The gallagher bashing is a bit ridiculous imo, not many young lads join a team and start banging them in first season. What I see is a determination to work hard and learn. Has he paid off the 5 mill fee - not yet, but I think he will. He dropped down in level and wage to get game time, he isn’t content on sitting on a bench. Is he the finished article- no. Is he a natural finisher- no. But if he was he wouldn’t be here. What I would like to see is for him to be taught to get into scoring positions, when to make runs etc, I think that’s what he lacks. At times he is trying to do too much himself by dropping back. But that’s what the criticism of Rhodes was- all he done was finish, we can’t have it all. I have seen him score some cracking goals, I’m convinced he will come good, I ask for a bit of patience with him. Brereton is a different kettle of fish I’m afraid..... for reference- gallagher has the same number of goals as Sam vokes this season who I regard as a very good striker.

At this stage of the season the table doesn't lie. We're past the half way point and 10 other teams have been better than us and accrued more points, that's just a fact regardless of any other speculations. It doesn't mean we can't go on to have a storming second half of the season and ultimately finish top six, but there's no real evidence pointing to that happening right now. What we've seen is the same old story of the team collapsing mentally when we get within touching distance of the playoff positions, only to start playing well again when we're back in mid-table with the pressure valve off. I'd like nothing better than for the manager and the players to prove me wrong, but unfortunately I don't think they have it in them.

I've heard this view a few times and I personally find it insane. Even if you get to the Prem and come back down having been battered every week, the financial reward for that completely outstrips any arguments for staying within this division. Going up would also give us extra funds (providing they were made available) to improve the squad, with the additional pull of Premier League football. So it wouldn't be a given that we'd come straight back down anyway. None of this really matters though because for the second season running we find ourselves in and around the playoff picture, but haven't took the initiative and properly strengthened in January. Yet.

That's convenient. Just after the window ends.

Mulgrew, Smallwood, Graham come to mind as feasible. I'd personally be upset if Graham featured on the list.

Mowbray makes it sound as if the difficulties encountered in the transfer window are unique to him and Rovers. How does anyone sign anyone Tony?

Exactly what people said about DG at the start of the league one campaign when he was left out. Remember that great run that actually almost got us into contention in November / December. Guess who started 5 out of 6 games? Against Preston he did more in two touches to bring others into the game than Gallagher had done in 75 minutes. He just doesn't fit in thanks to the spending narrative of the manager.

You’re being far too finicky mate. The PL is littered with very average teams. It’s been proven with the likes of Burnley, Brighton, Cardiff, Sheff United, Bournemouth, Watford and West Brom that you can go up with decent teams and survive for a few years on basic investment. In all honesty, I’d take a Norwich City situation. The finance and improvement of the squad could secure our long term future and even if we dropped straight back down the squad and club as a whole would be in a far better position.

Agree. Johnson has been another massively disappointing signing for me.

But what people cannot grasp is that those who see attending as a priority are already going. We are appealing to those who either dont see it as much of a priority or that cant see it as much of a priority. So there are 2 potential mindsets, feel bitter towards those we see as "less committed" which might create a feeling of entitlement but ultimately will achieve nothing. Or the club can really ask, why arent more coming and what can we do to get them back? Totally disagree that the club is doing all that it can to drag people in. Prices are no longer low, they have drifted up in recent years and are now middle of the road. Look especially at matchday tickets with a needless additional surcharge making it very unappealing for the type of less committed fan from making a decision last minute, may it be that their own game has been called off, maybe a family plan has changed, maybe the weathers nice and they think they fancy going, is the club pricing itself to attract that sort of person? Not at all. Not sure the product on offer is particularly appealing either, there is a whiff of stagnation at the moment. Agree with the red button, more a general point about the mentality regarding attendances. You say "pander" to fans but that sort of attitude from the club wont do anything to get people back.

This should have been done as soon as Mowbray arrived not 2 years later

The fact you keep repeating yourself to him doesn't mean you're right! ?

I'm sorry but to pay 5 million on a 24 year old striker and then have to teach him how to make runs and get into goal scoring positions beats the shit out of me.

If the summit of your expectations is not moaning and trying their best, and you turn a blind eye to strikers not scoring goals and the manager playing players in incorrect and uncomfortable positions then thats up to you. I want my strikers to score goals and I want players working effectively in their natural positions. More fool me. But it isnt needs must? We have actual wide men at the club. You are the absolute master at taking a point off tangent to hide something. Apparently being linked with players and then the manager saying that we are nowhere near asking prices is proof that the money is there to spend. If we cant judge or discuss anything "without knowing the full facts" whatever thag means then lets all not form opinions and instead close the messageboard. I can see with my own eyes that Gallagher cannot play effectively out wide and when he has been up front his goalscoring record has been dismal. But as long as he shuts up and doesnt publically berate the manager for it and he tries his best I am not within my rights to expect any more!

Always tomorrow, never today

Yeah, but it’s wrong and everyone can see it bar Mowbray. The galling thing is we have actual wingers kicking their heels, while Gallagher is out of position, like a fish up a tree. It’s not his fault he is picked there though.

