It did, in that Graham made way for him. Obviously the sub was not the main reason (forced or otherwise) for our collapse but you are naive to suggest that it had no impact on the game. Brereton didnt contribute positively. Graham was our best player pre-substitution. Uncharacteristically missing the point. Rayas idiocy was undoubtedly the trigger and the catalyst for 2 dropped points, but it was 2 nil at that time, why the total collapse? And more importantly, its far from the first time its happened! Every time it does you are closed minded, you investigate what caused it on the day, mistake or whatever, oblivious to the theme that theres on overall problem occurring, we keep throwing away points from favourable positions! It is not the sign of an efficient, fully functioning side. And youve put it down to a fluke goal, a bad ref decision, an individual error, whatever it is, and you might be right on them individual days, but totally naive to the overall issue. We are 22 games in. In that, we threw 2 points away at Ipswich, we got hammered from a winning position at Bristol City, we threw away 2 points at home to Villa, we threw 2 points away to Forest, we lost from a winning position at Swansea, we threw away 2 points against a 10 man Boro and again we threw away 2 points today. And almost topping all of these off, we were a penalty hitting the crossbar away from throwing a way a 3-0 lead from our best 80 minutes of the season. 16 points that we have thrown away, compared to 31 that we have. Is it reasonable to expect all of them to have been kept? No. But is that a worryingly high amount of points thrown away? Definitely. Is it fitness, is it psychological, is it tactical, is it a lack of quality, probably a bit of everything but it needs addressing. Brereton will continue to be a massive talking point due to his price tag, whether you like it or not. When he came on today he was poor, whereas Graham again was superb. On Graham youve backed yourself into a corner constantly writing him off and even last week contesting my claim that hes been easily one of our star performers this season. People acknowledge that hes yet to start, and we are basing it on sub appearances, but that all adds to the mystery.

Come home from a horrible, cold, rainy and windy day again pissed off at Rovers and their inability to see games out which means that I cant see any chance of a faint play off push even at this stage. Can see our season fizzling out and being over very early unless our results in the upcoming run of difficult games is particularly poor and we have to look over our shoulder. I read that we have won 4 out of 11 home games, that simply isnt good enough considering the points we have thrown away or failed to get. Yes you can point to a mistake as a turning point but its not right to brush it under the carpet because its a common theme. 2 weeks in a row we have thrown 4 points away totally needlessly and after doing all the hard work. I hope Mowbray is investigating and trying to solve why we have such a weak underbelly to throw away so many points, rather than putting it down to a specific error or decision and brushing it under the carpet, theres a deeper problem there. Graham was superb as always, Reed also very good, thought Evans was pretty neat and tidy aswell in the centre. Armstrong bar an excellent finish for the goal was poor, Dack was a bright spark and tried but not his best day, Smallwood poor again, centre backs ok, The 2 full back areas are massive weaknesses for us, Nyambe has seemingly turned back into the fragile player that broke in under Coyle, what was he doing for the second? And we have no cover for him. Bell is an absolute embarrassment of a player, needs replacing in Jan because hes never good enough, Williams is the lesser of 2 evils but down either flank we are so susceptible and often caught out. For a manager whose gained a reputation for being conservative at the club, and one who plays 2 defensive midfielders who are very limited, especially Smallwood, we concede far too many goals. Rayas mistake wasnt the first silly error hes ever made nor will it be the last. His kicking was terrible, he had the excuse of the wind today at least. The difference between Graham and Brereton is night and day. You can bang on about different types of strikers but Brereton wasnt even challenging for headers, he wasnt holding it up, his touch is awful, his positioning when the ball goes wide is poor in that he often is far too close to the wide man and not in the centre. I must say that hes still to start, but I do find the whole situation a bit bizarre, and I am basing my optimism for him on his reputation and price tag rather than anything I have seen for him. That being said, Danny Graham is a superb Championship striker, another goal and he makes the best out of rubbish service at times. @Bigdoggsteel you ask why theres so much focus on Brereton, he cost 7m so there will always be a lot of focus on him, to consider him as a scapegoat is both in-factual and laughable, considering the main conversation is about what else we could have spent with the money rather than the player himself. And all the while, Rothwell and Palmer continue to kick their heels on the sidelines!

