Maybe not...from the Poland vs. Ecuador preview on the BBC website: Kick-off: 2000 BST Live on BBC Radio Five Live & the BBC Sport website with highlights on Match of the Day (BBC One, 2335 BST)

lol

A cornflake in the hand is worth two in the toaster.

I'm guessing this is why he decided to do it... He's gone from the least confident player in the league to an all-singing, all-dancing entertainment machine.

Would this be because his wages on Football Manager are low? I remember someone claiming Mokoena was on £25,000 using the same theory.

£2 million? Where on earth did you pull that ridiculous figure from?

Dickov decides against renewing Rovers contract. I know this was mentioned in the transfer topic but I think it deserves a thread of it's own. I'm suprised he chose not take up the offer of a two year contract, at 33 he'll be lucky to get that same offer again. I guess he must have realised what the rest of us have; we've become too good for him, his first team chances would be limited to covering injuries and suspensions next year. This will surely now lead to us signing at least two strikers over the summer, or one if Pongolle is turned into a permanent fixture. Without Dickov's 10 goals in his first season we very well could have gone down, for £150,000 he was certainly one of Souness' better signings. I wish him well wherever he ends up, hopefully he'll get a welcome return when he visits Ewood again.

Is it 'Basque' you were referring to in your other post? If so...neither Madrid or Barcelona are part of Basque country...and therefore couldn't be involved in a Basque derby. Simple, really.

Michael ###### Owen will ###### play with Crouch you ######. He's in ###### training already, he'll be so ###### ready for the first game. Owen Hargreaves will ###### play because he's a ###### good player. He's been one of Bayern ###### Munich's best players this season, he's been ###### for England in the past but in the holding midfield role he's been ###### hot this season and got ###### loads of man of the match awards. I'd be a happy ###### if he started in central midfield with Lampard and had Gerrard further up the ###### pitch supporting Owen. Back to Walcott for a minute...the more I talk about him with people, the more I talk about it with people the more it makes sense. If we're losing I'd much rather Walcott came on than Darrent Bent. Bent never creates things for himself, he might put a half chance away should it fall to him but so should the majority of our strikers. Walcott does have that ability to do something unexepected, something that will suprise the opposition. Admittedly, Defoe does this from time to time as well but having never been a fan of is I wouldn't be too keen on him going either.

I had a conversation with my 13 year old brother today about Walcott being in the England squad...he came up with a more mature answer than that. Well done.

Why is he nuts for doing that? Johnson was more impressive in his season in the Premiership than Bent has been. As for the 'back to goal' thing...both Johnson and Bent played lone striking roles, so they're equal in that department. I'm pretty much on the same lines of thinking as Bobby G on this, Defoe and Bent will never have done enough for us so we may as well take Walcott. My only reservation is that I would have liked to have seen Ashton taken as the 'risk'. Actually, take both and drop Jenas from the squad, we don't need that many central midfielders.

Exactly the same here, I can see it being more flexible than that though and maybe moving to something like... ------------Robinson------------ --------Ferdinand Terry------- Neville---------------------Cole- -------Beckham Carrick-------- --Gerrard--Lampard---Cole-- --------------Owen------------ As long as we can stay tight at the back we're still more than capable of scoring goals without Rooney, on his day Gerrard can be a match winner from that floating role behind the striker(s). If Rooney is ever available to play at any point then I'd change the team to... -------------Robinson----------- --------Ferdinand Terry-------- Neville---------------------Cole-- ---------Carrick Lampard------- Beckham---------------Gerrard -----------Rooney------------ -------------------Owen---------

Why are people so angry about this appointment? I can see how he is the FA's first (maybe second) choice. I'm delighted we haven't appointed a foreign coach, I see no reason why we should do that. Why exactly would Scolari have been better? Winning the World Cup with the best team in the world wasn't exactly a masterstroke, he did well with Portugal at Euro 2004 but was it less than you would expect from a talented host nation? People still throw the 1-0 Brazil game at Eriksson when criticising him...I'm pretty sure those same people would be lambasting Scolari had we failed to break down that Greek side in the final. Back to McClaren (at least spell his name right), he's far better than Big Sam when it comes to the England job. Boro's style of play fits much better with the players available to England, Big Sam's horrible football has finally cost him something. He's shown he can vary his tactics depending on opposition, and the recent UEFA Cup run has proved he can change during the game as well, something which Eriksson has been, quite rightly, accused of not being able to do. On top of that he's done more for the English national side than anything other Premiership manager this season, fielding seven youth players at one point a few weeks back. What has Big Sam been doing in that time? The fact that McClaren has shown he isn't affraid to drop big-name players in favour of the young English players can only bode well for us, maybe we'll see less of the 'favouritism' that Eriksson is so often accused of. Alright...he's not perfect, yet no candidate was. The negative reaction to this appointment is unbelievable. If Rovers had appointed a new manager there's no way these sort of comments would have come out, they would have been along the lines of "give him a chance" etc etc, but because it's the FA doing it people feel the need to rip them to pieces. One final point...people are complaining that he's built his reputation with Boro being a 'cup team'. Remind me...which league is it England play in again?

