Blue blood

Probably won't stay up for it due to work but will catch up the next night or so. The idea of Goldberg or Mix as champion cannot get more off-putting if they tried. (Also didn't Miz fail his cash in at TLC? The briefcase has been terribly used this year.) Talk about developing stars, WWE really struggles with this. Men's Rumble - feel Orton, Fiend or Rollins. Agree should use it to elevate non main event stars though. Rollins is very talented so wouldn't be too gutted with a win for him. Either of the other two would be meh. Women's Rumble - it will be either Charlotte or Alexa Fiend/Bliss. Neither are an inspiring choice imo as both have been overused in the main event picture. There are a ton of very talented women though so hoping for a surprise win.

We often are looking. My worry is more in the acting and getting deals across the line! But good to know it is on our radar.

I think another centre back could make or break our promotion push. We are one injury/suspension away from trouble at CB. Even our stand in CB Johnson is injured and lacks stamina. Ayala has really struggled when he isn't fully fit which makes him a liability for those games. Kipre could be the difference between us making playoffs and crashing and burning.

I always have a bit of a dislike for Luton. It's a tad irrational and probably stems from their tactics, the fact I am somewhat embarrassed we are in the same league as them and work sometimes sends me to Luton which is a fair trek. So I'm delighted we got another three points and the victory yesterday. I'm really torn on the performance. On one hand you can only play badly and win so many times before your poor performances catch up with you. On the flip side this has happened a lot this season - Millwall, Rotherham, Boro and yesterday off the top of my head. It's getting a bit much to be a fluke and perhaps is the sign of a decent team. On reflection it probably means the better teams will put us to the sword but we will get away with it with the weaker teams. Is that enough for playoffs? I'm really not sure...

Think you have called this right. Lenihen is a bit of a fair weather player. Put him in a decent defence with some competence around him and he really shines. Put him with dross and it really affects his game. I know all players are impacted to an extent as to who they play with but I can't think of many who it has such an impact for as our captain. Mind you if you have a decent defence this really shouldn't be an issue.

I think this is my fear took Tyrone. That and the fact we are one defensive injury away from calamity again. It is a tad worrying that we don't know our best team of formation and and we are playing poorly - these things often catch up with you. BUT the flip side is despite all of this we are three points of playoffs. Imagine if just a little of this is fixed, a bit more of a settled team or a bit more consistency in our play. If we're just outside with all these faults, with a few improvements playoffs are very feasible. And the 4 subs also show we have strength in depth. As it is, history and our defensive frailties to me means that if I had to bet that the negatives we are seeing , our mental fragility and our history for bottling it will mean we just miss out. It's a shame though as playoffs are eminently doable in this league.

Without a trace of irony... The stuff people say to try justifying a manager. It's never a good sign when your defence of the manager and club is a criticism of the manager and the club!

I've thought about this. Swag screen shots the league table now, and makes sure this is the only one that TM and the players can see. They will happily churn out wins whilst we are a way off. Only reveal when playoffs are secured the real table. In fact I wouldn't even want to reveal the true table then but i can't think how the team and manager wouldn't notice the playoffs were a tad different.

I have to say I am very surprised as Reading really looked a mess the last couple of years. It makes mockery of TMs project time. Even if they fall away a bit they have achieved in one season what we have achieved in three. Mind you we see it everywhere but Rovers with excuses trotted out that we simply cannot compare the two. Boro were by all accounts absymal under Woodgate and cutting their cloth quite severely and Warnock has shifted that emphasis within a year. Stoke were a rotten club with noone having success as manager - young or old - for years, and yet somehow it has been turned round. Not exact like for like examples but I think there is enough evidence that the slow build is a load of bull. Having said all that we amazingly aren't too many points off the top 6. It shows what a rediculously forgiving league this is, giving you chance after chance. I recall the same last season too. Makes things even more frustrating.

To be honest if you have Armstrong up front, Dack in the hole and Elliott wide right in a 4-2-3-1 formation it doesn't really matter who the other one of the 3 is, we have our best attacking players in their best positions. That should more than be enough offensively for us. Get Travis and Davenport as the 2 protecting mids. Mobility and steel and it's looking a pretty solid team. Same with Kaminski as keeper. As for the defence... It picks itself from the least worse and available options! Hopefully Lenihen continues to look decent now he has a partner with him, Nayambe can be very good. Outside of a shaky defence that looks a very strong championship team with a lot of options from the bench. Certainly enough to get a win. 2-1 Rovers

All managers do it but it's a double edged sword for the manager as they should really know if the player is up to it or not having previously worked with them. Hence they are often judged more harshly and managers receive more criticism when they go wrong. Which is fair enough imo - if you have worked with them you should know what they are capable of.

That could feasibly be 15 points or none! Which sums up why we aren't going anywhere.

