All Activity

The same lads who were at Ewood V Burnley last Season no doubt.

I was told a story that Souness said "Get me the top scorer in Seria B". and thought he was getting a centre forward. At the first team meeting Grabbi explained he was a wide player and Souness turned white.

Danny Ventre joined us earlier this month

I remember him playing against Everton at Ewood. He just picked up the ball in the old inside left position, came inside, dipped his shoulder to come inside the two would be tacklers and slotted the ball into the far corner. As cool as you like. He made it look really easy. Reminded me of the goals Bryan Douglas used to score regularly.

We have a set piece specialist now apparently. Corners and everything seemed much improved last night. Prior to us scoring the commentators recited a stat that we hadn't scored a single goal from a cross all season.

You would expect him to take great pleasure in beating us. Beating a club (ie owners and management) that massively let him down and a fanbase of which a big chunk has given him lots of stick in the 2 games since he moved.

I think modern football is a bit more complicated nowadays than when you and I last played. Whether that’s a good thing or not is another story. Nobody signs a player on Friday and then throws them into the game on Saturday these days. It used to happen regularly in the old days. I remember Don Martin signing in those circumstances and looking completely lost in his first game.

souness stated he had the ability but could`nt adapt to living or playing in england,did score that fantastic bullet header against liverpool,he was invisible a lot of times though,one dreadful boxing day game against sunderland he was particularly bad

There was a fairly large Police escort after the game taking a group of fans back into town. We followed it down to the Adelphi where it continued further into town. I just presumed it was PNE fans as weirdly Preston is one of the only places I’ve seen the home fans in an escort before.

I usually agree with you on everything Tyrone but c'mon, what is there to learn that he couldn't impart in a matter of minutes? You make it sound like "experienced" players never have a bad game! Ismael bottled it against Derby and we paid the price. He got it right last night and we benefitted so credit to him for that.

A close friend was at the game last night as the referees coach and as such attends the security briefing before the game. He told me the police had said they were really worried about a group of 40 Zwolle supporters who were over for the game and had a reputation for causing bother. I wasn't aware of any trouble but we parked near the White Hart well away from the town centre. Is anybody else aware of this?

I really don't think that would make any difference. Pratt has played plenty of times in a three in the under 21's so from a system point of view he knows the role.I How would Hedges know the role never having played there before? What would have happened had one of the three centre had got injured in the warm up or in the early stages? I believe Ismael got it completely wrong against Derby.

I thought Grabbi was absolutely atrocious from the first minute I saw him in a pre season friendly. We were 100% scammed on that one. His Club/representatives saw us coming.

I was amazed that both our goals.came.from set pieces. The corner was a corner nothing special just a good cross into a good area and a good header with Miller having to fight off his marker. The second was a lovely freekick, different and caught nobbers completely off guard with Ice man sneaking round the back un noticed and finishing with a nicely placed header. If it was down to the new coach well done. Poor Ihashi must be tired of getting battered every time he is challenged he never get the calls he should. One in the 1st half not sure if it was Ohashi or hos counrry man but he oushed the balk past the defender and wiuld have been gone but he was clearly obstructed and with a two handed push. To me it was a yellow cos he would have been off. Ref was 5.yards.away.and did not even deem it worthy of a foul. Same with BigMac he does not get the calls. There was also Smith smacking Ohashi in the throat,.anither yellow or in the Prem likely a red and again nothing. At least this game Yuki got out of it without a gash in his head.

Obviously Pratt has had two extra weeks to learn what was required to play the position in the first team.

I disagree and I think that's really poor from Miller if he's said that. To the extent the ground is empty it's because of the owners and management and the Club clearly having no aspirations whatsoever of success or trying to achieve promotion. For those that are in the ground it's primarily the team's job to give the supporters something to shout about. We've (I think) lost four out of our six home League games and a League Cup tie against Bradford. Where's the enjoyment in that?

Ismael's logic for playing Hedges as a centre back in a three was flawed. He cited his height but being tall doesn't mean he is a good header of the ball, in fact I don't believe he is. Surely using someone who can head it should have been picked there. And as demonstrated last night we were further weakened against Derby because our best left sided player was playing at centre half. If Pratt was ready for last night surely he was ready a fortnight ago against Derby.

Corrado Grabbi had loads of ability, fantastic in his first few matches but as the luck deserted him, so did his confidence and that proved fatal. He could have had a hatrick in that early match against United, think he hit the woodwork twice.

I don't understand your point.

We need more than just defenders. You look at the bench and how weak it was last night. Gudjohnsen and Ohashi seem to benefit from the current system (as do a few others) but there is absolutely no credible alternative to the pair of them. If we are sticking to the current system then we badly need most likely 2 more forwards.

The two statements aren’t contradictory. Pratt may not have been ready for the Derby game for the reasons stated. So then it came down to one of Hedges, Pickering or Ribeiro for the left centre back role. Ismael may well have chosen Hedges on account of his height. Myself I would have chosen Pickering in that case and left Hedges out wide.

Couldn’t agree more and made this point many times. They prefer to play away, at Ewood the atmosphere is so funereal it is the clearest manifestation of what these owners have done to this club and its remnant and downtrodden supporter base. All a far cry from the loud and passionate cauldron that even the top teams feared playing here. Today, rather than being the twelfth man, they must feel like they are playing with ten at home. Of course, it is all very much the chicken and the egg and if the club was run properly and we could put performances and results together, ‘Rome’ could once again be rebuilt.

start him on wednesday definately,miller be unavailable so he should fit straight in,looks to me he`ll become a really solid no nonsense defender,bit short of pace but then again most centre backs are

He was excellent not sure what some people expect!!

Delighted and pleasantly surprised with both the performance and win last night. I really want to try to be more positive but it’s just so frustrating seeing us play like that with some fantastic individual performances knowing that the club will just sabotage any progression at the first opportunity. Take Tronstad for example: phenomenal last night. Yet seemingly the club are just content for him to leave for free in the summer. Cantwell too, no doubt off. Under any normal ownership there would be many reasons for optimism.