In Todd's defence...even I'd be angry if I got substituted for Mokoena, so one can only wonder what a Premiership football would think.

Excellent, thanks a lot. That's some superb Googling, I spent a while too then decided it wasn't going to happen. Thanks again.

That video looks fantastic, I can't wait. Incidently...does anyone know somewhere to download that song from? I completely forgot about that until then, I'd love to have it on my computer.

Even? EVEN?! HAHAHAHA. Aaaaah, so where's Johnny Foreigner now? Qatar? Hah.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Beautiful.

I never said it was purely Souness' fault, as you rightly pointed out there are external factors that come into it. However, I still firmly believe that the ast couple of years in the Souness era are still damaging the club and, as many people have rightly pointed out, it will probably take more than one good season to repair the damage. Unfortunately it seems easier to make the decision to stop attending than it does to start again. If you're still wondering why I believe Souness has something to do with it then I'll try to explain further. Many of our fans (myself included) are of the age where they've only been a supporter since the Jack Walker days and therefore are used to success at the top level. Speaking personally...whilst I really enjoy reading about the club's history and how we came to be at the level we are now, it all seems as distance as the World Wars and any other piece of history you care to mention. The phrases 'punching above our weight' and 'it's better than the days of...' are thrown around a fair bit by older supporters and, whilst they're blatantly true, they're not really relevant to a sizeable amount of the club's supporters. Again, personally, I just don't get that 'we're lucky to be where we are' feeling. I can fully understand how supporters from the 80s and earlier can have that mentality, but I just don't have it myself, and niether does any Rovers fan I've met that's my age. To use a painfully weak reference (it's the best I can do at this hour), it's basically the same thing as how our generation can't appreciate how lucky we are to have freedom, despite how many older people tell us so, because it hasn't been threatened in our lifetime.* The sad fact is that those 'survival is our aim' comments from Souness were the first I'd heard from the club that suggested the 'glory days' were over. Even in Division One there was still that belief that, if we got promoted, the money and ambition would be there to get back towards the top. In fact, the final 18-24 months under Souness were, by far, my least enjoyable as a Rovers supporter...Kidd/Hodgson/relegation/Division One included. For that very reason I will continue to believe that period is still having a direct impact on the club. Hughes and the board are doing everything possible to put it right, there's nothing but positive comments coming out of the club now. It will take more than one season though to get rid of the apathetic approach towards attending that the late-Souness era (and other external factors...) created. I suspect I'm going to get slaughtered for some of that. If I were ten years older reading it I can guarantee it would ###### me off a great deal. *I've just finished watching a war film in case anyone is worried about the obscure comparisons.

"The last few years have seen a change in mood in Blackburn, Mr Souness' aiming low philosophy became a major turn off" That sadly seems to be the most lasting effect from Souness' reign. The only reason he ever said that was to protect himself incase of failure. Complete and utter selfish behaviour which continues to cost the club money.

Just a quick update for anyone who's interested... Bolton Reserves' highlights have just been on SSN, Jansen scored an absolute screamer from outside the area...a dipping volley into the top corner after heading it up in the air. He also provided the cross for Bolton's second. Incidently, Thommo was playing for the opposition...who would have thought four years ago that those two would be coming up against each other in a reserve match for two of our 'local' rivals?

Oh come on, don't start the conspiracy @#/?. I know the Champion's League takes a lot of stick for being elitist etc etc...which may well be true, but tonight's games were excellent. Juve embarrassed themselves by their behaviour but Arsenal played some of the best free-flowing football I've seen in a long time. The Barcelona and Benfica game may have been 0-0 but it was another one you couldn't take your eyes off. How Barca never tonked Benfica I'll never know, I can't recall the last time I saw a team have that many great opportunities and fail to score a single goal.

He's a left/centre back...but a bloody good one, he'd walk into our side ahead of Gray. Lack of sleep is making me do this pointless post, but I'll do a couple of 'combined' teams to see if it helps the debate at all: Charlton/Newcastle: Given Young Fortune El Karkouri Hreidarson Solano Parker Emre Dyer Bent Owen Newcastle 6, Charlton 5 Charlton/Newcastle/Rovers: Given Neill Nelsen Todd Hreidarson Solano Parker Emre Pedersen Bellamy Owen Rovers 5, Newcastle 5, Charlton 1 Newcastle have plenty of quality in the midfield when everyone is fit...their problem is that, when Owen isn't playing, they have no-one to score goals for them...and when Boumsong/Bramble are playing they have no-one to stop the opposition scoring against them. I'd certainly take their squad over Charlton's though, it doesn't cost much to fix a defence...our back line cost less than £1 million for them all.

Gudjohnsen and Lampard went there WAY before the Abramovich era.

Bloody hell, are you being serious?