Rovers close to appointing a head of European scouting. https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/sport/18189615.rovers-close-appointment-boss-talks-overseas-targets/

They are better than us because they have more points than us. As a team they have all been more effective than we have over the past 28 games or so. Every team has to deal with injuries, that's why squad depth and not relying on injury prone players are a part of long-term planning. Lenihan and Nyambe being constantly injured isn't bad luck, it's natural for both of them. If we can't account for that then we can't chalk it up to bad luck, it's just poor planning.

If Armstrong is our number 9, fine, but then that means we need to play wingers on the wing and Gallagher needs to be on the bench.

The club isn’t a charity mate. People are banging on about Venkys who are £100m deep and still willing to spend but can’t even bring themselves to buy a cheap season ticket, half season ticket or whatever other deals they put on. Attending is a priority. Because we are supporters and that’s what supporters do at the most basic level. Plus the club needs to demonstrate generated income to move forwards under ffp. The club made massive mistakes. I stopped going myself for a couple of years. But they couldn’t have done much more in the last few years to get people back. If fans don’t wanna go, fine, I couldn’t care less. But don’t then whinge about missing out on a bonus crappy service like the red button.

Goal scorers are born not made. If you were watching the Shrewsbury v Liverpool game. Whalley was through on goal twice and never looked like scoring, Cummings comes on and with more or less two touches put two shots in the back of the net cool as you like.

Way too late for this window, all this should have been sorted out in November or December. Even if we had no money to spend there's an obvious and pressing need to shift out our deadwood and the window could have been put to good use by doing this but no doubt any half hearted attempts will come to nothing at this late stage. It really does make you wonder what Waggott does to justify his no doubt not inconsiderable salary when we cant even get our ducks in a row in time for the transfer windows. I'd say every one has been a disaster since he arrived. What else does he have to sort out all year?

People talk of him as young. Shearer had scored a hat trick on his debut, played for England, transferred for a record fee, got a career threatening injury, overcome a career threatening injury and was lifting the Premier League trophy at his age. Gallagher has already played more than half the amount of games that Big Al did for us - so it's about time he learned the basics of striking. ...of course I'm mischief making but it is all true.

You were criticising him, and pretty much writing him off already. Your saying strikers can’t learn and progress which is ridiculous. And yea not every striker is for scoring barrell loads of goals, it’s about how effective they are for the team. Also in his defence is that he is hardly getting great service from out wide

Look no further than a certain David Speedie. Instrumental in our promotion season to the top flight...sweet Jesus what an impact he made for one Season.How the ground used to echo to his name pre Shearer. The banner hung on the gates of the BBE terrace after his shock sale said it all: "Please Uncle Jack,bring David Speedie Back!"

Mulgrew surely. We need his wages off the books. I don't blame him for hanging onto a contact we gave him, but at 33, if he wants to play a bit more football in his career, he needs a fresh start somewhere new.

“When people phone about our players, you pick a number out of the air and that gives them an idea about what they might take. “Either negotiations start or you frighten them off with that number." Talk about amateur. No wonder other clubs are proving hard to deal with, "Oh you're calling about Richie Smallwood, (spins tombola), it think £6m sounds about right." Get rid.

If we are so good, how come we just played Wigan, Huddersfield, Forest, Preston and Birmingham (twice) and couldn't stuff any of them. We're a decent Championship side who is too inconsistent to challenge.

Its rovers mate, be told.

Groundhog day at Rovers with the same old excuses and soundbites coming from the club. Nearly 4 weeks into the window and only now realising that top targets might be too expensive. Have we done any homework? Pretending as though the Dack injury has thrown everything into chaos. 5 weeks nearly since that happened. It strikes me as amateur hour. Life on easy street with no funds and no pressure to deliver.

Can he play like that 3 games out of 4 or was that just because of the occasion ? He's certainly worth scouting to find out.

Josh Laurent was immense ... well worth it as he’s free in summer ... Probably end up being snapped up by Brentford!!

Sounds like Mowbray to me!

It's the mental side of the team that is a worry and it has been for years now. We haven't got enough " winners " at the club. That starts from right at the top.

This whole learning the way we play shit is driving me mad. I have watched every game this season and still have learnt it!!!

I never thought I'd type the following words, and I'll bet you never expected to read them, but "there was an interesting article in the Metro yesterday".? ? It was on the subject of FFP and made the point that we are not alone. We weren't mentioned specifically, but the article pointed out that even the teams at the top of the table - West Brom were cited- haven't looked that brilliant this season. At the time the article was published yesterday morning, the author said that Championship "teams have so far made a grand total of eight permanent signings between them in this transfer window, and there is one major reason for that - FFP." "... so many clubs are struggling to comply with Financial Fair Play Rules that significant signings are nigh-on impossible - and it is showing on the pitch. "A rule designed to improve competition and stop clubs going bust is instead a cap on ambition and also creates a huge gulf to the Premier League for those who do go up. "Do they splurge the cash like Aston Villa - with all the problems bedding in north of £100 million worth of players in one fell swoop brings - or not, like Norwich, and ensure relegation would not be a financial catastrophe? "The intentions of FFP may be honourable but, right now, fans of Championship clubs are being short-changed." I've quoted so much of the article, not to point any fingers at anyone in authority at Ewood, but to point out that we're in good[?] company in struggling with the shackles of FFP. Who knows: Brentford's approach - buy them cheap; sell them at a significant profit - may be the most effective way to get us back to the halcyon days of the 1990s. But that would surely require a good, reliable scouting network across Europe. And that seems as likely to appear at Ewood any time soon as those defenders we were apparently promised were "coming".

