Sam Gallagher on 40k a week? I upchucked my supper. If that list is correct maybe this one is too. Also from FB it's alleged to be Tony's entry for the FIFA 20 "All-Time World Eleven" competition.

“I’ve left him out for a few games, because he’s been poor with his distribution and was getting caught on the ball.” Meanwhile, Elliott Bennett has regular terrible performances, gives away penalties at will, but will never be dropped.

https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/politics/quicktest/18019452.rovers-weigh-options-mowbray-explains-travis-absence/ “I’ve left him out for a few games, because he’s been poor with his distribution and was getting caught on the ball.” I dont necessarily think that as a standalone comment, that there is anything wrong with that, he may have a point. But he replaced him in central midfield with Elliott Bennett! Who cant pass wind. (Although if chaddy is to believe did a man marking job on Paul Gallagher that had Kante taking notes!)

Yes Alejandro. We support a fabulous football club with a long and illustrious history, an iconic and beautiful kit and a record of achievement unsurpassed by any town of similar size. Present difficulties should not be a reason to deter you or any other fans from celebrating and supporting the Rovers. We have a history of punching above our weight, overcoming obstacles and representing with honour a Northern town itself characterised by the honest endeavour of straightforward folk. Be proud.

Do you sit behind a pillar? Only pulling your leg ? In all seriousness, what are these issues with his attitude? The only time I hear this, is when people defend Mowbray for not having the bollocks to pick an attack-minded team or go for it late on. I personally feel that he is on the edge of losing his job and it will force his hand to do the obvious and try to win games - that might give Chapman a chance. I'll be honest, if I was a lightening quick winger who scores, sets up and has proven my fitness in the U23's but has to frequently watch a load of out-of-position below par players be given chance after chance in a team that struggles to win or create chances, my attitude would be far worse than Chapman's.

He's so not bothered, he wrote an article about not being bothered. Has anyone got a flotation device? I'm drowning in irony over here.....

Says more about his team mates if you ask me. No bugger moving ahead of him and you don’t want to be passing back to Del and Benno...... Now Nyambe has forced himself back in, he’s just gone and made an argument for his little Benno to go into the middle for a bit. You couldn’t make it up really. He just needs to feck off and we get a team where everyone earns their place in the team.....this kind of shit must play ell with the team spirit. If Benno took my place in any part of that team I’d be fuming behind the scenes. Not good Mowbray Out

It was the quote that "the only difference between Jack Vale and a first teamer like Joe Rothwell is experience" which seemed a bit of a stretch. I dont doubt that Mowbray is perhaps over cautious with our youngsters, but the one thing I do think we need to look at is our use of the loan system. Buckley is the perfect candidate, when he features he looks lost IMO, he needs a loan spell in League 1 or 2, get kicked out a bit, learn through mistakes when to pass the ball and when to hold on to it. Our recent history of loans spells has been pretty poor, Wharton is a good example, you look at Fisher who I dont think has played a League game, I get that it can be very difficult to loan a player to a club in terms of guaranteeing game time, and there being a balance between getting them game time at as high a level as possible and getting them regular games, but we need to get better loans for our youngsters. Callum Hudson-Odoi is as good a youngster as you will find, and a special talent, whether he underwhelmed in one game or not.

A normal club would forget about that, as Wigan ain’t fetching folk at £28 for a Sky game. ’Christmas Cracker’ or some other PR guff. £15 anywhere in the ground. Lot of exiled Lancastrians will be arriving back home, lot of people take Christmas Eve off, so a chance of a ‘decent’ crowd... so no chance.

How long as Mowbray been here ? Yet to compete at this level we appear to need 5 new first team players !

Let's actually see Chapman in the team first before writing him off. I can often spot a player and that lad is bloody decent and way overdue his chance. It genuinely pisses me off how he hasn't had a fair crack of the whip. He'll be fast-tracking his way to wanting out and demoralisation being the mug who is in the squad but never on the bench. He offers something that absolutely none of the others can and would compliment an out and out striker. On the flipside, the wasted and prolonged opportunities offered to the likes of Bell and an out of position Bennett, who will never, ever make it at this level or above, rile me even more.

>No Bennett >Rothwell and Chapman

144 years a go the most beautiful football team...as a forgein supporter has to be impossible to say something that you doesn't know yet about our team but let me try... 144 years of a team that always has the special task to not only plays football but do it well thinking on people ho pays the ticket 144 years representing full of proud one of the most beautifull, traditional, and important countys...Lancashire...a place that has been forgotten like almoust the north a place that has much more to offer that people even imagine and Rovers always will represent the North. A team that changed my life in any aspects... thru football I knew and fell in love of England and your culture and values... a contry that now i respect and love just like mine. 144 years of glory and a present that yes wpuld be a shadow on our history but pals Blackburn Rovers has survived it doesen't matter why...since I'm a Rovers l hear a lot people sayung that we are lost that we are doomed etc...the only true is that we still here Why? Because of you and me becausewe know that to be a supporter it's not about trophys is not about economic success...Blackburn Rovers is about to pasion is about to love and defend your ground... 144 and I don't have nothing more to say but cheers to everybody ho supports my Blackburn it doesen't matter where. #Rovers #ImRoversTillIDie #Roversince2001 #TheMexicanRover

Doesn't mean he doesn't talk shit in the LET though.