Do one to Turf Moor. Problem solved.

Smallwood was, and continues to be, selected by Mowbray. You don’t think Brereton had any affect in the game/result? There’s really no way to respond to that. We seem to keep blaming our hardships on ‘individual errors’ but we are seemingly unable to see out a game without scoring three or more goals. If we keep conceding poor goals then we have the wrong personnel at the back - or the wrong tactics. Both are the manager’s responsibility. Lenihan is sadly not good enough for this division and Mulgrew is in the latter stage of his career. Yet we have spent millions on a substitute striker who doesn’t affect games rather than strengthen. Our centre midfield is a pair League One enforcers who can’t do this in the Championship. We have Raya and nobody to even push him, let alone put him under pressure for the jersey. These are the reasons that people become frustrated with the Brereton situation. We have wasted money we don’t have and neglected positions that need strengthening. Individual mistakes will happen but our issues are deeper than that. In 22 games we have conceded 2 or more goals in 10 and have 6 clean sheets, (effectively conceding 33 goals in those 16 games) with -4 GD. We rely on Dack (as does Graham) for goals. Take away him and Mulgrew’s set pieces and we don’t have a lot of goals in the team. Performances are less than convincing and we throw points away with alarming regularity. Fortunately for Mowbray he is under no pressure but that isn’t healthy either. Big January coming up. Acquisitions of Chapman and Gallagher will not impress. In fact, if those are the two we bring in it’s time to sack our scouts.

Some astute points already made. Agree with bigdog –most frustrating game this season. Highly annoying and Mogga’s interview, typically dour but sensible, didn’t help improve feelings in my household. Young side, we’ve just come up and so on –well yes, and before the start of the season I would have been happy with mid-table but some of the positions we find ourselves in with these games, it doesn’t really require genius to manage a game for a better result. The BlueNoses looked dispirited and the worst side I’ve seen here this season –no pressing of the ball, no urgency and some aimless long punts to little effect. So 2-0 up, without doing anything special in appalling conditions and on 76 mins Raya goes crackers rushing out for a ball and gives away a pen. Gardner (who galvanised them a little when he came on before that) duly converts. So 13 mins to survive by intelligent game management. Nah. They now have a little belief (something not present for the previous 79 mins). On 80 mins, can’t remember exactly how but we lose the ball, Gardner picks it up centrally and I lean over to wife and have time to say 3 times “he’s going to slot it inside Nyambe.” All Ryan has to do is make sure that his man is not going to get the ball –he seems to get mesmerised in no man’s land, the ball is duly slotted inside him and they score. 2-2. Cue head shaking from players and fans’ ire. So:- Where is the backbone when you need it? The leadership? The game management? The grit? At 2-0 nil up you work just as hard if not harder-didn’t happen. Lazy passing, not working as a unit. Agreed on the new personnel required –odd that such a large sum was used on a player who neither plays, or plays out of positon or doesn’t seem that effective On Graham –why should a team fall apart defensively when he goes off? Doesn’t account for a stupid goalie rush of blood and brainless right back defending. Agree that it was inevitable that his clockwork/fitness would run down in games and a replacement was necessary. Not sure Brereton is the answer. Looked like a floppy schoolboy to me today but it wasn’t his fault we drew Armstrong scored but just doesn’t seem interested to me-sulking because he is on the wing? Reed looked busy and lively and at it-effective centrally I would have thought Tony’s beloved 4231. No issue with it as such but strange that what is effectively a back 6 can leak so many goals. Perhaps that just comes down to players and ability. What is absolutely striking to me is the paucity of flair going forward. You could argue that today, in appalling conditions, that it didn’t really matter and was less of an issue and especially when you go 2-0 up. Perhaps that is more for another time, when we are drawing and can’t open a side up. One other thing –Raya cost us the game? Nope. He gave them some hope and it was 2-1 with 13 to go. That’s when you need the leadership and grit I mentioned above from all your players. Didn’t see it and the inevitable happened.