Then why where we having bids of 4 million for Luke Freeman last summer,and didn't we agree a fee for Celina only for him to get a better offer from Swansea? Mowbray has had a hard on for Gallagher since his loan spell,he spent all last summer chasing him and when he didn't get him panicked into buying Brererton for 7 million. He has had a very very decent budget since we got promoted and he hasn't had to sell any player.He wasn't bothered about Raya leaving. They backed him and he could have spent the money a lot more wisely.

It’s like a repeating Groundhog Day! No one knows on here whether we have money to spend or not, no one knows of bids other than the supposed media links and no one knows of any plans inside the club right this minute. Wait and see if anything happens, if not we pee with the todger we have??

Downing and Johnson will not have come cheap,million pound loan fee for tosin if reports are true,I'd imagine we are paying some of his 25 grand a week wage that he is on at City.Holtby would have got a significant signing on fee for him to join us and we paid out 5 million for Gallagher. We did spend in the summer.Johnson was on good money at Derby with another year left he didn't sign for peanuts and neither did Downing.

We had a minimal budget in the summer. It was pretty much loans and frees - Tosin, Downing, Johnson, Walton, Cunningham - other than the exceptional funding allowance made for Project B Gallagher because someone fancied another punt on a buy on the basis it would reap big dividends after the Brereton one the previous summer. Now granted - some of those signings have been good uns - Tosin, Downing, Cunningham until he got injured - and wages will not have been insignificant - but lets not make out like we've spent big or built on these guys. Come the summer most of them won't be here and those that are will be in the twilight of their careers. It's about as far away from the Brentford model as you can get - despite Mowbray referring to them as a template. It is also worth bearing in mind that Cunningham was only done at the 11th hour presumably when the financial requirements were more favourable or when we finally found space in the budget by offloading Mulgrew for 6 months. Money is virtually non-existent for transfer fees - as it was in the summer. The Gallagher and Brereton ones are special cases where someone chucked the cash in on the basis they were projects likely to pay off with interest in years to come. I don't believe that money could or would ever have materialised for other positions, or for several smaller purchases. Mowbray and Waggott get their budget in May for the year and there it is. The only way we will see incomings in January is by shuffling around on the wage bill by offloading a couple for a few months or if we get lucky and manage to sell someone. This talk about European targets, Polish wingers for £3 million, Venkys ready to invest but constrained by evil FFP rules is just fantasy land stuff.

Apart from the play-off part...

As a neutral, I need to tell you it's because you're almost always unable to provide him with a convincing counter argument. You repeat yourself because you don't have a better argument to offer even though your first wasn't convincing. You keep saying things like 'I already told you I think'. He knows what you told him you think, he's a smart guy. He's trying to tell you, you might well think it but your argument doesn't stack up because x, y or z. If you dont have anything new to reply with, I'd recommend you don't reply instead of repeating yourself to all of us. Hope that helps. I'm not trying to have a go, just telling you how it comes across.

Mowbray has been banging on about overseas scouting since we got back into League 2/ Now we are close to appointing someone to run it. My pulse is racing, How can I contain this excitement. Nevermind though, this is how you build football clubs.

You seriously think that each of those players you listed are the best in the league in their positions?

Leeds have signed Jean-Kevin Augustin on loan from Leipzig.........

When he left we were on a decline which eventually lead us into league 1!? Whereas we now sit in the Championship looking up at a potential promotion push having spent less than at least 11 teams in there who currently benefit from parachute payments. But all of the above is only the tip of the iceberg. There’s been huge steps made internally and in terms of infrastructure.

I would say Dack, Travis and Armstrong have all got better under Mowbray. Yes Mowbray is playing Gallagher on the right but hes a role for the team and wants to get better in that role. I agree. Rhodes's career has gone nowhere since leaving here.

For fans, it wouldnt be enjoyable getting hammered each week but for the sake of the football club we need to get promoted even if that would be the outcome. The hundred+ millions that come with promotion, increased gates, increased exposure, and the parachute payments when we go back down should not be sniffed at. I agree it is not wise to do a Villa (or Fulham the previous year) of getting up and then going and spending crazy money in an attempt to stay there. I would rather go up and invest wisely so that should we go back down, the squad is in a strong position to get straight back up again.

Excellent email from the Trust today about its plans and the ideas it wants to persuade the Club to adopt. Very encouraging. If we only had similar inventiveness and enthusiasm within the Club.... Too long to post.

I'd put my house on us not making the playoffs, in fact I'd put decent money on us not getting in the top 6 at any time this season. Feel free to bring this post back if I'm wrong. You won't need to though. Oh and Brentford will be playoffs minimum, even though we 'stuffed' them 1-0.