What a fall for Juventus this season. Down to 13th in the League having just been beaten 2-0 at home by Monza. With 23 pts they have less than half of leaders Napoli (50 pts). And Napoli have a game in hand tonight. When you think Juve were going for 10 league titles on the bounce a few years ago. Going to be a long road back to the top.

My word, the bitterness is strong. I had no idea we had such a fan. He only tweets a handful of times a month but was fully at it on derby day supporting Burnley: 🤣🤣🤣 Someone needs to introduce him to that old phrase: Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. What an unhealthy place to be.

It's entirely accurate if what we're trying to judge is goals in a 'team'. I think you're more trying to look at it in terms of player v player. Diaz has been our top goalscorer the last season and a half. Where he plays is irrelevant to that stat. Lucas Joao has scored at a better strike rate than Diaz over their total recent club careers, both have had 22 goal seasons in the last 3 years. We desperately need goals in the team, and Diaz will probably be gone soon, 4 months or 4 days. So, with such similar records I think it's entirely fair to compare in terms of the needs for our team. I'm not thrilled about it either. Wasn't massively on board the first stint he had with us. But beggars can't be choosers and he ticks a lot of the boxes missing at the moment. So, the signing would get a big thumbs up from me initially. Genuinely can't see how it can be looked at any other way when you factor in the whole Hirst/Vale saga. It's been depressing watching them two dollop about up top. Particularly Vale's recent backtracking warm up jogs.

According to Wiki: Lucas Joao = 40 goals in 100 appearances Brereton Diaz = 40 goals in 128 appearances Exact same time period in the same division. Now stats don't always tell us everything. But I'm not sure we're in a position to turn our noses up at a player that has a better recent strike rate than our 'star man'. Whether you argue about who's played on the wings or not. (I'm guessing a lot of those Joao appearances are from the bench too). Particularly when one of our biggest problems at the moment is scoring goals.

Modi wants all investment kept in India.......supposedly.

Am I still allowed to be scared that February is only a few days away.

My research on Sorba: Had a swift rise to up to professional level. Went from training as a scaffolder/bricklayer and working at JD Sports to getting in the Wales team and into a Playoff Final in a matter of years. “Sometimes I have to pinch myself and think: ‘Is that really Aaron Ramsey right there?” he said. “Guys I used to watch on TV or play with on Fifa are now opposite me.” Had a great season 21-22 when he played a major role in Huddersfield Town finishing 3rd in the Championship In Sep 2022 there was some unsubstantiated rumours circulated on social media about the player. (Don't think they need repeated on here!). But this lead to him getting a lot of abuse online, and he was also booed by 'some' HT fans whilst coming on as substitute. There are further rumours of a fallout with HT manager around Boxing Day 2022 when he was left out the matchday squad. Some say this could be related to lack of gametime due the manager choosing to play a different formation without wingers. HT fans seem to see him as one of their major assets (young, long contract, good record) and are as worried about losing him on the cheap as we are at not being able to get him for a fair fee should the loan go well. His form has clearly been poor this season. Some of their fans calling him a one trick pony that is good at set pieces (and crosses) but weak in general open play.

For clarification what's the 2? That 2 players will definitely be signed by Saturday? Or something more specific on a particular player? Just want to be clear on what I can attack you about when it doesn't come off!

Sorry, no, there's too much of it now, and the horse has fairly bolted. We do let the transfer threads go off tangent a bit, understandable considering the level of transfer activity equals zero! But the people have spoken, since this is the most liked post for a good few pages. So with a week to go: Can we please keep the transfer thread on the topic of transfers. Take ex manager discussions to the relevant manager threads please. From here on out any off topic posts will be hidden, so please don't waste your time just for the content to disappear.

Not to be pedantic but he's 23 (24 in a few months) Shoddy 'journalism'.

Yep, I got no argument with the red. Sometimes you get away with them due to being so far from goal. But can't complain when the ref shows a 2nd yellow there, player should know better when he's on a card.

Is there one area you think he's learnt and developed in this season Chaddy? I'm all for giving young players time and patience. But also, the player has to show something to warrant the continued gametime.

Yep, yet we'll all be here suffering the next 20 mins or so. Sadomasochism in it's purest form. A good psychotherapist would have a field day.

