here and learned an awful lot that I didn't expect to learn; the tough spell in the relegation was soul-searching and then we built a really good side after a tricky spell in League Two and finished with a really good group. And then there was a new challenge in League One, stabilising in it.
Hopefully, in another year's time, we can talk about how does year three compares to one and two? I've enjoyed every moment here, even the tough ones - how am I going to turn this around? For me, no matter what happens here, what happened last year will live forever. That group, wherever we go on our journeys as coaches and players, we'll always have that afternoon in the Mem, on the back of Rochdale.
It'll be tough, no matter what happens in my career, to replicate that. I'm almost a bit gutted, because I might have peaked! From where the club had been - the culture we inherited, Covid, fans being divided - and to have that moment where... just a magical, magical moment. It will live forever.
Now, we're hoping to have similar types of moments but I'm struggling, how are we going to get better? Have we got to win 8-0? Coming back from 3-2 to beat Oxford in that cup game was a great moment, but I don't think anything will ever come close. I may may as well retire... knock it on the head...
I actually like the adversity, and the conflict and the building and the struggle, I actually enjoy it - that's why I don't support Liverpool, I support Everton. I could have easily have supported Liverpool but I think there's a part of my personality that just likes having its back to the wall and when the going gets tough.
Your true character is revealed when the chips are down. I think ours was at Barrow, and Exeter, everyone looking at you like you're a space cadet and you're saying, 'I think we can get out of this, I think we're better than what we're showing'.
It feels similar this year. We've lost a little bit of confidence and that's disappointing because we could have done something special again this year - we had a sniff of gate-crashing a League One promotion scene - but the reality has kicked in but, again, everybody would have snapped your hands off for the state of play.
Look at everybody else who came up, the champions, Forest Green - would they swap with us? Absolutely. And everybody else is much of a muchness. Port Vale and Exeter, we're all scrapping to establish ourselves as a League One club.
I was talking to the lads this morning about Plymouth in League One. After they got points per game in the Covid year, finished third in League Two. Bolton, similar, late run like us. Then went on to establish themselves.
Bolton had a better season last year, finished mid-table comfortably, but Plymouth in their first year back under Ryan Lowe finished fifth from bottom - they were right down there, stayed up and then they built and were solid. Unlucky last year with the play-offs and have built again.
So it shows you if you can consolidate in this division - which is what we've got to do this year - just because you just stay up, doesn't mean in a short space of time you can all of a sudden (compete for promotion) because Bolton have showed that, multiple teams have shown that.
The challenge for us was making sure when our 46th fixture was played in this season, that the Gas were a League One club for the following season. That was success. In the midst of that, we had a bit of rarefied air, everybody, me as well - 'we can get promoted here, why not?' And then obviously we've had a bit of a tricky spell and it's knocked belief and confidence.
But that hasn't taken us off track and that is making sure Bristol Rovers are a League One club for the season that is to come. And that gives is the chance to build. What we ultimately want is a team capable of getting in the Championship and staying in the Championship.
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