Rovers 0-2 Oxford United (League Two)

What an underwhelming and anti-cilmactic start to the League Two season for Bristol Rovers.

Despite enjoying healthy amounts of possession we clearly lacked any sort of final ball and barely threatened Ryan Clarke in the Oxford goal - much to the disappointment of Rovers fans. The game started, and finished, evenly, with Rovers probably edging it territorially but two moments of ill-discipline from individuals cost us the game.

On a day where anticipation was high ahead of the upcoming campaign Mark McGhee handed league debuts to Sam Walker and David Clarkson, whilst Matt Lund made his first start since his return to the club on loan over the summer. Fabian Broghammer and Oliver Norburn made their debuts from the substitutes bench in the second half. Hope is always high when a new season starts as supporters expect their new signings to produce from the off - in reality that rarely happens but we can't help fuelling the hype that builds over pre-season. But for every dream we have of tearing our opponents to shreds, Oxford fans will have imagined exactly the same thing - only one set of fans could be right come the full-time whistle. They weren't Gasheads today.

Forster-Caskey was the architect of our downfall

We had a couple of forays forward early on with Wayne Brown firing straight at Clarke with his right foot when the ball was played across to him. Rovers did also have the ball in the net following a set-piece in to the box - Harrold was at the back stick to nod across goal and it was turned home but the linesman adjudged one of the Rovers players to be offside. 0-0 it remained until 22 minutes in when Jake Forster-Caskey fired a superb effort beyond Walker and in to the top corner of the goal. For the first time all afternoon you could hear the Oxford fans make some noise but it was short-lived as they fell silent again - despite the fact they doubled their lead 10 minutes later. Alfie Potter dispossessed Michael Smith on the right and began striding in-field towards the Rovers box. James Constable occupied the attention of two defenders allowing Potter to continue his run towards goal before slotting past the on-coming Walker and in to the bottom corner. 2-0 and it was looking bleak. We just lacked any sort of cutting edge.

We tried to get a goal back before half-time but Clarkson's strike was tipped around the post by Clarke when he probably would've hoped to score. We were unable to reduce the arrears and despite an early rally in the second half that was buoyed by the introductions of Eliot Richards and Broghammer the game slipped away. We put countless balls in to the box but nobody got on the end of any of them and when the ball was at the feet of a Rovers player it just wouldn't fall for them to shoot - it was one of those days. Our forwards still need to gel and adapt to a new system, something which may be made even more difficult when a new striker is signed soon. The 4-5-1/4-3-3 formation hasn't shown many signs of bringing us success in the last two games but if McGhee thinks that it will work for us then it's something we have to persist with. There were some encouraging signs but we didn't pass the ball well enough and played too many long balls from the back towards Harrold that didn't create any real openings. Everyone knows we are a work in progress with injuries and an incomplete squad but that wasn't the start we would have wanted.

McGhee has some work to do before the midweek trip to Barnet if we are to improve defensively and offensively and he'll have made this fact known to the players at full-time. His proud unbeaten home record under his stewardship ended with a lacklustre display and he'll want no repeat of that at the Mem this season. He'll be even more determined to put together the final pieces of his squad in the next few days and give each player as much time as possible to settle in and begin contributing to the team. Our pursuit of Constable is now over after Nick Higgs announced pre-match that a third and final bid had been rejected for the striker, so attention will now be turned to a different target. A centre half is also high on the list of priorities and McGhee confirmed in his post-match press conference that he still wants to sign Tom Parkes from Leicester City. Movement in the next couple of days please.

It's important nobody gets carried away with the result as it was the first game of a 46 match season. The mindless idiots who booed at half-time aren't real supporters of the side - it's absolute lunacy to boo after 45 minutes and it can't do our players any good to hear it. It wasn't the best start in the world but fortunately the games come thick and fast at this time of year and we have the chance to make amends at Underhill on Tuesday evening before we face a trip to Wycombe Wanderers. Let's see what this week brings us.