2 hours ago, Mashed Potatoes said:

The biggest attendances in British sport came immediately in the years after the Second World War when people were desperate to get back to entertainment.

Emphasis on entertainment not an endless supply of bullshit excuses and being taken for mugs . Somehow this could be a different situation once the initial honeymoon is over . And ours has been over for ten years .

1 minute ago, Mercer said:

Never mind top 6, have we beat a top half side this season?

Dreadfully disappointing.

Couldn't see City scoring.  Sloppy defending!

Douglas the most overrated left back in our history!

Douglas was decent 1st half when going forward and we had more of the ball In promising positions .

we’ve been beaten again when top 6 beckoned , by a nothing team really .

We played some decent stuff and I’d have been a bit disappointed with a draw tbh. Not sure subs gave us anything either .
But I can’t help thinking a more demanding ruthless manager would get far more out of this group of players . 
we are half decent but no more or less than many others and we will need to discover a killer instinct if we have designs on top 6 .

But let’s not forget that top 6 isn’t the prize - it’s a ticket to the lottery that we also then have to win .

15 minutes ago, Doug said:

Not a great first half. Three up front really leaves us lacking legs in midfield. Gally off, Rothy on. 

Commentator said bell has been here 4 years, please get a replacement soon Tony. 

I know - he is hopeless . Gives the ball away for fun 

2 hours ago, DE. said:

Brereton wasn't used as a scapegoat, he was simply pointed out as being a huge waste of money when other areas of the team - goalkeeper and defence primarily - were being criminally overlooked. Arguably our defence still has been. Even when taking into account how Brereton played this season, there's no doubt in my mind that such a significant amount of money could have been spent far more wisely than on a single player who was not ready for the first team at the time of signing. 

Whilst we are looking okay at the moment, let's not get ahead of ourselves with talk of how we've been saved. As it stands we remain a mid-table Championship team - the same as we have been for the vast majority of time under Venky's reign. Mowbray has done a good job of getting us out of League 1 and stabilising us back into the position we were in 5 years ago, but let's also remember he hasn't had to sell a single player and has been given plenty of money to spend in order to do so. 

To claim success we require a top six finish at the very least - as it stands we are still in a position where as soon as we get within touching distance we seem to mentally implode. We are yet to beat any of the better teams in the league yet this season. There are still barriers we need to break down before we can truly say we are going in the right direction, rather than seeing a rerun of the Bowyer years. I would love for Mowbray to be the man to finally give us something to look forward to after a decade of nothingness, but for me at least the jury is still out for as long as we continue our aversion to being in the top six of the division for any significant amount of time. 

Totally right .

I also think we need to just calm down a bit over the justification of BB & SG. 
yes much better from BB this year largely down to a much improved work rate and far better use of his strength . Is he a finisher ? Not in my book - his one on one in the 2nd half today for example was embarrassing . So he’s doing ok but £7m ? Not for me.

SG getting lauded for a couple of goals which is fine and today’s was great . But 4 games ago I didn’t want him near the team . 
Still too much reliance on AA for our goals . If he has a quiet spell or gets injured I worry for us .

promising signs I’d say big much still to deliver . 

8 hours ago, JoeH said:

Straight back into the team. As he should be. Was dropped for Gallagher after his goal against Luton, and now rightly back in the side.

Not disputing his quality and he’d play above Gallagher for me every week on the right side. But just saying you have to manage a young lad carefully . 
Tbh I thought today was one of his quieter games .

9 hours ago, JoeH said:

I think Elliott will play, because there'll be clauses in his loan agreement that ensure it from Liverpool's perspective. Gallagher did well against Preston for sure, but Elliott had 6 good games out of 7 before that and didn't really deserve to be dropped either.

I doubt it was ‘dropped’ , Joe. The lad is 17 and has gone into hard competitive football playing a daft amount of games including England last week  . I think Liverpool would expect us to look after him a bit not flog him to death .

Just now, Miller11 said:

“Naive” and “Badly advised”...

