Rovers need to reflect and regroup as relegation looms

BRISTOL Rovers have been all but relegated from League One. Barring an absolute miracle, the Gas will be playing in League Two next season, three years on from the club’s last game in the fourth tier.

- Dan Hargraves

It is a bizarre feeling still. Every-one knows that relegation will be the outcome of the season, but at this moment in time Burton Albion still need another point to confirm it mathematically with goal difference still a potential avenue to survival. However, it would require a monstrous goal swing seemingly beyond the realms of possibility. Let's face it, what's done is done.

So how did we get here? That’s a question we'll be asking ourselves for the coming weeks and months as a football club in desperate need of change tries to rebuild itself and prepare for giving an immediate return to League One their best shot. Although Rovers’ last two seasons at League Two level ended in promotion, confidence right now is pretty scarce that that will be the case once again.

Of course it’s going to be low. Wounds are still incredibly fresh and will take time to heal. Frankly, the conversation hasn't, and won't, move on to ‘how do Bristol Rovers get themselves out of League Two’ until the debate of ‘how have Bristol Rovers ended up back there’ gets its moment.

The answers are becoming increasingly apparent with two telling post-match interviews from Inigo Calderon and James Wilson after Saturday's 2-0 defeat to Reading offering further clarity. Honestly though, this has been coming for far longer than just over the last nine games in which a meagre one point has been collected.

There will be further analysis on the bigger picture and what happens next to come. For now, here are the main talking points from Saturday as Rovers lost to Reading despite a spirited hour, and ultimately find themselves on the brink of going down.

A better performance but outcome was set