New-look Doncaster Rovers held to stalemate in second friendly outing of the day
Doncaster Rovers might have romped to a heavy win earlier in the day, but they had to make do with a gritty 1-1 draw at Peterborough Sports in their second Saturday outing.
After a 5-0 thrashing of Stamford, Grant McCann and the other half of his squad made the short journey down the A47 to face the Turbines. Rovers employed a new-look XI for this one, with five of their summer signings on show and Zain Westbrooke operating as a makeshift right-back in the absence once again of Jamie Sterry.
In what was a stodgy first half, Rovers barely created anything of note. Billy Sharp headed over whilst Jordan Gibson was denied twice after good wing work from Glenn Middleton. There was an elongated stoppage in play midway through the half which did nothing to aid fluency, but it would be the hosts who awoke from their slumber first when they took the lead just before half-time: Max Booth's free-kick sailing straight in beyond the dive of Thimothee Lo-Tutala.
Sam Straughan-Brown, playing against his parent club, was clearly out to impress and one moment in the first half he showed a sublime piece of skill to brilliantly evade a clutch of Rovers players hunting him down. That was just one highlight in a fine performance from the young midfielder.
Possibly with firm words still ringing in their ears, Rovers came out of the traps quickly after half-time and it wasn't too long before they levelled matters. Gibson finished off a counter-attacking move that he started, applying a fine strike to restore parity.
Sports almost fired an immediate riposte when goalscorer Booth saw a crashing effort come back off Lo-Tutala's crossbar but as the game went on Rovers slowly increased their dominance, with plenty of ball-hogging as they gradually wore their National League North hosts down.
They couldn't manifest a winner though, as spoils were shared in Cambridgeshire.
Rovers: Lo-Tutala, Wecstbrooke, Pearson, O'Riordan, Maxwell, Bailey, Broadbent, Gotts, G Middleton, Sharp, Gibson
Subs not used: Oram, Cashmore, F Middleton, Murray.