Great example. Lucky draws and good achievements can both happen together.

And that failure to even get a contract in front of Travis (or indeed any of our 3 key players) ultimately is the critical part. We are now left in a fairly helpless, really weak position. Anything around that inability to get a concrete offer down long before now becomes somewhat immaterial. We have missed our chance. As you say, its been dismissed and shrugged aside. If we had offered him a deal last summer or even after the season had started, at that point, he would have obviously had twice as long to run on his deal, he wouldnt have just had that extra strong season as credit in the back and crucially, if we assume there is any truth in these convenient rumours, we wouldnt be being blown out the water by clubs who were then in League 1. You dont expect us to pay £30k do you is such a brainless counter argument. That shouldnt be a question that needs to be asked and wouldnt if we were run with a semblance of order.

The difference between you and I is firstly I don't believe for one second that those clubs will be offering that to Travis, nor will he be demanding that, it is a made up figure to exaggerate the situation and make out like the money required is at crazy/ridiculous levels. This is all part of the regimes strategy - making out like little old Rovers are at the limits of their capabilities, can't compete, are being blown away by richer clubs, poor us. It just isn't true. The reason Travis hasn't signed a new deal is because he hasn't been offered one. He told us this in March, and I'd be surprised indeed if Rovers have done very much since then. Rovers approach to renewing contracts - aside from a brief and ultimately sabotaged spell under Broughton - has been a total failure. Lenihan, Nyambe, Rothwell, Diaz, Dolan, Travis, Tronstad, Brittain, Tens of millions of value flushed away, quality committed players allowed to walk and you seem fine with it. Shoulder shrug. Secondly you seem fine saying 'Gestede should have sorted it'. Shoulder shrug. That isn't good enough in my book. The situation this club has put itself in is not acceptable.

We shouldn’t be paying our players miles less than what newly promoted clubs are willing to pay them, there’s no excuse for that.

You just twist things to make others appear unreasonable. This situation simply should not be happening because the contract situation should not have been allowed to get to this stage. To have all 3 key players admitting publically at Easter that they hadn't been offered a new deal is unacceptable and inexcusable. You acknowledge that we should have offered new deals last season but dismiss if as if it is minor. This Wrexham £30k offer is pure speculation but had we offered him a deal last summer or even after the season had started then Wrexham (or Birmingham) wouldnt have been an option. You say I am blaming Rovers as if its unreasonable considering the dreadful way in which we are run. We are again left in a position where we have multiple key players entering their final year. So amidst an already busy summer, we have these totally avoidable situations. This always seemed inevitable too. Thats the frustrating thing. Yes we can offer new deals now but our negotiating position is now really weak and its all our fault.

Millwall reached an FA Cup final in 2004 before getting battered off Man Utd in the final. Still a great achievement for a 2nd tier club. However they didn’t face a premier league team until the final. They played:- Walsall at home, Telford away Burnley at home. In the quarter final they got past 3rd tier Tranmere, the lowest side still in the tournament. Meanwhile the four remaining Premier League sides all drew each other. In the semi they beat second tier Sunderland whilst Arsenal played Man Utd in the other semi. Is anyone actually arguing here that they didn’t have luck on their side with the draw?

Yep. The standard Rovers playbook..

YES. Absolutely. "Clubs like Wrexham". Deary me.

Two opposing things can have an element of truth in them at the same time, novel, I know.

Well that makes me question him even more, then. He was either naive or desperate and I'm thinking more likely the second option

There's a surprise that you are blaming Rovers. So you think we should be paying Travis 30k a week then if that what other clubs like Wrexham and Birmingham are? Yes Gestede should have been on with new contracts during the season but he didn't. We can still get them to sign new contracts even now.

Its wonder why yourself Mark. 😁

You think its down to the luck of the draw which we don't control and you beat whoever you have to play and win the game. Its embarrassing how you want to belittled how Southgate performed in major tournaments and it was the best we performed since 1966

wrong again, He reported his info just like other journalist and I just post the info or comment on the info. That's all whether Nicko's story is about a target or bid or contract or player maybe leaving us.

Yeah it's possible. I was just expecting it to be referenced in the article, if he was to no longer qualify.

They might not do but do you really stop agents asking more money for their players at the club? As I said those 3 players would be the highest earners along with Hyam then other players underneath that. I don't agree he has reported the story on

Hahahaha back to this again. If you play those teams in the finals then you play them because they have won the same amount of games as you. They are as deserving to be there as you, regardless of if you consider them “elite countries” (what?) When Scolari won the World Cup in 2002 he had a team of Ronaldo, Rivaldo, Ronaldinho, Silva, Cafu and Carlos - they played Belgium, England and Turkey on the way to the final. Arguably an easy route to the final, right? Belgium weren’t the Belgium they are now and Turkey isn’t “elite”, right? The hardest team was England - with Mills at right back and Heskey up top Were Brazil lucky? Nope. They beat teams that others couldn’t. Luck had very little to do with it The quarter finals of that year featured the elite nations of South Korea, Turkey, Senegal, the US and Turkey. It has always been that way. To think you have to beat Germany, Spain, Argentina, Brazil or France on the way to winning a tournament so as not to be ‘lucky’ is delusional In 06 Italy beat Australia, Ukraine, Germany and France. Was that a lucky win? We could go on and on and on. In Germany winning in 2014 is probably the hardest route - they beat Algeria, France, Brazil and Argentina. But even then, France and Brazil had relatively poor teams by historic standards. So were they lucky to come across such poor squads? I just don’t get it. Luck or otherwise, you have to beat them. And for them to get a quarter final of the World Cup - whether they are Spain or Papa New Guinea - they got there by winning the same games in the same groups in the same location. So they are deserving

Hopefully someone will be along shortly to clarify why Mafoumbi wouldn’t be an ESC player. I was wrong about something yesterday so I might be 2 for 2 😁😁

Bloody hell Chaddy read the last few pages before jumping on that comment. Maybe you will understand the post then. Plus, I never said it about De Neve.

So it would make Elliots article incorrect then? Thought that Andy Watson was the "best in the business" at this sort of thing?!

why? you said the same about the winger we just signed. Ismael has said previously he did his own research on the club and the problems before his appointment yet he since wanted to come here.

The weirdest signing we've ever made.

Have all the Egyptian fans been arrested and deported yet?

I think they must have.

The club put themselves in this position with the Cantwell signing. Apart from 10 games or so last season he was a show pony. If he is on 10-15 k more than the top performers at the club there is no surprise they will want to bridge the gap.