The SIMON GARNER column

GRAEME Souness's decision to sell Dwight Yorke to Birmingham City earlier this week was a bold gamble on the manager's part.

Some fans would argue that Yorke's sale was long overdue after becoming frustrated by his laid-back style.

But whether you loved him or loathed him, the one thing that can't be disputed is Yorke brought vital experience to a forward line that now looks increasingly youthful in Premiership terms.

Jonathan Stead, Paul Gallagher and Rovers' latest signing Jay Bothroyd are still raw at this level, which means there's even more pressure than ever on Paul Dickov now, who has suddenly become the elder statesman in Souness's strike-force.

The onus is on the Scotland international to use all his experience to help the others along but from what I've seen of him so far, I think he's got the temperament to be a father-figure.

I found myself in a similar position at Wycombe Wanderers towards the end of my career but it wasn't just the strikers who needed my help in that instance, it was the whole team!

Wycombe had just got promoted to the Football League and though many of their players were in their mid-20s, virtually the entire squad were new to the full-time game.

That's one of the main reasons why Martin O'Neill decided to bring me and Cyrille Regis to the club.

We were the old heads in the team and our job was to take some of the pressure off the other lads.

Because they were new to the game at that level, their confidence took a battering whenever we lost a couple of games so Martin looked to us as the guys to help them through it.

When things are going well, you don't need to say anything but it's through the hard times when you're experience is needed.

If you've got a young striker, for instance, who's missing chances and not playing well then it's down to the senior players to keep his head up by constantly talking to him and encouraging him - on and off the pitch.

We've all been in that situation ourselves at some point in our careers and as you get older as a striker you come to accept there are going to be times when you can't hit a cow's backside with a banjo.

The worst thing you can do is rollick someone when that happens because it only makes things worse.

I'm sure there'll be times this season when Stead, Gallagher and Bothroyd all experience droughts in front of goal and that's when Dickov's experience will come to the fore.

I've got to say I've been pleasantly surprised by the way he's performed for Rovers since he arrived from Leicester.

He's already scored a couple of goals - and good goals as well. On top of that, he looks sharp and works hard so you've got to say he's probably been the biggest plus of our season so far.

The danger is the way he plays, he's likely to pick up one or two suspensions and that's when we could find ourselves short of experience now that Dwight has gone.

I must confess I don't know too much about Jay Bothroyd, other than he's scored goals in Serie A, which is arguably the toughest league in the world for a striker.

Let's just hope he makes the kind of impact Jon Stead did when he arrived from Huddersfield last season.