No doubt both of these things are true, but I’d say it’s also pretty indisputable they have also displayed massive amounts of arrogance and incompetence. Ignoring that and blaming everything on Jerome Anderson and absolving Venky’s is ridiculous.

Apparently he was persona non grata when Coyle was appointed... although join the dots with the agents of all their managerial appointments since Bowyer and it’s apparent that the “lessons have been learned” line isn’t true.

Like Glen and Philip have touched on, there’s nothing much new there for us, and plenty more that could have been said, but obviously it’s for the wider audience.

Badly advised.... particularly by the global adviser they brought in themselves to advise them ! You couldn’t make this stuff up . 
what’s the story with Anderson being in a bad way?  Have I missed something ?

16 minutes ago, Paul Mani said:

Yup, the manager gives people COVID and ACL Injuries ???

But he does give out £12 million on two complete and utter embarrassments 

1 hour ago, RevidgeBlue said:

Don't get the Dolan bashing, looks more likely to do something than most.

I'd take Gallagher off, bring Rothwell on and move Elliot into the middle. At least he might be able to control the ball up front.

 

Like a little boy rocking up in the park and the men ask him if he wants to join in . Enthusiastic ( which is more than many out there) but brushed off and out muscled far too easily to have any more than a fleeting impact every so often . 
it’s not bashing the kid , it’s stating the bare facts .

Just now, Gavlar Somerset Rover! said:

This performance is so embarrassing. On every level. Gallagher - sh*te, Brereton - sh*te, Dolan - sh*te. I could continue.

Dolan looks like he should be in a circus ..... oh wait 

12 minutes ago, Bbrovers2288 said:

Those world beaters reading just got done by Coventry city, shows our result to be horrible 

Or our result last week to be outstanding ??!!

Far too early to be getting hung up on league position/ result patterns . Far more relevant to know that you have a settled team with good players in a system that will work over the course of a season and with a manager who is tactically astute enough to manage it properly .

The good clubs will concentrate on themselves and make sure they can defend properly when needed but have the class and firepower to impose themselves and to boss games more often than the others in the league .

that simple really . Are we that team ????

13 hours ago, philipl said:

At least with Ben, I think there is increasing basis for hope that after a quiescent two seasons he is blossoming into something we hoped for.

The deadweight write-off is Sam Gallagher's £5m transfer fee. Wrong position or not, he just doesn't have the basics of reading the game or controlling a football. Hope I am wrong on Sam but he is mid-20s now and at this rate destined to slip out on a free when his contract expires.

Yes the cumulative cost of these 2 - especially Gallagher and his astronomical wages ( By our standards at least) makes the case for signing them even more far fetched . By the end of their first contracts  the £12m transfer fees plus wages for 3 or 4 years will take the cost of the pair of them above £20mill. Absolutely frightening . At the current rate it will be close to £1m a goal !! 

On 26/10/2020 at 08:19, DavidMailsTightPerm said:

I think (and this isn't BBs fault,) £7m was far too much for a Championship side to pay for potential. Even most Premiership sides would have hesitated at that price. 

If he continues to improve, and possibly plays a key role in promotion we may look back and congratulate TM for his eye for a player - but will still think it was a huge gamble for a mid table Championship club.

Not kidding!

what position did we think we were  filling for £7million ?? Serious question . That’s the kind of money you’d pay for a pretty Decent goal return , very likely a central striker .Safe to say that ain’t happening .. ......ever. 
So when we bought him what did we have in mind?

There can’t be an answer that justifies it so ergo a waste of a lot of money . 
Then we move on to Gallagher - hells bloody bells. 
Somebody at that Club should have been relieved of their post for such crass misjudgements and reckless squandering of much needed cash. All this carried out in the ‘defenders are coming ‘ era.

They are  decisions which you can’t get away with in any other occupation. 
 Not much more to say really. £12million spent neither problem solved .

48 minutes ago, Parsonblue said:

The family in India will make the appointment and you actually think they will pluck some rising star from Europe or further afield?  The appointment will come from whichever agent is in favour at that particular time.  The owners won't have a clue if that appointment is an improvement on the present manager or not.