Tosin for me. He brings something different to the team that we've not seen for a while and I now like him complaining to our defense - someone needed to shout at them. Sometimes he does play a risky square ball but that shows his confidence. Can't see him reaching City's first team and in all probability a good season with us will see him signing for a lower premier team. Be good if we could have him for keeps but we aren't at that level (yet?). Looks like a leader to me.

So not bothered he created an account here to tell us he aint bothered before then writing an article about how unbothered he is.

If he leaves Travis out to accommodate Bennett then he needs his bumps felt. More likely he’ll stick with him at right back with using Nyambe in the centre beside Adarabioyo, and Williams back out on the left with Downing covering. Mowbray has fallen into the exact same trap that Coyle did. Everyone make way for the bloke who trains the hardest. Shame how it’s (not) working out, I used to really like Bennett but he is becoming that player. Just as it was when Bowyer was here - another squad-that-could-have-been...

Dread to think if he hated him!

Fucking LOL ??

It is still predominantly academy grads that get singled out for criticism by the looks of it...

If we went 442 it becomes a problem to fit in the likes of Dack, Holtby and Rothwell. We'd have to play a CM combo of the likes of Travis and Johnson for stability and wide players who can get up and down. It would make us defensively very fragile to pack a midfield four with Dack, Holtby etc. Our best players are attacking central midfielders - hence why we end up with 451 or 4141 to fit them in with the requires support.

Some over egging how bad it is as well i think as it is far from a bad squad it's just bang on average overall, A few bright points, a few low points but most are bog standard. The key is getting the right blend, weeding of the real weaknesses, playing to the strengths and adding to it because all that can be done to this squad to get it capable of competing in the top 9. Mid table squad, mid table manager, middle of the road championship club costing minus c10 million overspend every season and a 7 miliion pound substitute at best when he's fit. That's what they've collectively created so far, problem is we aren't even midtable are we.......

Charlie Austin is a good example. If he gets you promotion and you think you need a better striker for the Prem you sell him on to another Championship club for more or less what you paid for him. If you don't get promoted you keep him for another go at promotion. That's a much more sensible purchase that chucking big bucks at some kid who may or may not make it 2 or 3 years in the future.

Beg the hierarchy to switch kick off times on behalf of his mates in blue.

I keep seeing you talk about this, but it doesn't matter what he did if he wasn't the one sent off. If another couple of players got themselves sent off by intervening, it's because of something THEY did. If he stayed on the pitch then he isn't responsible. You seem to have it in for Chapman and I can't figure out why. But in this scenario you should be blaming the two fools who got themselves sent off, whoever they were. Instead, for some reason you seem to think Harry is the only one who should keep his temper, even though what he did can't have been as bad.

I do think some people tend to over egg how good our squad is. I do think we have some good players, and as said before I think we're definitely hampered by some poor management, but you only have to look at the defensive options in this squad to know that even the mighty Alex Neil wouldn't have this side in the top 6. As for Saturday, maybe we have a spring in our step after finally scoring an injury time winner last weekend, be delighted if we come away with a 1-1. £40 though is crazy, last time I went to Leeds was on New Years day 2014, think we won 2-1, think the ticket was £36 and only went as it was a chance for a bit of a session with some lads who I hadn't seen for a while. I can't get my head around anyone paying £40 for a nothing second division match, but each to there own.

??????

Not a chance wed get a fee that high for him IMO.

Which year?

