Every word Dave Horseman said on Exeter City trip, Bristol Rovers’ fight, next manager and more
Every word Dave Horseman said to local media ahead of Bristol Rovers’ trip to Exeter City on Boxing Day
Although Bristol Rovers are closing in on appointing their new permanent manager or head coach, Dave Horseman remains in interim charge and, as things stand at the time of writing, will be in charge for the Boxing Day trip to Exeter City.
The Rovers coach oversaw a solid 1-1 draw at home to Wrexham on Saturday afternoon and has had to deal with a number of other setbacks away from the pitch.
It’s currently unclear exactly when a new manager will be appointed but preparations have taken place with the assumption that Horseman will be in charge once again.
Therefore, the Gas’ interim manager met with local media once again on Monday afternoon to discuss the Wrexham draw, managerial latest, the trip to Exeter, festive plans and much more.
Here’s a transcript of every word Horseman said ahead of the Boxing Day clash…
I know it’s been a crazy few days, but at some point on Saturday was there just a bit of calm and a chance to assess things and take in what’s been happening?
Yeah, probably when I got home if I’m being honest. We had five minutes in the office afterwards where…yeah, it wasn’t just even last week. It was probably, obviously unfortunate with the previous manager’s family situation, even the period before that.
So it’s felt like a really, for me personally, a chaotic two weeks and I think probably when I was reflecting on Saturday night a situation I’ve never been in before where you’re kind of just looking after something, trying to keep it ticking along because you’re not building towards your philosophy or at the moment we’re waiting for that next period of time.
So you’re trying to keep the team going without actually building towards the bigger picture. That’s actually a lot tougher than a lot of things I’ve done in football where it’s been clear the direction you’re going and you’re always working towards that.
So sat down and probably my overriding feeling after I sat down was just that, in the end, although it was way from being perfect, I just felt a load of pride because I think at the very end everybody felt together.
Now we only got a 1-1 and the performance wasn’t particularly great for the most part but we got a draw against third in the table after having weeks and weeks and weeks of pretty poor performances for 90 minutes. You know, players, the fans, everybody, the staff all come together to get a point. It was only a point but that might be a start in the start point and that was probably my biggest reflection.
And was it fitting for the goal? Maybe two players who haven’t had it all their own way this season were involved with Luke (Thomas)’s cross and Promise (Omochere) scoring the goal?
Yeah, exactly. I mean, it’s really interesting. There’s so many ups and downs in football and particularly for individual players. Joel (Senior) obviously had the excitement of coming in and getting injured. He puts the ball in for LT who’s clearly, from the fans’ reaction, they’ve been desperate to have him out there.
Then he crosses and he’s missed loads of football for somebody who then has missed loads of football and they head it in and they probably felt really high on Saturday night and you actually, in those moments, forget all the lows and obviously you have way more lows in football than highs, but the highs far outweigh the lows and I think probably Saturday night, for quite a few individuals, probably felt that way.
