Maybe. I'd say the odds of three out of the four being out for any length of time at the same time are fairly slim. If there's a bit of an overlap use one of the young lads to cover the slack. (Atcheson/Litherland?)

What on earth even is this? So do 'these people', by which I assume you mean yourself, have no interest in: Raducanu winning US Open as a complete unknown Jess Ennis winning Gold just 1 year after giving birth Ledecky winning Gold aged just 15 in one of the toughest swimming heats Simone Biles inventing god knows how many gymnastic moves now named after her Lionesses back-to-back Euros Women's first every Hockey Gold medal The year Fallon Sherrock chinned a few at Ally Pally Katie Taylor chinning plenty over the last 10 years If you like Sport, but have no interest in any of the above, well that tells me something about you for sure.

The thought fills me with horror. Think re-signing Forshaw was an act of desperation as we'd only landed De Neve at that point. Already injured, played little or no part in pre season and wont be fit for the big kick off. As for 'Jason Lowe' Montgomery, a Lazarian footballer who has risen from the sixth tier of English football (Marine and Chorley) in the blink of an eye. Seen little to suggest the lad offers much beyond athleticism. Wouldn't like to start a match with him in our midfield.

Only playing 1 striker is a factor for sure. I'd still add one if we could. Carter is quite injury prone and when he gets injured, it's usually for months at a time. Wharton has been out for a long time and is highly unlikely to be ready to play week in week out. Will very likely pick up minor injuries along the way. I think the odds are that we'll end up with just Hyam and McLoughlin as our only fit centre backs for large portions of the season (without signing another) 5 probably is too many, if all 5 stay fit but chances of that happening are slim.

Squeeze - Annie Get Your Gun

I'm talking about rotation more than Travis and Tronstad being out at the same time. We ran them into the ground last year - and the system last year was far less intense than Ismael's approach to the game. Montgomery and Forshaw might be good to bring off the bench for 15-20 mins every match, but I wouldn't want to start them. We're hoping Tavares is good - and even if he is I think it's clear we need one more.

I'd imagine it'll be Travis, Trondstad, Tavares as the first 3 choices then we become reliant on Forshaw / Montgomery / Garrett / Buckley / maybe a loan. Travis and Tronstad made 38 appearances each out of 46 games - I can't be bothered looking but i'd imagine it's very rare that we'd be without BOTH of them. I think 3 with a good 4th option (Baker-esque) is where we realistically should be. We have the 3, it's whether the 4th choice of Forshaw / Montgomery is good enough (IMO probably not so would like to see someone come in perm or loan, and we ship out Buckley and Garrett).

Do we know whether the 'pay as you play' deal is for the player or the club? I'd suggest it's for the player if he's still "super keen" to join as obviously he wouldn't give af if his old club was being short changed when he gets injured (so his opinion wouldn't be mentioned in the article - it'd be "the club are still super keen on the transfer". Also do we know what the injury is? Evidently not something that stops him playing, but perhaps something that COULD go wrong down the line?

No, but are there really many teams out there who won’t suffer if their two most important players gets injured? And I might be happy with Tavares, just don’t know enough yet.

Buckley got 4 minutes against Elche (and still managed to get booked). They clearly don't rate him. Would you be happy with starting Forshaw and Montgomery midweek against Stoke?

Lots of unproven premier league wingers out there. I’m sure we will end up with one of them. Might even get a young CM in and send Buckley out of loan.

Tavares can play further forward so I imagine he will cover Cantwell.

Annie Lennox- Walking on broken glass

We desperately need a right winger. we dont need a third striker, we'd just like one. We need cover for cantwell unless tyjon is ready now (don't think he is). We could do with extra cb cover. Baradji confuses me unless we lose one of the current centre mids as we currently have 5 senior ones (travis, tronstad, tavares, buckley, forshaw) and young Montgomery who they appear to like. My guess is one more permanent unless brittain leaves and then to see what the premier league loan market brings

Limmie and the Family Cookin' - Walking Miracle

I can't believe they have said we only need 2 more signings. The lack of planning and signings over the last few summers has led to the panic buys/disastrous January transfer windows we've recently had and us falling away at the end in the last 4 seasons. It's a long season. If you get it right in the summer you don't need to bring in 5 or 6 in January. Look at Bristol City last year, they didn't sign anyone in Jan but made playoffs (they could have probs done with 1 or 2). The squad will be padded out with youngsters, they should be out on loan getting game time, not a few mins here and there. Rovers will be forced to play Tyjon in order to keep him at the club. Is he ready? I hope so, but I doubt we can rely on him week in week out off the bench. Quality off the bench is lacking and has been for a while.

It's about being proud of watching your country winning things.I'd watch Tiddlywinks if it was England playing someone.

There are too many speed merchants in the men's game who would kill you on a counter. Even Kargbo would be lethal in that scenario.

Wharton might excel in friendlies against Accrington Stanley and the likes, but he wasn't good enough to start before his latest injury and most certainly isn't now. He's a good squad player, if he can keep himself fit.

Not having a pop at you as you're not the only one to say it, but we have 4 senior centre backs but only 2 senior strikers. Why is a CB more of a priority than a striker? (I'm guessing the answer will be something along the lines that you only start with one striker these days but nevertheless once Carter is fit, two injuries and/or suspensions in either department leaves us able to cope at CB but without a single striking option and you also need a lot more striking options on the bench, you dont usually bring a CB on to try and change the game) I think 5 CB's is too many personally.

Telalovic was down the list of options and we had tried to sign better strikers all summer before we ended up with him. I suspect we're about to experience a bit of the same this summer.

Yeah, I'm not sure you can have a DM who can play RW. Certainly feels like the positions (or at least what you want from players in those positions) couldn't be further apart. Yeah we desperately need a decent RW

This whole Baradji story is a 'strange' one. My take on it: - Player wants the move - Rovers knows this and are trying with a low-ball offer (pay as you play) to get the player to sign for less than what was initially agreed upon (i.e. prior to his medical). - If player has a foot fracture, then surely his current club (Yverdon Sport) wouldn't allow him to play 70+ minutes in the first competitive game of the season and risk aggravating the injury (and lose transfer money in the process). - He played 27 matches averaging 80 minutes per game last season including five matches in the final month of May (on the 6th, 10th, 14th, 17th and 22nd). I find it quite unlikely that the injury is serious given the match congestion during the latter stages of the Swiss league last season and the fact that he played regularly for the club since December last year. -If he has a foot fracture, has he been playing with painkillers lately? If yes, for how long? How has he managed to not aggravate his injury during this period given his style of play and number of minutes he's been playing? Another theory could be that Rovers doesn't want to pay any fee up front and only smaller instalments/game until player reaches a certain limit (say something like £30 K per match until player reaches 50 matches in total since reported fee was in the region of £1.5 million). This could explain why Yverdon Sport doesn't feel like they're getting any value of a potential deal/ can't bring in an immediate replacement and thus allowed him to play yesterday until a better offer comes by. The medical issue seems more of an excuse from Rovers' side to try to renegotiate the terms of the deal rather than actual concern that the player might not stay fit for large parts of the season.

I'd agree that CB must be low on the list, Wharton may be off injury but has probably been the best in pre-season and they will want a "pathway" for Atcheson/Litherland etc

“Plan”….hahaha.thats a good one!