A slightly longer version of this week's Accrington Observer column Adarabioyo Rises To The Challenge The fireworks were scheduled for 5:10pm but in reality, they started closer to 4:50pm when Wednesday substitute Jacob Murphy nodded home from close range and set off delirious celebrations in the upper tier of the Darwen End, just the upper tier note. I struggle to think of any circumstances under which asking £40 plus to watch a Championship fixture is justifiable, clearly several thousand Wednesday fans thought similarly. It was set up by former Claret Steven Fletcher, a nuisance for Rovers all afternoon, beating Walton to a near-post cross but only able to deflect it onto the bar, Murphy finished the job from a metre out. At that precise moment, any hopes that Rovers had for resurrection of their season seemed fit only to top one of the bonfires planned for later on Saturday night. It had been a dispiriting week, the Preston result forcing even Tony Mowbray’s staunchest admirers to reassess just what the future might hold. Another relegation would surely be cataclysmic for a club still coming to terms with its post-Premier League fate. Twenty years ago, almost to the day, Jack Walker lost patience with Brian Kidd following a seven-game winless run and the speculation was mounting that Mowbray might soon meet a similar fate. However, structures seem more stable around Ewood Park these days, with knee-jerk reactions much less likely; but for all that, a win would help to dowse the bonfire of criticism aimed at Mowbray. Pre-season expectations varied significantly across the fanbase, some expecting play-off contention, some content with modest improvement but hardly anyone predicted a relegation battle. In a week where Netflix announced that they had been trialling software to allow viewers to watch films at 1.5x speed, the first half at Ewood had you longing for such a gadget for use in real-life. Reducing the “spectacle” to 30 minutes would have been a popular option such was the paucity of entertainment. The atmosphere in the ground was in parts of that first half, quieter than during the pre-match period of remembrance, sullied as it was by some unseemly noise emanating from the Darwen End. Charging those particular loons £40 for their tickets didn’t seem such bad idea at that point. Much like a jigsaw puzzle afficionado, Wednesday collected a series of corners but they failed to convert their pressure into clear chances and so praise must be handed out to Rovers latest defensive formation. Initially, it seemed to be a three when attacking, four when defending, but it soon settled down as a flat four with Williams wide left and the inexorable Bennett slotting in at right back. The stand-out performer in that first-half was the on-loan youngster Tosin Adarabioyo. His calmness in possession, desire to play it on the grass, to split the opponent’s lines with his passes and to treat possession of the football with the highest of respect marks him out as a player who has evidently received coaching of the highest quality. The half-time whistle was something of a relief, a chance to re-group and re-think and start anew in the second; for the fans as well for that matter. It was Garry Monk who blinked first, introducing Forestieri. Soon afterwards, the predictable reply from Rovers was to turn to Danny Graham, a man whose lustrous, bushy beard appears to signify a dearth of offers for razor sponsorship deals. Sam Gallagher suffered a knock but it might have been the preferred tactical change in any event. A Rovers attack with Graham at its fulcrum still looks the best option for Tony Mowbray; unless and until Sam Gallagher can reproduce that opening 25 minutes at Deepdale across 90 minutes and on a regular basis. With Joe Rothwell joining Graham a few minutes later and disrupting the midfield with his high intensity running and dribbling, the game finally sparked into life. Keiren Westwood in the Wednesday goal, himself no ally of Gillette it seems, demonstrated that goalkeepers mature with age like a fine port and two impressive saves from Travis and Rothwell in short order seemed to suggest that a goalless draw was to be the height of Rovers aspirations. The intervention of Fletcher & Murphy, sounding for all the world like the names of a brace of springer spaniel pups, seemed to have marked Rovers cards and the ground braced itself. Which is when Tony Mowbray threw on young John Buckley for the veteran Downing, presumably in the hope that his youthful endeavour could contrive a chance where Downing’s experience had been unable. Buckley entered the fray carrying a note which was passed to Adarabioyo. Much speculation ensued on social media as to the contents but frankly, even if it did say “Score two lads” as one wag on Twitter suggested, it did the trick. With just two minutes of regulation time remaining, Bennett flighted a delightful free kick into the box, Adarabioyo used his physical presence once more, this time as an attacking force and looped a lovely header over the previously invincible Westwood, ostensibly it appeared to save a point. Well surely that’s what most of us thought? Except for John Buckley... Three minutes later, more Rovers pressure resulted in Dack & Graham reforming their tried and tested partnership, a horrible slice by Börner left Danny Graham with time and space in the box to set up Rothwell. He wanted a touch too many and Börner seemed to have atoned by sliding in to clear the ball, but only to the feet of Buckley, who needed no second bidding to shoot and via a kindly deflection off the left leg of the hapless...yup, Börner again, wrong footed Westwood, to make it 2-1 and initiate delirious celebrations. Much has been made of Rovers recent inability to retrieve lost causes and/or score late goals; all too often being on the wrong end of astonishing comebacks (just last week for instance) but this was as welcoming as a potato pie supper, followed by parkin and treacle toffee; nourishing, warming, then ultimately sweet. Naturally, the remainder of stoppage time was still sufficient for the Owls to hit the post following a deflection from that man Adarabioyo again and Rovers needed a fine save from Walton to keep out the follow up. The impromptu on-field firework display was over, just the off-field ones to enjoy now. Crisis averted, at least temporarily; zero without a win. Leeds Utd away up next, if ever there was a place to stage another comeback in stoppage time...