Spot on. I'm not interested in what Raya did. Focusing on individuals is missing the bigger picture. This backs to the wall hanging on rubbish has been going on for more than a year, only now we aren't getting away with it. It's a mentality and coaching issue and it occurs regardless of personnel.

Is anyone surprised? I'm certainly not, once they got one back the equaliser was inevitable. We are too soft and too many players go missing when the going gets tough instead of rolling their sleeves up and fighting. The engine room of Smallwood and Evans is always the first thing to evaporate, if I was Reed I'd be looking to move to a club where I am played in my best and most effective position as he is wasted out wide. But the result has to be on Mowbray today why is he taking Graham off has he learnt nothing from performances when Graham has not been playing this season, we can not afford to take Graham of as he is our key player and despite Mowbray spending £7 Million on Brereton we don't have anyone capable of replacing Graham. After a promising start to the season the defence has as I feared been shown not to be up to it at this level which is not really a surprise as we struggled to keep clean sheets last season in League 1 and no new defenders have been added. Nyambe has been well off the pace since his injury, Lenihan looks well out of place at this level as a centre back and as for Bell I've seen statue's with more energy. A big, physical ball winning centre back to play alongside Mulgrew is a must in January but it has been what we have needed for 3 or 4 windows now.

I think blaming the comeback purely on Raya's mistake is focusing too much on one issue and not the whole problem. Yes in this game it was clearly his error that gave them the penalty and the foothold to come back into it but they scored 2 goals, and sadly we've thrown away winning positions far too many times this season for them all to be ascribed to individual error or bad fortune. It's a common theme, we're becoming experts at letting winning positions slip and ultimately when happens so frequently you have to look holistically at the team and its approach to winning positions. Do we have what it takes to protect winning positions effectively? If not why not when we've 2 defensive CMs playing all the match every match? Simply to say it is all Raya's fault and we'd all be happily ever after if he hadn't done what he did I don't think is entirely right. There's a bigger picture in play of a team that for 18 months has been uncomfortable in winning positions and never far away from handing the opposition a leg up.

When bringing up the stats of our dropped points this season, it was said that stat was pointless. Well I bring it up again, now 16 points dropped from winning positions (nearly 18 stoke game) that's the most in the league, it's becoming a bit a joke now, and highlights the poor transfer window, of which defenders were and still are needed and a replacement for Smallwood.

Graham was holding his back before he went off. To suggest that though was the reason for dropped points is nonsense as we were comfortable and Birmingham hardly threatened. The game turned on Raya's stupidity which gave Birmingham a foothold but as importantly a huge lift. Without Raya's idiocy I'm convinced we would have seen the game out comfortably irrespective of who came on or went off.

Isn't this the problem? All debated here at length but TM went ahead collecting mid-fielders whom he doesn't pick and ignoring the key positions we all identified. And this is where Brereton comes in. Its not that he's to blame for the result, its people thinking that we could have sorted out those key positions for less than 7M. That's why the focus is often on Brereton. So, we should be looking at" what did Brereton do when he came on?" Isn't the answer "not much"? Haven't we made a big mistake here? Its no good keep arguing "we can't judge Brereton till he's played a run of full games." He has not shown enough to be given that chance. In any case, the formation TM prefers doesn't allow 2 upfront in the middle which, apparently, is the only place Brereton can play! That position is Graham's till he can no longer walk! Finally, as many have said, too much faith is being put in the players that took us up. Perhaps that's why TM did not address glaring issues in the transfer window. I think we will be at least 5 points off the play-offs by the end of the season and look back at what could have been. TM has done a great job for us so far but he might not be the man to take us further. That's the sad conclusion I reach.

