As I remember being told at school many years ago, "Don't call him an arsehole; an arsehole's useful." "Not one that big!"

I've just looked - probably for the first time - our last three fixtures are against Huddersfield, Rotherham & Birmingham!! So the manager's motivational speeches will be needed as never before. Oh sorry; I forgot; he doesn't do them, does he?

Especially if Mowbray & his pal Waggott are still around.

That's why my Geordie pals told me that Benitez let him go so - comparatively - cheaply. They thought Rafa saw him as a good Championship forward but was one of those who couldn't make the transition to the Premier League.

Can anybody on here please explain to me why, if the owners were so ruthless as to sack BFS after one bad result - that Man Utd game - they've been so incredibly lenient with Teflon Tony?

I'm with you on this one, 47er. The word I've used to describe my relationship with what I used to call, "This Great Club Of Ours" is 'divorced'. Obviously the pandemic and the truncated season's part of that; but until the Trust sold us to our present owners, I always felt that the club was in good hands, run by Boards who had the same sort of affection for it as we, the fans, have. Now, it feels that we're in an era of benign[?] neglect, with owners that do the bare minimum for us, and can't be bothered even to sack the manager for his bizarre tactics leading to pathetic results. I'm sure you, 47er, will doubtless remember Al Read, the comedian from Salford, on the wireless [old meaning!] in the 1950s. One of his monologues was as a football fan who wouldn't go to watch his team who were on an unsuccessful run like Mowbray has us on at present. "Why would I go and watch them?", he asked. "They never came to see me when I were bad!" Which is just how I feel about Mowbray's present team and tactics.

The thought that's kept going through my mind this weekend is that, if Quality Control in the main part of our owners' 'Empire' is as abysmal as it is in our part, thank goodness I don't eat their chickens!

Maybe; but far too subtle for TM!

So long as it's not the bottom three!

I'd been shouting for Pearson for weeks now - long before Bristol City recruited him. Now that he's unavailable, how about the latest Rovers' Old Boy to actually win - scuse me for splitting an infinitive! - win something? And with apologies to anyone north of Hadrian's Wall: it may only be Scotland; it may only be their League Cup; but could we do worse than Callum Davidson? I can't remember Alec Neil actually winning that much - I may have forgotten; I've been on a cheaper Red tonight than I'm sure Mercer would ever consume! - before he rocked up at Deepdale.

How's a 1-1 draw the "worst possible outcome"? Wouldn't a 1-0 defeat be worse than that? Or losing 2-1? And so on, ad infinitum.

It's only now - 1.00 pm on Thursday - that I feel strong enough to read through this thread. I totally agree with your first paragraph, Pirate; you sum up exactly how I feel. The phrase I've used in conversations with friends to sum up how I feel these days about the club I've been following forever is "that I feel divorced from them." I don't 'do' iFollow - far too technical for this old fogey! - and I must confess that, for the first time since probably the Jim Iley era, I completely forgot that we were playing last night. I'm bemused by what's going on at Ewood and, behind the scenes, with regard to Brockhall. It feels like we're directionless at every level of the club; and, as for our owners, well, why can't they be as ruthless with Mowbray as they once were with BFS? I remember, probably three years ago now, being taken in by the public image of Mowbray as a competent 'Mr. Nice-Guy'. To my embarrassment, I recall comparing where we were at that time with where we were at the time of the first game I remember attending at Ewood in November 1953 and said something about both teams being where was appropriate for a club of our size in a town of our size: mid-table in Division Two/Championship. How naïve of me, eh? With Mowbray bemusing all of us with his team selections - and those selections almost invariably and inevitably being less than the sum of their parts - we seem, at best, doomed to float around where we are at present. And, put simply, it isn't good enough for us.

To do what? See if he can get us into the relegation zone???

Yes; but will they be: 1] polite; and 2] about how following a team he manages drives you to drink? Well, that's my excuse, anyway!😉

Possibly the saddest post I've read on here in some time.

Hope you'll accept an amendment to your post, Exiled_Rover.

If they haven't already, why don't they whack a bid in for Chorley's groundsman??

And you forgot about The Dingles crabbing a win against MK Dons, tony!😉

Totally agree with you, bazza. He's hard, yet intelligent and above all a man who doesn't suffer fools gladly; that's a mixture that, imo, we need behind the manager's desk. Additionally, although he's a few months older than Mowbray, his image is of a man who isn't dictated to by events. I can't imagine him signing his mates' lads, for example. See this from the Smoggie-land evening paper: https://www.gazettelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/eric-paylor-nigel-pearson-mans-9611087 Admittedly, it's almost 6 seasons old; but I wouldn't look beyond him in the search for the manager to put the 'Great' back in the phrase, 'This Great Club Of Ours.'

What I find difficult to comprehend is, if BFS was sacked within 48 hours of the notorious defeat to MUFC, why displays like today's - and goodness knows there have been enough of them - haven't provoked a similar reaction by our owners towards Mowbray? Do they not realise that their 'investment' is depreciating with every game like today's? I know that nobody's allowed in to watch a 'live' game at the moment; but, really, displays like today's provide no incentive for fans to return to fortnightly attendance at Ewood once the All-Clear in the war against Covid19 has sounded.

Simplistic comments like this are REALLY annoying. That may be what the history books show in years to come; but to put it on here as a point of comparison with our performance and result today is cheap. The full facts are that Derby County, whose squad was decimated by Covid19 and played their youth squad at Chorley, lost that game. There can be no comparison between the result at Chorley and the unmotivated performance that the 10 players in blue and white and a Reserve goalkeeper put on this afternoon. If it sent Mowbray to sleep - as it appeared to - then that surely shows he's no longer fit to occupy the manager's office.

True; but he's even luckier that we've got apathetic owners who are, apparently happy to keep paying him to 'manage' displays like today's.

And now I'm living in a new circle of hell; dreading the message from NZ confirming that the 6-fingered ones now have an owner with the sort of specifications I alluded to above.

My own personal Hell is that I have an old schoolmate who emigrated to New Zealand and supports the 6-fingered ones. I KNOW, that when I wake up tomorrow morning, there'll be a cheery message from him celebrating yet another crabby win for them and yet another crappy defeat for us. What I do not understand is why our owners should want to keep hold of such an under-performing 'asset'. There's nothing we can do about it, I guess; but I can't help wishing that, if they aren't going to put some money into us, they'd sell us to someone/some organisation that's interested in their football team progressing, rather than being allowed to regress.

Yes; it's really got to be, "Defenders are coming" in January!