Where’s Judan Ali these days????

28 minutes ago, Mercer said:

If Pears is number 2 then, IMO, the Greek lad must be utter sh1te.  Just where on earth do we find them !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Europe or Teeside - the much vaunted new scouting system, Merc . Come on keep up !!’ ??

We have a million pages going on here and actually some of the stuff we play is pretty decent and we do have some classy players .

But when all is said and done Mowbray couldn’t get a tune out of the London Philharmonic. It all rests on him and he hasn’t got a clue how to set a team up . 

18 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

That's my concern as well. We need Gallagher or Brererton to discover where the goals are.

Which is a barely believable statement Tyrone when they cost us £12million!!! 
proof of the pudding etc etc I guess but at least I’m not doing my usual deadline day thing of going to sleep in a rage for once ! 
we can at least say defenders( and keepers)  finally came this time .

1 hour ago, Wing Wizard Windy Miller said:

Good end to the window that.  Couldn't have gone much better with minimal resources so fair play to Mowbray.

Certainly going to be our best chance of top 6 this year. 

 

Agree - nagging doubt whether we have the goal power over 46 games out with Armstrong but highly encouraging squad overall .

Better than we could have dared to hope for .Let’s hope he knows where to fit them all in ...... in their right positions !!! ?

1 minute ago, Oldgregg86 said:

Brandon Williams will be a good premier league player male no mistake over that. Like shaw is very injury prone and with Telles being a new acquisition and an unknown in terms of acclimatising to a new league, area etc they don’t always settle quickly and it may or may not work out. If I was Williams I’d be staying around and waiting for my chance. 

They discussed him going on loan on Talkshite this week but OGS reckons no chance because he is right footed and provides cover at right back for them . 

4 minutes ago, simongarnerisgod said:

iv`e watched mowbrays teams since the start of his tenure,i don`t think this "entertainment" is going to last,i don`t think other fans do either,don`t know about you but i prefer realism

Exactly . 
4 games,  decent start , scoring a good few and keeping clean sheets so what’s not to like . 
but there are still key issues and positions that haven’t been   addressed do let’s not run away with ourselves and talk things up that don’t really justify it . 
Enjoy it of course we all will but it’s 4 games and we’ve got 7 points . I prefer to keep things level and see where we go before we extol the virtues of a ‘ wonderful’ European scouting system . There are significant issues still to deal with so apart from Chaddy let’s keep things realistic. 

36 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

Kaminski may be ok? 

Mowbray convinced Ayala to join here. 

Rovers recruitment team suggested Dolan and Mowbray backed their judgement on signing him. Since signing him he has surprise the club and IMO been excellent so far. 

How many European players have we signed under Bowyer, Appleton, Lambert, Coyle then? We didn't those managers not implement an European Scouting department during their time here? 

Mowbray and Rovers have always said this European scouting network is here for the long term and not just for this window. Thats why we investing money, time and bringing in the right staff into the recruitment, scouting and data analysis departments 

36 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

Well Joe is entitled to his opinion but I do feel that Joe has a faIr point. Bringing in experience keeper, experience centre defender that we need, a winger who has been total surprise. Joe does worked for EA Sports so has more experience than most of players around Europe. 

A left back we have interest in. He hasn't signed yet. You can watch him on Thursday if you want play for Norway. Hopefully we will sign a left back before the 16th Deadline day. 

You got to trust your scouting, recruitment and data analysis departments that the players they recommend and scout more are the right ones. Mowbray backs these people after bring in the right ones. You need to believe more in the people we have in these roles unless you wish to go back to us using agents to bring players like under previous managers. 

Chaddy I really can’t be arsed . We’ve played 4 games , signed one from Preston and one from Boro and all of a sudden the European Scouting  network is ready to change the course of Our Club . If that was the key to it all why have we had to endure 8 shite windows ?
you crack on and enjoy the delusion .

ultimately we all want the same outcome for our Club so  Let’s leave it at that.