Of course the fee is, and should, be a talking point.

There always seem to be a catalyst for a collapse and it always seems to be a defensive howler either by the keeper or the back 4. That could be just a lack of experience or it could be that the players aren't good enough (yet). Even Mulgrew, who is meant to provide the experience, defended appallingly for the Bannan goal against Wednesday t'other week. We got out of this league the last two times with battle hardened CB's and experienced GK's. We have a backline of relative novices at the moment in comparison. I think mistakes and collapses will continue for that very reason.

Raya has got away with a lot of poor performances in the last 18 months. He makes great saves but the number of avoidable goals he gives away is criminal. He's been a lot better this season and not thrown as many in his own net but he needs competition so he can be dropped like every other keeper at every other club. The lack of competition brought in for Raya is another reason why this summers transfer business was so poor.

I would say there is a bigger gap between League 1 and the championship, than between the championship and Premier league

Goals and build his confidence. I am surprised he hasn't had a few run outs with them to be honest. Rodwell and Downing have played with them this season.

Actually that is wrong pal The convo is not about Brereton coming on. It is about Graham going off. As soon as it happens we are usually fucked.

Can’t blame Brereton for the result today at all, a lot of people have made this point but only a select few could be argued to have singled him out for criticism. Think this point has been made into a bigger issue than it is... I stick by the fact he cannot be blamed for today but I’ll also stick by my opinion that for a club with questionable finances, for us to have spent 7 million pounds on an unproven 19 year old is f**king crazy.

They weren't wrong.

In episode 2 two scouts go and watch Bell play for Fleetwood against Scunthorpe. Make a comment about him wearing gloves when it’s not cold and then agree “there’s better out there than him.”

In fairness there were at least two defenders in front of him. One of them blocked his shot. It's baffling to me that he is being singled out. He had a few decent touches and I don't recall him doing anything bad. We looked a combination of lazy and nervous at 2-0 up. Lenihan played one absolutely shocking pass to Mulgrew. Now if Brereton did that, there would be uproar on here. Nyambe and Bell lost the ball a number of times, they were also caught out of position. People need to ask themselves why are they singling Brereton out. It seems some fans on here focus on a particular scapegoat and regardless of what they do, they will always be blackened. You could list out the players who fell into that category over the years.

I'm not. Raya's idiocy was no surprise but had he not done that I'm sure we would have found a way to let them back in elsewhere. Winning a game comfortably isn't something we do sadly, at best it is hanging on to a one goal lead.

Never said it was I was talking about Graham and how we have nobody even close to being able to play his role when Tony takes him off... and then we chuck points away as a result... over and over again.

AGAIN Been saying it for months. He must be kept on the pitch or we have nobody else who can win balls up top and get us playing in their half. Ball just ends up constantly in our half with everyone getting sucked deep. It happens time and time and time again. Brereton looked like a lost schoolboy when he came on.

The alternative is Williams. Choosing between them is like deciding which b*llock you’d prefer to be whacked in.

You only have to look at the effect taking Graham has on our results, we don't score and we are under the cosh more defensively as we don't have anyone to keep hold of the ball when we clear it so instead it comes straight back at us. Do you think it is purely coincidence the amount of points dropped when Graham has been taken off? As for you comments about Evans and Smallwood I have long said that they should not be playing in midfield together, Reed should be in there instead of being wasted out of position. As for Bell why is Mowbray even picking him has he not seen enough of him now to know that he is useless.

