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Except you should be. That's just kicking the can down the road and completely goes against the approach that our leadership claims to have. We should be using every window to sign young players, especially in a period with an ever-closing P&S window. Based on everything Gestede says, we have the same budget for every window. That means that we can never expect a future window where we will realistically be able to sign 6 or 7 players. In order to build a good squad, we have to sign 2 or 3 players every window. Each time we don't we set ourselves back 12 to 18 months. Not only that, but if the focus is on signing young players then we have to accept 2 things. The first? It takes time for them to develop. The second? Some of them will be misses (as is the case with any signing, but the risk is exponentially greater with younger players). So, what you're endorsing is a pragmatic approach for a club that is sensibly run. But we aren't sensibly run and we can't be pragmatic. We will lose more players this summer on free transfers. We will be faced with having to sign 5 or 6 players JUST to get our squad back to the numbers that we started this season with. If the club had any sense about them, they would know that every window requires 4/5 signings and they would plan that out weeks and months ahead of time. But we can't be giving them an out by saying 'the sensible thing to do is to bring in a couple of players to get us out of a relegation scrap'. To be perfectly honest, if the commitment is to implement some kind of quasi-Bournemouth/Brentford/Brighton model, then we shouldn't even be that concerned about relegation. The focus should be on squad building, amassing young talent, and knowing that, in the long run, that will deliver results on and off the pitch. I would actually find that messaging somewhat refreshing. The problem is, we don't have a strong enough commitment to anything. Our strategy is determined by whichever way the wind blows based on a bit of public pressure, the right agents making calls, and whichever side of the bed a couple of key people wake up on. But signing a couple of quick-fixes to a relegation scrap this season guarantees problems next year.

Loans are likely to be signed after the deadline... oops!

How have we got to the 13th Jan with still no sign of a striker? They should have been signed on Jan 1st!!!

I think he will do, I just don't think it will be this season, but think it will be very close. As for recruitment in this window, all they are doing is hoping something falls into there laps for minimal outlay in the last few days of the window.

Yeah... then we sign them late in the window so they're not up and running when the season starts. Unbelievable that we have only signed CB (!) on loan so far.

Or he could be another Harry Chapman. £5m is too much for a relatively unknown, and definitely too much considering how much we've spent on transfers the past few seasons.

If there is genuine interest we need to be making sure that: A) the venkys know about it. I don't trust Pasha to relay the message if they're getting stonewalled, make sure the interest is public knowledge. I'm sick of the "who would buy us" crowd.

I think Norwich will get past us. And then the problem was that away at Portsmouth, we looked no better than them. You see the injury situation as something external. In contrast, I see it as something internal, i.e. to do with a) our recruitment b) totally running players down during games and potentially c) our training methods.

Like several others, I am a long distance Rovers fan, having moved to Cornwall (after a divorce and career change) a few weeks after I went to the play off final. I first went to Ewood in the late 50s as a babe in arms as my parents had the shop next to the Aquaduct pub. I've continued to support them ever since, following home and away through the 70s and 80s, good times and bad. I used to plan my trips back up north to see family and friends to coincide with Rovers games. That ended a couple of seasons ago and apart from the odd SW away game I haven't seen the team live since JDT. I'll support Rovers till I die which unfortunately will be before Venkys leave and I will be the last of my line to support this once great club - my grandkids now support Manure 😢 after their parents separated and new influences arrived. Keep the faith everyone, they will be gone at some stage, what state we will be in by then is anyone's guess but there will always be a Blackburn Rovers.

I think if we get Gudjohnson back and sign another striker we will be safe yeah Iv seen us being competitive enough to believe there are 3 worse teams than us and we have had some good performances this season I will say Ismael's home record is a disgrace tho even with a fit squad

They paid £31M and have apparently "lost" $200M+ in the 15years since. I'm sure they'd sell for that but nobody will pay it. The only joy I get from that is how much more the Walker Trust would have got if they'd only hung on for a while longer.

You think he'll keep us safe. I think he'll take us down.

And thus far Ismael has kept us out of the bottom 3 with the exception of a week or 2 and he has had a horrendous injury hit squad with multiple key players missing

Like when the Qatari's were on the phone to Anderson is one of the lounges at Ewood but Balaji said no ? Or when Red Bull were on their way over to buy an English club and Rovers kit was the best match ?

Sorry---lost me there.

Iv given my other reasons why I don't think a change in head coach is going to change much here. I have also said i wouldn't shed a tear if he was sacked.I just feel if he was replaced the same things being said now about Ismael would be said about the new guy. We need the owners out and Gestede and Pasha they go Ismael and managers of his ilk won't be here

Ismael runs his players into the ground. It is very easy online to sit & blame head coaches or club staff for everything and anything, knowing you never really have to prove it. Lovely to moan isn't it. Yet when you look at our injuries this year, you would be daft not to question exactly what has been going on both during training and within the match day itself. The way we set up puts a lot of strain on our forward / midfield players. Our defence begins quite deep for a team who is tasked with pressing so high, and we don't seem to push up until a press looks like it may come off. That space between the back 3 and the front 3 is enormous at times, which means that either the wing backs or the attackers have a hell of a lot of ground to cover basically running around like headless chickens Wrexham found us out with this one. They really drew us on to them, ran us into the ground and then pumped long when the centre halves eventually pushed up to shrink that space. It was amateur really. Parkinson is a shrewd manager but there's no way he does a number on Eustace the way he did on Ismael. We looked amateur that day Then there is the training. I know quite a few baggies fans and they have all said that Ismael is supposed to be fanatical on running & distance & sprints and recoveries. I am saying this with zero authority here but it would not surprise me if we are running ourselves ragged in a training environment. The amount of muscle injuries point to that for sure I have to be honest and say that I have never warmed to Val. I always try but we have had some fantastic coaches previously - and yes, I count Mowbray in that - but this chap has come at the wrong time for me. Right at the end of an era that looked like it may result in a play off place; right after the drama with JDT & Eustace and the commencement of the PashaRudy show; and, to top it off, a tired and young squad that he can't appear to get a tune out of I just don't see our identity which after this long in charge is criminal really. For me we should change head coach and soon. A loss against Ipswich on the weekend would be my tipping point

Ok. I want someone in that can save us from being relegated. I know I'll not get it.

We are well past the point where we need to "target" players. We need them signed. Although O'Rourke seems particularly active at the moment in linking us and numerous other clubs with various players which suggests agents at work.

Thunder thighs Mike Harrison and Duggie, early 1960s From another site and possibly AI generated but a good image nonetheless Note the spectators wearing ties

This is the problem now they are clearly being beasted in training and games to the detriment of playing some actual football. Hence the fatigue and constant massive injury list. We've gone from JDT trying to play total football from his own penalty area to a guy who just wants to pin opponents in their own box for 95 mins as a form of defending from the front. We certainly have defensive strikers !

I think it shows how low standards are that I quite regularly see the defence of Ismael that the players at least havent all give up.

Whoever the head coach is recruitment will stay the same some hits and some misses. We are offering peanuts In transfer fees and wages it's unrealistic to think that there will be much improvement on that side with the way things are by just changing the head coach. And all head coaches use excuses even Eustace after he said about no excuse culture did it At the moment the players are still playing for him and they haven't downed tools like they did under JDT in the last couple of months of his reign

You forgot Akor Adams.

You can't blame people for not believing you every season you used say the tipping point is coming and admin was around the corner. You sold Jordan Rhodes more times than Alan Nixon. You claimed to have the inner details of Adam Armstrongs move to Southampton. I could go on. It's hardly aggravation to be questioned by a few posters on here over the legitimacy of your claims