He is apparently returning to Rovers, they are just fine tuning the deal. I was speaking to his personal kit sponsor yesterday and it is all going through. Apparently his injury problems are all down to his own stupidity. If the physio's tell him to do a, he goes off and does b, then wonders why he is always injured. Not a great deal upstairs is how he was described to me. I assume that Mr Hughes will be able to inject some "intelligence" into his actions once he returns.

I just don't see what all the fuss is about Derbyshire. He may one day turn into a useful player, but at the moment he is nothing special and does little if anything to inspire or excite. His performance against Nancy was absolutely woeful. He is doing a job for us, but let's be honest, on his current performances and ability, Jeffers and Roberts will both knock him down the pecking order. I'm not saying that he won't one day be good, but that day is just not today.

Utter, utter @#/?. We were awful. If Nancy were any good in front of goal we would have got buried. They played like it was a pre-season friendly. Nobody put a decent challenge in all night, the control was apalling from everybody and the number of hopeful hoofs down the pitch for Derbyshire to chase was depressing in the extreme. We had one shot first half, which was the kind of chance that a quality striker takes every time. One on one, plenty of space, no real angle to complain about, Derbyshire bottles in plain and simple. Second half was no better. A thirty yarder from Bentley that drew a good save and then the goal. Ooijer was hopeless. Drawn out of position so many times I thought he was playing blindfolded. Nolan (who is he by the way?) was completely lightweight and looked petrified if he had to put his foot in, which he didn't do. By far the most entertaining part of the game was Hughes getting arsey with their number 8 and then trying to pick a fight with their bench. I have to say, the pitch looked appalling. Very bobbly and bare. When was it last relaid?

I see that nobody is complaining about the fact that St Helens won the team of the year. A far greater injustice. A two bob sport played by Yorkshire and two sides in Lancashire that was won due to a concerted campaign by the club to get all its fans and local people to log onto the 5 live website and for for them. How they can be considered to be a greater team that the Ryder cup boys who beat the Americans (who have about 7 of the worlds top ten in their team) at a sport played by every country in the sporting world is a mystery to me. Populist voting is not the way forward.

It's all likely to be academic as a contact of mine seems to think that Lonsdale/Sportsworld are almost certainly going to try to back out of the deal as they are making huge losses on it. On the upside, at least we might be able to get a decent kit sponsor.

You mean that you don't have someone to do all of those things for you?

If it goes to a text or telephone vote then United will be team of the year, Ronaldo will be overseas personality of the year, Rooney young personality of the year and Ferguson will get the main award. I can't see anyone other than Darren Clarke getting the award. It's a world cup year and our footballers were shocking. It is therefore going to be the Ryder cup team and Darren Clarke that will win.

And you call yourselves Rovers fans! They are called the Scum because they are scum. End of. They believe that they have a God given right to win every game, every title even every challenge, and if they don't it's because somebody else cheated. Have you ever heard RFW actually say "We were outplayed, well done the other guys". Never. Their fans are all glory hunting shithouses from Guildford and Chelmsford. I remember driving down to cardfiff the night before the Final, and the M6 was absolutely chock full of range rovers and BMW's heading back down south after the game, Scum scarves hanging out of the windows. They gave us piles of grief for "buying" the title, whereas Cantona, Bruce, Pallister, Keane, Ince, Yorke, Cole, Rooney, Ronaldo, Van Horse, Saha, Stamm, Veron, Solkjsjaer etc are all good home grown players that have come through the ranks at Old Trafford.... Brian Kidd nearly killed our club and they currently have Rio on their books. I cannot find anything objectionable about Chelsea. Surely they are just the modern day incarnation of Rovers in 92? Mourinho is a tit, but so be it. They have piles of money and they spend it on the best players. Pretty much what we did (and indeed what every successful club does), only on a grander scale. Scumchester will always be the red scum to me. As for the Scum game, we'll stuff them all ends up. Sparky has the indian sign over them, so it will be 2-0.

The problem you have is that even the tree hugging organisations can't agree on how best to help the earth. Case in point - an old acquiantance of mine has a business building wind farms. He bought the rights to about 20 sites in various parts of north wales (including certain remote parts of Snowdonia where it is just about always windy) to build "proper" wind farms, the sort that actually generate real power that would keep towns lit. Each wind turbine was several million pounds and were coming from Sweden, as they were the only company that could make them big enough. After getting through the local community (they objected because they were apparently unsightly - even though they could not actually see them from their homes) every single one of his applications was rejected because some Bird lobbiest claimed that the turbines were a danger to bird life. The government has told all power companies that they need to get 10% of all of their energy from renewable sources, then they throw out wind turbine applications (the only renewable energy source that even stands a chance of working) due to the danger to birds. You'll excuse me if i don't therefore give two hoots about jumping in my gas guzzling motor and driving half a mile to the shops. The government can create all the hysteria they like. They have zero credibility and frankly, nobody really believes them anyway. We all know that it is just another excuse to hike up taxes to pay for their other failings.

