All about him here at Wikipedia! Seems he was in the Dutch squad for the 1998 World Cup as well as the one that has just gone, although it says he didn't actually do any more than warm the bench. Soccernet here confirming it is on a two-year contract The Soccernet article also says "It is understood the fee for the 32-year-old is in the region of £2.1million."

Everton preview here - When Skies are Grey. Seems we aren't alone thinking that £36 is a bit steep for the game this year.

Maybe the delay is caused by John Williams having to vet the applicants due to the bashing he and the club received from your predecessor. Revidgegate I believe it is referred to as in Ewood's corridors of power.

False reasoning. You're not suggesting that the bank would pass on the savings made through admin to their customers and not just pocket it themselves are you? Besides, I don't always want to send my card details when ordered via mail order, also agree with Jim that there have people using cheques for generations who may not wish to change.

The backlash begins...Rovers 2 Everton 1

We'd just about hit our limit in the season when we finished sixth...we averaged over 26,000. Besides, our home performances were actually not that great. Finishing sixth this time should reverse the decline of the last three seasons by a bit at least. Marketing does have a part to play as it should always do but the improved performances must have more to do with it.

With such a large crowd there must have been a few turnstiles that were...ahem...kept out of the total figures. 'Chairman's turnstiles' I believe they were known as...they are mentioned in Tom Bower's superb and highly recommended expose of the English game, 'Broken Dreams.'

The club has its most successful season for years and season ticket sales/hospitality figures are up are they?!?! Of course they are up after the abysmal lows of last year! From 15th to 6th and plunging sales are (incredibly partially) alleviated...that plays far more of a part than any marketing scheme could ever dream of.

Hopefully we have put in a clause relating to a sell-on fee if he leaves, as we did for Danns and Beattie among others. We should be doing this with every youngster we let go to a lower league side.

You can also see it at the excellent National Football Museum at Deepdale in Preston which, as it is free, is as cheap as chips too!

If anybody couldn't remember the result from the West Ham game then it will have been burned onto their brain by now - it's mentioned about twenty times! Mokoena at right back, Neill at centre back, Bentley in central midfield, an unfit Reid on the right wing...if anyone had a bad day at the office yesterday it must have been Hughes! Still, hopefully he will have learnt from this game and against Everton on Wednesday we will see a very different side, both in lineup and in determination. It sounds like Todd's red card will probably be rescinded and that is important as, like Jan, I do think that he is still our most reliable pairing with Nelsen in the centre. That said, the Ooijer signing could change all that. This shows how disciplinary problems can come back to bite us on the bum. Already short on numbers on the back we will miss Neill for a match and possibly Todd will be suspended as well. Not only that but Tugay may have been a good option today which would have allowed Reid to be used only as sub if need be. That said, it seems like Portsmouth would have given him no time to work his magic but his suspension meant we didn't have that option. We can mention various incidents in which we can feel hard done by but the fact remains that we have finished bottom of the Fair Play League for the previous two seasons and have hit the ground running in our quest for a hat trick. We need aggression in our game but need to keep control. Silly sending offs like Neill's sounds to be (I haven't seen any of the game) need to cut out of our game. A question for those at the game...did Lucas really seem disinterested like some have suggested?

It seems they have no credibility at all as it is. Pubs continue to show games and nothing much is done about it. There obviously is a belief amond landlords that there is little risk in showing the games or at least not a significant enough risk to stop it and lose custom over it. That's the obvious course of action. How much would it cost them to stop selling the saturday 3.00pm matches? Surely it also cuts into Sky's number of subscribers as it seems all matches can be seen at many pubs.

It may be hypocritical but if they could let it be known they would only pursue legal action against those local establishments that showed home games while turning a blind eye to coverage of away games...no need to broadcast the information or too loud or anything like that

True but I think we are straying from the point - the fans (the ones that go the games anyway) can't do much about this, it needs either the police (which seems unlikely) or Rovers to do something about it. Some of the people on here are suggesting that fans just want to spend the money on beer rather than going to the game but that doesn't quite compute. 2 x pints in a pub = £5 + free live game thrown in ticket for next home match = £27 at cheapest, beer extra Most of the people in the pubs are being lazy and can't be bothered, but if they didn't have that option every week I think a lot would make their way down for a couple of games a season. It's something to do. Having these games on in their local just makes their whole decision so much easier. If some people are offered the easy (and cheap) option they will take it. So yeah these 'fans' are lazy so-and-so's but it's also understandable when football costs so much. Other than having a chat to the LET and sending out a letter, something more needs to done by Rovers. Either that or just accept it, one of the two.

If Rovers do nothing about this after suggesting it is 'killing' their attendances then whose fault will it be den?

If the club doesn't know which pubs are showing the games then they must be blind seeing as a number of the pubs actually advertise the games outside for all to see! It's all irrelevant however unless the club takes it further as just a letter by itself is unlikely to work. Besides, which landlord is going to turn custom away when the pub down the road is full up because the landlord there shows the games and isn't scared off by a meaningless piece of paper? Something more needs to be done as expecting landlords to stop filling up their pub (as Ozzie Jones indicates about the Horden as an example) to stop showing the games is a bit like expecting turkeys to vote for christmas.