14 minutes ago, Mashed Potatoes said:

And yet no other manager was able to have the same "slice of luck" with Dolan as Mowbray ?

Basically, if every time the manager makes a good call it's written off as luck then you can construct any argument you like. I prefer to give our manager credit.

Maybe the case but the point is I doubt the signing of Dolan typifies the excellence of our scouting system. They said at the time that they liked him when he played against us but that was that and then Preston released him . So opportunistic I’d say .... fine with that it was a smart move . Not being negative but imo it was a slice of Good luck rather than a  miracle of scouting as Chaddy now seems to be making out.

13 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

Dolan was signed on the back of recommendation of the scouting and recruitment department and Mowbray his people on that. 

I don't know if Brereton was scouting at all. 

But focusing on the negative of past seasons instead of focusing on how good our scouting has been in bringing the players we have this summer and hopefully a left back to come in before the 16th October deadline

As it stands now Chaddy , the keeper may we’ll be ok , Ayala wasn’t the result of good scouting really was he? And Dolan was a slice of luck thatPreston somehow  released him , not one we set our sights on . 
god knows about the Greek lad .

hopefully more to come because we are still light in key areas so pardon me for not getting giddy just yet. 
It just makes me smile that Mowbray talks about Europe like he’s Christopher Columbus and just discovered it exists. We have had European players before you know ?

If they can find half a dozen Nzonzis over the next few years then maybe it’s working .

14 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

Thats why recruitment, scouting and data analysis departments have been invested in by the club, so we are scouting players properly and been less reliant on agents suggestions like under previous managers in the past. Watching games from a lot of European leagues so we know the players qualities in depth. 

Scouting players properly ?? Like Brereton and the others who either have connections with he north east or have played for mowbray before?? 
even Dolan was an accident- saw him once playing against us .

16 minutes ago, JHRover said:

Not really. If the transfer budget and wage budget is impacted by the number of season ticket sales who in their right minds would sit and do nothing until mid September and then complain by early October about numbers sold?

Why set a transfer and wage budget and then wait 3 months before starting sales?

Doesn't add up and you were the one who brought season tickets up.

As I say, doesn't actually matter. I'm more interested in the precipice of next summer. I just hope nobody has the audacity to complain about limited money if those players walk for nothing.

It’s strange given that ST income represents a relatively small part of the income contribution to us. If total match income reaches £3m a year then I think that’s about as good as it gets . Take off match day costs which we haven’t had either and maybe not playing has cost us about £1.5m a season when both are taken into account . 
The point I am making if I’ve got this right is that in the scheme of £18m losses every season it fairly minor . Hence I think Waggott and by definition Venkys may be making more of the Covid effect than is really the case . The more likely scenario is that Venkys are suffering globally and have put up the shutters on further spending at the football club they barely care about . It’s convenient a bit like hiding behind FFP in the past.

To put in context I bet match day income for a season would barely cover the salaries of our top 2 earners .To think we are paying Mulgrew a third of our total match day revenue ( including STs) and he hadn’t played for months . 
For this reason I can’t really buy the Waggott spiel . If my numbers are correct we are even paying him 10% of our total match day and ST income !!

If Venkys are as wealthy as we have been led to believe ( admittedly before Covid came along) then this would be the year to blow the doors off and go for it whilst everyone else is struggling . This could be a god given chance to get to the PL and really eat into their debt but appear not interested in seizing it .

9 hours ago, bluebruce said:

Don't think that's it. The max Fleetwood are allowed to contribute is 2.5k p/w and we are still entertaining that. Shouldn't be an issue for a Championship side.

That would leave us paying close to £15k a week for a bloke not to play for us . Add that to the last 9 months when he has also been paid not to play for us and we’ve blown our brains. No wonder football clubs are deep in the soft stuff.

Doesnt really make me want tax payers money to be used to shore up an industry that’s rotten to the core and one that’s certainly no more deserving than any other part of the economy whose plight isn’t any where near as self inflicted as football is. 
The whole thing is pretty sickening tbh especially when it’s been fed to us by the likes of Swaggot on £300k a year .