Hasta

We certainly fought hard but i have to say I'm disappointed (which I didn't think I;d be saying after a close 1-0 defeat tonight). In the final third of the pitch we were again extremely poor. We know thats our problem and it showed again. I know Chelsea are an outstanding defensive unit but we hardly ever looked like creating anything. Second half we couldnt even keep possession of the ball around the edge of their box. Also Hughes was either way to negative or tactically niave. To leave Dickov on his own more or less all game was as frustrating for me as it was for Dickov himself. If J Johnson is the only striker on the bench and we are 1-0 he has to come on surely. A better option given the way we were lumping the ball upfield would have been to put Amo up front which shows how desperate we are. Far be it for me to praise the 'tached scottish one but if that had been Souness in the last 5 minutes we'd have had 4 strikers on the pitch. I just felt like we never had a real go at them. (Although we certainly had a 'go' at them in the other sense!) Don't get me wrong there were plenty of positives as have been mention on other posts so I won't repeat. At the moment though I'm just too frustrated to be proud and look on the bright side.

I think both camps have a point here. It was one of the most watchable game in ages and the tackles and confrontations I can live with. When Henry is that wound up in the game that he bangs the ball into the turf after a foul is given against him fine. Why does he need to be booked? He's just caught up the the passion and excitement around him. I thought Poll (who is NOT a fave ref of mine) did well in the circumstances. However sometimes things can go to far. Like spitting Diouf last week, Ashley Cole needs the FA to act over his dispicable dive in the first half. Also Rooney should have walked for the language he gave the ref. I can sort of understand a player in the heat of the moment telling a ref to F Off but Rooney seemed to tell him where to go about 5 times in the same converstation. One red card for it and he will think twice before doing it again. However if you headbut someone you walk. That's black and white. Fair play to Man U though. Everyone hates them but in games it really matters they don't half dig in.

True it was a horrendoues tackle. Even from the back of that hoorible stand I knwe Ball was walking the minute it happened. I think the tunnel is still in the same place. I'm pretty sure Burnley haven't had the finances to move it into the main stand.

I thought in 2000 a few Rovers players actually froze at Turf Moor. Dunn and Duff spring to mind as being fairly quiet by their then standards. Hughes and Bent were also pretty inconspicuous. Flitcroft put a lot of work in and played well and McAteer was outstading. Defensively we were solid apart from when Payton tried to split Friedel in half with his studs.

One thought. If the game is drawn the replay will be a nightmare. 7.45pm kick off. No restrictions on alcohol before the game there. 6,000 dingles.

Newsflash:- Barry Ferguson makes his Rangers return back in the hustle and bustle of the SPL

Stay with us Al. Our Messiah will arrive in the next 17 minutes.

Don't think you can change it. However if you speak kindly to the Mods you might get away with taking a couple of letter out to make Bazzatherat. Or maybe something that rhymes with that.

From official site. Sorry if already posted. Mark Hughes:-

No probs. Have Lancashire Constab ..... sorry Burnley released any ticket details yet!

One of the selling points Rovers stress when trying to tempt people to buy season tickets is the fact they are in a privelidged position re: cup tickets. It's going to be season ticket holders before non season ticket holders regardless of how many away stubs the latter have.

It will be on TV without a doubt.

No no no no no no no no no no no no

I'm away for the weekend of the 5th round so I do not want Burnley home or away, United home or Birmingham home. Any of these would force me to abandon any plans I had (which would not go down well !) and stay at home. Apart from that any game on TV so I can see it! If we get Burnley there's no chance the police will allow it to be played that late regardless of how much money Sky throw at the clubs.

I'll give you £1,500 for it Tashor as long as you let me off the £2,000 I owe you for that last dodgy deal we were involved in . I know that deal wasn't directly involving you but that 'tached scottish ex-buddy of yours but that's life. If you want i'll even throw in a knackered, useless Vauxhall Nova that hasn't been used since i got it from Liverpool. Must hold some value though.

Just watched the Man U - Chelsea gamme. Rovers 0 - 4 Chelsea Lampard 2 Robben Showpony Cole

No in reality it's still 4.5million. It means that come August of this year Rovers will have £4.5 million more in their bank than they would have if Ferguson were still with us. Make it £5mill and I'd take it.

Still on his feet. What happens next?

Cheating, spitting, uncouth, uncivilised, diving female genitalia

Letting him rot doesn't benefit us though as we'll still have to pay him for no return. No club can afford to do this with the salaries players earn these days, especially not us. If we were to do that we might as well sell for what we can get to clear the wage bill even if its only the £3m. Rangers would know this and would just hold on until we eventually offloaded. However playing him in the first team, whether he's booed or not, shows that he is going to be utilised whilst we're paying his wages and if Rangers want him they have to cough up Hughes' value. Don't get me wrong I'd rather he didn't play for us but if it pockets us and extra £1m play him. The only problem with this logic would be that any widepread booing would probably lead to Hughes' hand being forced into not picking him.

I've just gone back and read Dado_Prso's posts and he did not say Rangers would pay the same amount of money as Rovers did in the first place. All he said was that Rangers should pay £4.4m for him of which £2.1m was the outstanding debt. He never implied we would not be making a loss. When he mentioned a 'similar deal' to the one Rovers arranged to buy Ferguson he was talking about putting in extra clauses for Rangers qualifying for the champions league such as 0.5m for every appearance. It's not often we get well reasoned away fans on the board, especially ones that stick around. Sometimes I understand why.

The only way Rovers can swing this situation back anywhere near to their favour is if Hughes has a chat with Ferguson, gets his head right and then plays him tommorow night. He just has to be sure that Ferguson will give it his all. It's OK people saying they never want to see him wear the shirt again but this move would be the only way we could show that we feel we don't have to sell unless the price is right. If playing him squeezes an extra £1m+ out of Rangers then it's worth upsetting certain fans for.

This is probably already mentioned earlier in the thread but it would seem that Savage can play in the away game at St Andrews. If that the case why was David Gold once again just blatantly lying on the SSN interview.

Look at the poll on that site. If Ferguson ends up stopping at Ewood until at least the summer then there'll be some miffed Rangers fans. When does the transfer window shut??

Agree with you on that score Izzi. I'd lump Palace in there aswell, There's no way 3 of the bottom 4 clubs now will get over 35 points IMO.