General A Slightly Unconventional Rowett Revival

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I'm an Ipswich Town fan who likes to write about the EFL. I've just published an article on my blog about Oxford's rapid improvement under Gary Rowett.

Let me know what you think of the article and please subscribe to the blog (it's free) if you enjoy. I'd be interested to know what your views were of the appointment at the time and what you think the ceiling of the club over the next few years can be?

Looks like Oxford v Town will be a fixture again next year so that'll be another unbeaten home game for you. I can't say I'm looking forward to another trip after the fog game and McNally's 95th minute equaliser the year before!

https://jacobpowley.substack.com/p/a-slightly-unconventional-rowett
 
Very very good; I enjoyed it.

Points for discussion.
1. Vaulks was a summer coup but largely failed in the first third of the season. This wasn’t so much because CamBram was upfield but because he was on the treatment table. Vaulks was making one or two high profile errors per game; the front five leaving him horribly exposed. Vaulks has arguably been the player of Oxford’s second third of the season (vying with Brown) and the Vaulks-Brannagan midfield axis is a delight.
2. Can’t believe you haven’t mentioned Ciaron Brown. The guy is our overall player of the year so far. The team has been built on him, Cumming, Elliott Moore (now Helik) and increasing the full-backs. The back 5 have been the foundation for success.
3. You say “Oxford fans have witnessed traits of a classic Rowett mid-season revival, the first being the January arrivals of seasoned Championship performers. Ex- Millwall forward Tom Bradshaw, 32” - but I wouldn’t much stock in him. TB looks well off it and has added absolutely zilch on the field.
4. For info, Placheta is generally referred to as ‘cheese’
 
Very very good; I enjoyed it.

Points for discussion.
1. Vaulks was a summer coup but largely failed in the first third of the season. This wasn’t so much because CamBram was upfield but because he was on the treatment table. Vaulks was making one or two high profile errors per game; the front five leaving him horribly exposed. Vaulks has arguably been the player of Oxford’s second third of the season (vying with Brown) and the Vaulks-Brannagan midfield axis is a delight.
2. Can’t believe you haven’t mentioned Ciaron Brown. The guy is our overall player of the year so far. The team has been built on him, Cumming, Elliott Moore (now Helik) and increasing the full-backs. The back 5 have been the foundation for success.
3. You say “Oxford fans have witnessed traits of a classic Rowett mid-season revival, the first being the January arrivals of seasoned Championship performers. Ex- Millwall forward Tom Bradshaw, 32” - but I wouldn’t much stock in him. TB looks well off it and has added absolutely zilch on the field.
4. For info, Placheta is generally referred to as ‘cheese’
Thanks, glad you liked it.

Not sure how I missed out the Brannagan injury! I'm glad Vaulks has finally found his form because on paper, it was a sensible signing, but it's always tough to be the sole deep midfielder in a team that generally doesn't dominate the ball.

Yeah, plenty of players I could have mentioned; I'm definitely a fan of Moore. Good to see Cumming at Oxford permanently too, never easy for players to be going out on loan constantly.

I probably didn't make it clear in the article but I wasn't suggesting Bradshaw was a key player, just that he's a very Rowett-esque signing. Do you think you'll be in for another striker tomorrow? The links to Al-Hamadi before he went to Stoke were interesting, he's struggled for fitness with us but when he's on it, I think the striker role in the Oxford system would suit him. Maybe someone in a similar mould would be an option?

Noted re Placheta!
 
I wouldn't take too much notice of what AssHead says about Tom Bradshaw. Some of our fan base are very quick to judge incoming players. Bradshaw has only had a handful of appearances so far and one start as he builds his match sharpness up after not playing much. He looks like he has lots of energy and a great work rate in the small amount of appearances we have seen from him so far. By all accounts he is fitting in with the squad well.

Rowett has also brought in Helik as a centre back with Championship experience who has on the whole looked good so far and we have signed an exciting midfielder on loan from Chelsea, Alex Matos, who also has positive Championship experience.
 
Also only two people refer to Płacheta as "cheese."
Must be me and my missus then

She loves the idea of one of our players being called cheese so much that when I first told her this information, she spent the first 45 minutes of the home game against Plymouth trying to guess which one was cheese.

That wasn’t irritating at all. Good job we won or she might have been dropped off at a dairy farm on the way back.
 
I wouldn't take too much notice of what AssHead says about Tom Bradshaw. Some of our fan base are very quick to judge incoming players. Bradshaw has only had a handful of appearances so far and one start as he builds his match sharpness up after not playing much. He looks like he has lots of energy and a great work rate in the small amount of appearances we have seen from him so far. By all accounts he is fitting in with the squad well.

Rowett has also brought in Helik as a centre back with Championship experience who has on the whole looked good so far and we have signed an exciting midfielder on loan from Chelsea, Alex Matos, who also has positive Championship experience.

Yeah, not enough of a sample size on which to judge Bradshaw.

To be honest, I was surprised Helik accepted the move with Huddersfield going well in League One, but fair play for pulling that off. He had a lot of interest from other Championship clubs in the summer. I like Matos too, midfield scrappers are quite hard to recruit in the Championship and it takes the pressure of Vaulks to play that role.
 
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