Simon is a thoroughly respected commentator on the Rovers from the fanzine's perspective. Massively grateful that he went to the effort of getting quotes from the likes of Terry Gennoe, Mick Rathbone, Mick Speight and other teammates for his wonderful 2000-word tribute to Kevin Stonehouse in Issue 97 earlier this season. This was followed up by another brilliant piece about John Lowey last month.

Comparing anyone to Damien Duff is lining them up to fail. Duff was special and would be playing for City if he were in the game now. The saddest thing is that we will NEVER have another Duff while Mowbray is here. He’d have been stifled from the start, dropped when playing well and slated for not being defensive enough.

I remember saying when Mahoney first came into the reckoning at Rovers that he could be the new Damien Duff or he could be the new Keith Tracy. I think I know which way that guess has gone.

Yes, this is what gets me. Bennett, Evans, Smallwood, Mulgrew Gally and Armstrong to name a few all have to go on monumentally bad runs of exceptional length before they are dropped - and some of them aren't even then. Others, like Johnston have been dropped, presumably for under performing and yet there's no peep of criticism saying why they were dropped (this goes also for Evans and Smallwood when eventually dropped.) It's pathetic behaviour. I coul be wrong but I am pretty sure that virtually all the players TM has singled out for criticism are under 24. Speaks volumes that this is the case.

Mowbray doesn't know his arse from his elbow. Mowbray out.

Which makes his achievements even more impressive. He got Shamrock Rovers into the group stages of the Europa league, the first time an Irish league side every qualified for the group stages of a European competition. Everywhere he has managed he has exceeded expectations, not a little bit, but massively. He may have an issue with egos etc managing a club in England, but I think appointing him would be less of a gamble than many of the names that get bandied about when a vacancy comes up at this level. I would have loved him here. I would have been more excited with appointing him than I would be if we appointed Hughton.

Hearing very good things about Cody’s promo on AEW this week, looking forward to seeing that. A mate of mine has managed to get me a comp ticket to the WWE tapings in Manchester tomorrow, so I’m going to have to do some catching up before then.

Where’s Del

Someone like Allardyce or Warnock could probably get our lot into the top six. It would mean playing percentages and set-pieces, much to the chagrin of purists everywhere, but it would get the job done.

Steve Kean and Jerome Anderson just about everything connected to the clowns.

Asks for swathes of the Stadium to be closed off... #EasyDayAtTheOffice

Just to update your Rovers knowledge, our first match was a 1-1 draw against Church (a part now of Hyndburn - Accrington) on the 11th December 1875. I presume it was quite friendly. Parsonblue will let us know! ?

A lot of figures on there tie in with what's been banded about at times in the press, even the LT in Armstrongs case so it'll be near the mark. Gallagher though is surely based on his time at Saints but he won't be cheap nontheless and that is a fact. If they are paying Johnson and Downing those wages though whoever signed that off should be sacked on the spot !

I was screaming for Charlie Austin this summer.

I completely agree in the fact we need defenders asap. Just wondered why you said that Rhodes isn't coming back. I think if DG goes to Australia then Rhodes on loan until the end of the season would be a good signing. As much as I want Brereton to come good and eventually justify the price tag, I don't think he could do what Rhodes could in the final 5 months of the season. Rhodes was loved at Champions Norwich last season and scored some vital LATE goals, something nobody in our team seems able to do.

Cos Mowbray wont sign him and he not the forward we need. We need a keeper, centre back and left back. Not another striker. Plenty of people complained in the summer about signing a striker and not the centre back.we need. Are we back to this again.

Rhodes aint coming back here. For me, it would be the wrong move.

Birmingham charged us £15 the other week so if Waggott really does base his prices on what the other club charges our fans e.g. Leeds then what will his excuse be against Birmingham? He just makes it up as he goes along. Some Rovers fans are still falling for it.

I'm not really sure the owners are backing anything. I just think they quite like Mowbray as a human being (as everyone seems to do who has had dealings with him) and as a result they are comfortable with him being in place. Twas the same with Kean and Bowyer for a good while. The managers that haven't lasted are the ones who haven't had that personal link to Mrs Desai - Berg, Appleton, Lambert and Coyle - but even then it seems they all departed for other reasons than the owners getting fed up - Berg and Appleton were caught up in the Singh/Shaw chaos, Lambert walked of his own accord and Coyle was removed only when Senior was brought in to troubleshoot. Personally I don't think the owners (Mrs Desai and husband) have any interest whatsoever in results or performances or what the fans want or whether we are delivering on a particular target. They review things bi-annually when Mowbray makes the effort to jump on a plane to talk to them and keep an eye on losses and the amount they need to inject. Far from having faith in Mowbray and persevering through a bad patch because they believe in what he is doing I just don't think they know or care about what is happening on a match by match basis.