A good time to play them as I understand that their purchase is just about completed. Once the back room wranglings die down, they will start to perform better. Rovers to win relatively easily. 2-0 with both our front men scoring.

Craig Bellamy anyone?

We'll stuff them all ends up, but it will be 0-0.

Micheal Owen is a bright as a button. Very clever, very articulate and also very funny. Mark Hughes is also very bright, and I seem to recall that Ian Dowie has a degree in quantum physics or some such like.

Out of 6, yes?

Did it win?

I'm currently reading "Pitch Invasion" by Barbara Smit. It is the story of Adidas and Puma and how big money was introduced into sport by the warring Dassler brothers. If you are interested in Sport, Economics or history, it is very engrossing.

We'll stuff them all ends up. Rovers 2 - Liverpool 0. MGP and Lucas Neill from the spot.

I think it is nice that Scotland won a game. It's a rare treat for our celtic friends north of the wall and therefore we should not begrudge them their five minutes of fun. Well done Scotland. As for England, I cannot understand how Lampard keeps getting picked. Has he ever had a good game for England? He's in danger of becoming another John Barnes / Matt le Tiss - Fantastic at club level but useless at international level. As somebody else pointed out, when you are missing Gerrard, Joe Cole, Lennon, Lampard is still playing poorly and for some reason you're sticking with Downing (despite there being absolutely so suggestion as to why), surely there must be a place for Beckham? He is still international class, he has a level of experience that we need, and frankly he is worth a goal a game against the likes of Croatia from free kicks alone.

I can't believe that nobody else has mentioned Tim Flowers. Made great saves, and fantastic errors (ball hitting divot, going over shoulder), but always played with a smile on his face. Shearer for pure excitement and anticipation. Somehow you knew something was going to happen whenever the right chance came through to him. Colin Hendry always gave his all and stopped the ball with whatever he had to stop it with. Always good to watch, if a little tear jerking for the male members of the crowd from time to time. My personal favourite will always be Simon Garner though. He looks as much like a footballer as I do, but kept being in the right place at the right time game after game.

I bought the new Killers album on monday. It's rubbish. One or two decent tunes, but majorly disappointing after the first album.

I've read that a dozen times and still cannot understand what the hell it means. There will be no third kit as Sportsworld are responsible for manufacturing our kits and the chances of them bothering to get one designed, approved and sourced in time for the Fayenoord game is about the same as Craig Bellamy being god father to Alan Shearers next baby.

You don't need 5 goals a season from a central midfielder when your two wide men are both looking like getting 10 goals each this year. Given that Tugay is getting on and in my view can only realistically play 75 minutes a week, I think you will see that Reid/Savage will both end up on the scoresheet at some point in the season. 40 from your 5 forwards in total, 20 from your wide men and say another 10/15 from everybody else, and you have a pretty good goal haul for the season. Certainly one that will only be added to if Tugay can be allowed to play football and protected by the likes of Savage and Mokoena. As GAV states above, Tugay has never been a prolific defender. He puts his foot in where needed, but he has never been able catch the likes of Henry. He still reads the game well and has a habit of being in the right place at the right time. Tugay and Dunny are the two players we need for that central midfield role. Between them, we'd get a full season for the next season or so, and that would see us through nicely.

Looks like O'neill is trying to reasssemble the Celtic side of 3 years ago!

There is only one decent team in France and that is Lyon. The rest are very ordinary. I would guess that Rovers and Feyenoord are hot favourites for the top two places with Basel probably favourites with the bookies for third. If Krakow or Nancy get through I would be quite surprised. Good luck to those of you that are going to Krakow. I think Texan Rover is being a little generous with his assesment of teh average Polish football fan. Having seen them at work in Germany at the world cup, I'd suggest to all travelling fans that you keep your shirt covered, your mouth shut and your wits about you. Just about every police force in Europe will tell you that their fans are the worst for mindless violence. Closely followed by the Dutch. What a great draw we've got!

We'll get Panathanikos, Rangers, Besiktas and Spurs. Two crappy away trips with Spurs and Rangers at home.