In the early days of the internet there were numerous independent football sites and plenty of Rovers ones, together offering plenty of variety, good quality content and an abundance of innovative ideas. Since then, however, the amount of consolidation has been quite frightening. Type the name of a football club into a search engine these days and more likely than not you'll get a choice of two: the official site courtesy of Premium TV or a Rivals-sponsored site. The former will give you "all the latest news", complete of course with the official spin (we'll never forget the quote about Rovers being in the upper reaches of the bottom part of the table). Rivals markets itself as the independent voice of the fans online, but this doesn't tend to sit well with the standard format, links and adverts. In practice, the majority of their sites seem to be little more than match reports, old news and a message board.

Add to this the fact that the local media coverage of the Gas amounts to little more than a standard churning out of club press releases and regular interviews with players, managers or officials and you get an idea as to why a group of us are setting up this site. In short, we want to provide Gasheads with a source of information and views on Rovers that isn't currently available, be it on web sites, in the local print media or in the matchday programme.

For this reason, there are certain things we won't doing, like match reports, stats and squad details as there are loads of different sites where you can get that. Take match reports for example. If you want the “ we thought we did OK even though we had no shots, we're down but we'll get back on the training ground and sort it out, we owe the fans, we can still make the play offs ” line, then the official site will give you that. If you want a more objective view from a qualified journalist (albeit one who needs to keep the club onside to ensure good relations/access) then the Evening Post or the Western Daily Press will sort you out. On top of that, an array of individual fans' match reports can be found on the official message board. If that's not sufficient then the matchday programme will give you an in-depth account of the BRSC coach trip. What more could we possibly add? What more would we want to?

Likewise, if you want to get the latest up-to-the-minute information on events at the Gas, find out who we've signed the minute they do so (or in the case of Clive Platt who we think we've signed), and maybe even get a textie in advance, then sorry we won't be able to help. There will be a news section on this site, but we won't be able to bring it to you first, probably because we haven't signed up for the official advanced text message service ourselves and will therefore be scouring the official site for more details along with the rest of you the minute some bright spark who has got a textie tells us on the official forum.

But the reporting of Gas news is one of the key areas where we really hope to make a difference and provide a source of information and views that isn't currently available. As we said, we won't be able to provide breaking news, but we do hope to take a critical look at events at the Gas, maybe do a bit of research around the subject and come up with something that is more than a simple regurgitation of the stories that appear on the official site or in the local media. There is a tendency at present we feel to take the news emanating from official sources as read, with little in the way of critical analysis (with the honourable exception of Kevin Fahey in the Sunday Independent). We don't think that's particularly healthy for our football club. No doubt there will be some who will equate the term “critical analysis” with slagging the club off, but we don't see it as that. We don't plan to slate for the sake of it, and where credit is due we'll give it. But if there are issues that need to be addressed for the good of the club then we plan to tackle them. A fair number of the people involved in putting this site together don't agree with the “We Want Dunford Out” chants heard over the last couple of seasons on the grounds that it's too simplistic an answer to the club's current problems. Having said that, to simply gloss over all the mistakes that have been made in recent seasons with “ there wouldn't be a club without the Dunfords ” is equally over-simplistic. We want this site to delve into the complex issues affecting the Gas without having to tow the party line or keep anyone happy. Facing up to issues is surely something that has to happen if the club is to emerge from its current trough.

So how else are we going to provide Gasheads with a source of information and views that isn't currently available? Well there will be a regular set of columns and features which we hope will be informative, thought-provoking and amusing or even all three. It's early days yet, but we aim to focus not only on issues unique to Rovers but also on general developments in the football world and look at what impact they may or may not have on the Gas. Some of these issues will no doubt raise a lot of emotions and for this reason we aim to get involved in campaigning where we think a difference can be made that will benefit our club. In addition, we hope to try and get interviews with some people who are/have been associated with our club or who are involved in things that may have an impact on our club but who may not necessarily feature on other sites or in the local media. In short, another way of providing Gasheads with more information and views on issues which affect them.

There is of course one group of people not yet mentioned who we want to feature on and involve in this site – Gasheads. There are quite a lot of us involved in this site but there's no way we can reflect the whole spectrum of views on our club, so we want to get as many of you as possible offering your views on Bristol Rovers and generally getting involved. The people who have set this site up have plenty of ideas on what they'd like on it, but this is a site for Gasheads and in terms of content ideas, the more the merrier. So enjoy this site and make sure that you help us make it the truly independent site for Gasheads.

We Are The Gas

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