Vale didn't fancy tracking that run back. Nice light jog.

Sounds like a legendary Viking warrior from tales of olden times. If only they had that fight in them.

Don't bother, I think we're good.

Sickening this. The spoilt (won 4 League titles out of 5) City fans who booed at HT are going to ne rewarded with a fantastic fightback victory it seems. 🤮🤮🤮

If it's stage shows you're after might I suggest Monkee Business the Musical is more up your street. Then you can singalong to your theme tune 😜:

Jeez, and you picked the eve of 'Blue Monday' to lay this on us. Way to keep everyone's spirits high Tom! 😂 Personally, out of everything, it's the transfers bit you mention that probably hits me the most. I can take the crap managers, the mind boggling tactics, the poor performances, even the relegation scraps etc. As long as there's something along the way to get excited about with Rovers. And for a football fan that's usually the anticipation that comes with new players joining the club, filling you with hope and expectation. And then I look back at 12 long years under Venky ownership and think about how many times a transfer has done that to me: Jordan Rhodes did. I'm shamed to admit David Goodwillie did (We'd beat Rangers to the 'new Wayne Rooney' 🙄) Ruben Rochina and Harvey Elliot got my blood pumping. Adam Armstrong and Tom Cairney had me pretty hyped for a while. Can't think of many others of the top of my head. So, that's tracking at a rate of once every 2 years a signing has really lifted my spirits. Slow going that. Obviously, there's been some very good signings along the way that have proved beneficial over time. Kaminski, Dack, and Diaz to name a few. But none of them were exciting signings at the time imo. I totally understand where we are in the football pyramid, the financial constraints, and am in no way expecting star transfers anymore. But you can still get very hyped for a 10 goal a season striker from League 1 or 2 coming to test themselves at Championship level. But we don't even seem to manage that anymore. Just a continuing cycle of Gallagher dolloping around the wings and occasionally up front. I was fairly looking forward to Dembele putting on a Rovers shirt from Peterborough, and look how that turned out. As usual, pipped to the post, for him to barely play anymore for his parent club. Infuriating. And then we come to things like Adam Wharton. Those couple of games early this season that had me thinking we'd lucked out with the new Championship Xavi/Iniesta. Just what we needed in the middle of the park, and with Diaz firing up front and a stronger looking new defence, things were really looking up. Fast forward 6 months later and he's nowhere to be seen, rumours of big fallouts, and to top it all off his brother starts going through a bad patch of form too. From dreams of a Toure brothers situation, to nothingness in the blink of an eye. 😪 Even now, in this window, after another catastrophic loss of form, the start of the inevitable slide down the table from a great position, the hammerings from 2 local rivals, and the biannual beating from Wigan and whichever team is rock bottom of the form table (who we always make look like Man City!), I would still be full of optimism and renewed dreams of glory if we could just get a couple new faces in at vital positions in the squad. A cheap lower league option and a good loan from a Prem club could work wonders for my Rover's mindset right now. Am I expecting any news by 31st Jan to cheer me up? Am I bollocks. More concerned about 'outs' rather than any interesting 'ins'. And I think it's probably that repetitive, vicious cycle that grinds me down the most. It can't be that hard to at least keep a squad constantly progressing rather than declining. We've all played Championship Manager. 🤣

Personally, I just think they have more money than sense. And it's coupled with a whole image/ego thing. Don't know if that's cultural or not. But I believe they simply hate the thought of forever being labelled a 'failure'. So whilst there's still the slimmest of chances of saving face and hitting the Prem jackpot again, they'll keep clinging on. How long till they realise money can outweigh the shame? Well, they're going to be hitting quarter of a billion before long. I'd quite happily be shamed for about 2.5k. 😂 It's crackers really.

Spurs fan will get a lifetime ban plus more for a weak kick. Idiot.

In case anyone missed it! For the record, baiting could include very over the top positive comments. We're not stupid enough not to realise what their purpose is.

Will JDT be smirking in the post match interview? If ever there was a time to show some contrition it's now.

I see what you did there. Perhaps some dummys scattered on the floor of the Wharton household. 🤔

Weird how often we say this though right? 🤔 Comes a time you've got to address the patterns and results rather than the actions. Cause and effect and all that.