I don't remember feeling as comfortable about a game as I did today at 2-0 up. A thoroughly disinterested Birmingham were beaten and didn't look like they had anything in them and had settled for a two goal defeat. And then Raya gives away the most stupid penalty I have seen in a long time. What on earth he was doing out there I don't know but to make the challenge with his feet shows how random his decision making is sometimes. And when they scored I really felt they whoever another and perhaps go on and win it. Quite frankly we just concede too many goals without the opposition having to work hard or through their own creativity. We are suspect defensively and today both full backs looked full of mistakes. I am still strongly of the opinion that we need to get to fifty points sooner rate than later or we could be in for a turbulent couple of months at the end of the season.

The issue isn't taking Graham off he needs to be managed that way now to get the best out of him the real issue is not having another guy to take his place therefore altering the way it's going. Dress it up all you want but this lack of prep and acquiring another target man knowing full well you are going to be playing that way this season and whizzing your money on a might be might not be overated kid is piss poor. Yet again a proper commanding centre back and another proper target man type could be the difference between a comfortable season and a worrying one. We are falling down with the same old problems w eek in week out.

This team lacks a Ryan Nelson style leader of a central defender who defends first over anything. It also lacks a commanding centre midfielder who can take control of a game. If those two positions could be sorted then this team could get top 6 without a doubt. Never going to blame the Brereton lad because he doesn't set his price at 7 million and I genuinely think he will be a very good player but to spend that kind of money on one player is naive. For 7 million you could have bought the best centre back in the league or the best centre midfielder. I'd be looking to replace Smallwood and Lenihan come the next window with them dropping to bench options along with Downing.

What's sad is that the playoffs are there to be taken this season. Better investment in the summer and either a coach or a different manager who could organise a defence and this could have been a very interesting season. As it stands it's going to be a season of wasted opportunities, with poor summer investment meaning we're still a long way from even being back to where we were three years ago, let alone when Venky's first darkened the doors of Ewood with their presence.

2-2, then. Mowbray needs to be careful. Letting the fans down like this repeatedly will become almost as insidious as losing matches. We're already at the point where unless we're 3 or 4 goals up we can't trust the team to see the game out. That's not a situation that can continue for long.

Sod Lowe he's irrelevant but sending Bolton down would be sweet for a whole host of reasons it could be a highlight near the end of what will probably turn out to be a modest but respectable season

Two individual errors - Raya and Bell - cost us today. Raya had a major lapse for the penalty but goalkeepers do that at times. Bell, who I thought was dreadful, lost possession for the second when he could easily have simply pumped it forward. The fact that Bell made Mahoney look half decent just about sums up his performance. I thought Reed, Evans and Graham were our best performers - which they have been on a regular basis. Whilst Brereton was in no way to blame for the defeat it was noticeable that when Graham came off we struggled to maintain possession and missed Graham closing down defenders. Having watched every minute of Brereton so far this season I must admit that I'm struggling to see how he's going to win a regular spot in the starting line-up, particularly if we bring in another striker in January. He doesn't appear overly physical and he certainly isn't quick. I hope the lad proves me wrong but I've seen any number of players brought in over the years who have failed to make an impact and at the moment Brereton is beginning to fall into that category.

I'd say 5 points is being pretty optimistic to be honest. I see us being much further behind, maybe as much as 10-15 points. Teams around us will gain momentum as we stumble our way through the season without ever picking up a proper run of form, whilst the better clubs will be able to hold onto winning positions in a way we simply can't. Barring a very good January transfer window, which I am not expecting, I foresee a decent but uninspiring mid-table finish with a lot of uncertainty as to whether we can progress as we go into the summer.

Players need games for a variety of reasons and Brereton has has very little game time this season. His sharpness, match fitness and probably confidence will inevitably suffer as a result. I don't see any harm at all in giving him a few midweek outings along with several others who just aren't getting enough minutes on the pitch.

No question about it. The PL is littered with bang average teams all the way up to 6th spot (and nowadays you could even include Man Utd in that). Burnley came 7th having barely spent anything. It's a bit of a joke. Clubs that get relegated to the Championship tend to struggle to get back out, even if they keep a lot of their better players, whereas even teams like us and Sunderland who get relegated to L1 in total dissarray tend to dominate that league without even needing to play very well.