Oh and Jemal has now joined Jay at Wolves...what a forward line-up they could have!

Nope...sounds like a perfectly reasonable prediction. In fact is almost the same as my prediction...was I also going for 'readership numbers'? Paranoia perhaps?

Why? Because they disagreed with you? Nothing worse than all the other predictions being bandied about.

Did anybody watch to see how Bentley did with the U21s tonight?

Hmmm...Man Utd to finish fifth? Where've I heard that one before? As for my attempt... 1. Chelsea. The Premiership isn't about one-off games but about strength in depth. Chelsea have the most talented squad in the history of the English game. Even if they start to have a wobble...Roman will just unleash another £30 million or so in the transfer window. 2. Manchester United. Finished with 83 points last season, which would have been enough for the title on some previous occasions. They are not the spent force that some will have you believe. Ruud leaving may be a blessing in disguise as Rooney, Saha, Smith and Rossi should be able to step up to replace him. Carrick may have been a larger fee than expected but he will become an excellent signing for them. Ferguson to (once again) stick it to the naysayers and mean that no Glazers come calling for Hughes for a while yet. 3. Liverpool. Improving all the time but I fancy their chances more in Europe...although could easily swap places with United. 4. Arsenal. No Campbell, no Cole either it seems. Sounds a bit like last season! Should be good enough to see off their neighbours. 5. Tottenham Hotspur. Think they'll miss Carrick and Mido, how long until Berbatov settles? 6. Newcastle United. They've got to do better than last year...surely. I'd also expect they'd somehow find the cash for more players, they always do despite being up to their necks in debt. 7. Everton. Despite an awful start they started to come good, Johnson is overrated but at least is an improvement on what Beattie had to play with last year (Big Dunc...where has his number one fan gone?). They should boringly make their way up the table. 8. Bolton Wanderers. Somehow they keep grinding out results and without the distractions of Europe should finish in the top half. 9. Blackburn Rovers. Hate to be pessimistic but if we do make it through to the group stage of the Uefa Cup then we will have played at least six games in Europe by the time that round ends. If we go further than that and have any other decent cup run then we will be stretching our squad to the limit. A second top half finish would be a excellent achievement when mixed with good performances in the cups. 10. West Ham United. Likely to suffer from the same burnout as us. 11. Aston Villa. Should see an improvement under O'Neill but not a complete turnaround just yet. 12. Portsmouth. Their late season form shows they shouldn't struggle this time and I expect there will be at least a couple more new faces before transfer deadline day. 13. Reading. Look the best of the three promoted clubs. 14. Middlesbrough. Dull and mid-table again. 15. Manchester City. Ditto. 16. Charlton Atheltic. Dowie thinks Djimi Traore and Amdy Faye will shoot them up the league. They may struggle. 17. Fulham. Without Malbranque it is hard to see them doing much. If he does go...they will be the poorer for it. 18. Wigan Athletic. Second season syndrome to get to them? Swapping Heskey for Roberts and losing a few million while doing it sounds like a relegation scrap brewing to me. 19. Sheffield United. Stumbled across the finishing line last season, can't see them breaking into a run up the table against the big boys. 20. Watford. Good manager but they play crap, long route football and their small squad ain't anywhere near good enough. Still, they'll do a lot better than Sunderland did last year. Soccernet preview of the season for Rovers here - Blackburn dream of reliving glory days

Bit disappointed with that selection...I was hoping he'd give a starting chance to the likes of Ashton, Lennon and Dawson. We know what Ferdinand or Crouch can do. Why not use this game as an opportunity for those on the fringe? Hopefully friendlies under Stevie Mac won't be quite the farce they were under Sven. EDIT - I take that back then about Ashton, see post below from pks1984!

I'll go for a repeat of last season, 2-2.

Friday 25th August.

The problem is that when in the eighties and even in most of the nineties there needn't have been a "lifestyle choice" to be made. Tickets weren't THAT expensive that people would have to go without something else. Moving abroad is also a lifestyle choice but it doesn't make a blind bit of difference to Rovers what the reason is as they still won't have the money from that supporter. It's difficult whatever the club does...if they put the prices down then they will lose money they need to compete. It isn't their fault that Blackburn is a poor town compared to the areas that the majority of the Premiership clubs represent. Generally I back the decision of the club as they need to get the money from somewhere. Many people complaining about the price were probably no doubt complaining about the lack of signings before we brought Benni in. Well...Rovers fans can't have their cake and eat it I'm afraid. The money has to come from somewhere. Lord knows how we'll compete if crowds keep falling. TV revenues keep us up there but all the other teams get that as well. It isn't enough solely on its own to keep us in the top half. The only real gripe I'd have is the timing...why make the first home game (particularly against Everton) an A+ game? It's not a good start and really we should be trying to get people in for that first game and hope they keep coming back even when the price rises. A rise of about a tenner for the next game is a lot less than a rise from zero would have been.