I think they have made jack a scapegoat and believed this even before he signed for us. They offered him a deal. He signed it and was available for selection. They froze him out. He was entitled to every penny he received from Sunderland and I dare anyone to tell me they would have took between a 30 and 50 grand a week pay cut because the club could no longer afford you. That's the finance people's issue not Jack's. It's ok making out it's Jack's fault that Sunderland had to make redundnacies and couldn't sign players. Why don't the people who made the decision to sign him and drew up his contract tear there contracts up and free up some funds for the minimum wage positions being lost it is after all there fault. If he refused to play then that's different but that wasn't the case.

Lack of upper body strength. He's been earmarked for a run in the under 15's at some point although Mogga has his eye on a big fat 14 year old lad from Chorley FC who may be above him in the pecking order. Waggott is currently negotiating for t'Chorley lad but won't go above £12m.

Getting three points today would have been hugely beneficial. We would have been 8th and 2 points off the playoffs, despite a fairly poor recent run of form. Instead we're 12th, with just one win in five games and looking over our shoulders as QPR, Preston and Bristol City all start catching up. With the run of fixtures coming up all three could easily overtake us by the time December is finished.

I contacted him via Twitter but he didn’t reply BTW...

Harlee Dean cost Birmingham 2 million, we could have done worse than snap him up. Lenihan is beginning to concern me a bit. Maybe Downing should have been allowed continue at centre half today, he was doing well. I was less nervous with him there. I suppose he is a natural center half whereas Mulgrew def isn't and you could argue Lenihan isn't either. We seem calmer with him and Mulgrew together. Lenihan plays like he gets very nervous at times, panicky even.

Raya cost us 3 points AGAIN today. I hope Mogga is still looking to bring in another keeper.

Numb people will sadly make an issue of the price tag, and quite frankly be dick heads

He looked like a player who knew were he wanted the ball putting.Not his fault if is team mates don't see it.

It wasn't Breretons fault that Raya had a brain storm ....

That was the worst and most frustrating game I have ever seen and I have an Ireland season ticket. Bell and Nyambe are brain dead. Really poor I thought. Lenihan was bad as well. Evans and Smallwood were OK. Dack was pretty good. Armstrong terrible. He really annoys me to be honest. He gives up chasing the ball and tracking back far too easily, a lazy little sod. Reed was good as usual, but clearly put of position as he kept coming into the middle. Graham was good. I don't think it's fair to blame Brereton for us falling apart, that lies with Raya. What an absolutely ridiculous thing to do. It wasn't just that though. He is so slow kicking the ball out. At the end when we needed urgency he was fecking around with the ball instead of launching it. I would drop him. Birmingham were absolutely awful. We bet ourselves basically. Every time they attacked I was nervous, we are so shakey at the back it's unreal. I knew that we would mess it up I just knew it. I didn't know how, but I knew we would. That's a bad position to be in. We could have lost that at the end. That game has the feel of one that's hard to bounce back from. I wouldn't be surprised if we lose the next day, or even if we lose a couple now.

Off the top of my head Ipswich 2-1 up drew 2-2 Bristol City 2-1 down lost 4-1 Sheffield United 0-0 Lost 2-0 Swansea 1-0 up lost 3-1 Birmingham 2-0 up drew 2-2 That's 8 points dropped, 10 goals conceded and 0 goals scored. Mowbray has to take the blame on two fronts, one taking Graham of when its clear how much we struggle without him. And two for not signing a suitable alternative to him when it was clear to everyone that we needed one in the summer.

Why does Mowbray insist on taking Danny Graham off early almost every game, we were cruising at 2-0, how many times have we dropped points after his departure from the field ?

What an awful day that was! If Brereton is the answer then the question must have been ‘what’s the best way to throw away £7m?’. Cold, wet, and pissed off with that today.

I just want Rothwell to start