Yeah and I said at the time in principle someone with English experience makes sense. It's the fee and quality i have issue with. I think we could have got just as good a quality a second choice keeper with UK experience without having to cough up a six figure fee. First choice keeper hunting out has been a fantastic success no arguments there. Yeah the Boro fan was really not complimentary about Pears and the fact Warnock shipped him out so quickly also bares weight to this assessment. So when you consider fee, quality and length of contract j think you can make quite a case for favour for a mate/lazy signing. Of course it doesn't help ease suspicion when we have signed a number of Boro players! Sorry I meant Lenihen. And again with him and Williams on the books plus potentially Nayambe too signing a centre back with fitness issues is very risky. My Boro colleague said of Ayala great if you can get him to play and said he was one of the most injury prone players he had seen. So yeah not an exact science but really don't think we helped ourselves here. Agree about the young and old pairing btw. Should perhaps have posted the Boro fan I know's comments here. Yes it does seem he had fitness issues. Not huge but more than warranted. Blimey the defence would still be underfunded but given we seemed to struggle to pay fees I think it certainly could have been spent more on the defence. A few buy for fee options were mooted and I wonder if the Pears fee would have been better spent on perhaps bringing them in. Yeah I hear that you look to see what your youth can augment and that may save you a few fees. Thing is we still have been short on numbers of defenders, especially as some of the youth aren't ready. We've been thin on defensive numbers for years regardless of Warton stepping up this year. Last year Williams was our sole back up at lb and CB at the same time for example, Bennett and Downing have played full back, we've thrown in a few youngsters at CB (not Warton) who weren't ready. Even before you get to the problems caused by too many injury prone centre backs you have to conclude that we haven't had enough defenders in the squad for years. The injury prone nature of the defenders has added to that problem. So whilst there may have been more need for attacking reinforcements - with Travis Lenihen Nayambe, Warton and JRC coming through the defence still needed work in terms of numbers and this was neglected. And that's before we even get in to debating whether the current defenders are good enough or whether the money spent on the forward line was well spent! Thing is for me it's a build from the back situation and we really haven't. Look at under Hughes for example - we had a year of Kuqi and Dickov as strikers accompanying Bellamy but because the defense and midfield was solid it worked. When Big Sam and Hughes both came in the defence was sorted first. Sure we may have needed attackers but the defence has been woefully neglected. These 2 transfers are a part of that imo. Yeah it's not simple but if 1 year is too short and 3 too much the answer is pretty clear. Also if we were actually more on the ball with these things then perhaps shorter contracts would be less of an issue. I agree it isn't simple or straightforward but 3 years for an over 30 injury prone defender seems risky even taking complexities into account.

If he had said that I would have handed him his P45. Brentford (much better run I admit) prove that you can compete with those clubs with more financial muscle. No parachute payments there. Boro and Reading making a decent stab of competing too. As have Preston, Millwall etc over the years and Huddersfield and Norwich when they got promoted first time round. Also in a league where any team can and does beat any other this defeatest attitude particularly grates. Not saying it is easy, we have an automatic right to be top 6 or anything like that but the idea we can't compete is not true.

1) it's also based on reports from Boro fans I work with.as well as 3 poor games, which seems to be in keeping with their reports. Also I said not very good which is less dramatic than your summation. Have to say both on reports from previous and what seems it appears a fair assessment of him. Also given he is a number 2 he isn't going to get huge amounts of games is he. Leuts only made a handful prior to him and Raya leaving but it was enough to see he was poor. 2) if anything this makes signing him worse. Him being a crock would have been much less a gamble had our other defenders been more robust. In fact it would have probably been a more worthwhile gamble to take in those circumstances. As it is with two other centre backs badly injury prone it was playing with fire. 3) Not sure the goalposts are being moved. Both the defence AND the keeper situation really needed badly sorting. Yes we needed a couple of keepers, no arguments from me there - I agree with you. We also however really needed to strengthen a depleted and injury prone defence. That the money went on a second keeper when we already had the Greek lad as back up, and we badly needed defensive reinforcements too, seems a poor use of the money. Don't think that's hindsight whatsoever. 4) Maybe it was key to us signing him, in which case we were had. It's bad business regardless of how much it happens in football as we don't come out well from it. I'm not sure why eyebrows can't be raised at Pears contract. Is a second choice keeper who hasn't really performed really worth a 4 year deal? I would have expected he would have had more to prove to justify being locked down for that long. It's not like a Dack or Armstrong situation of tying down your star players. What I will say though is if it was longer for a lower wage than perhaps that makes sense and I would withdraw that criticism as I could see why you would want that situation.

Probably because 1) Pears isn't very good. 2) Ayala is a crock adding to a list of other defensive crocks - not what was needed. 3) We paid a fee for a second choice keeper when we already had a second choice and haven't spent a fee on a permanent defender since 1066. 4) Despite ability and fitness doubts respectively they got overly long contracts, 4 and 3 years respectively. Overly generous is an overly generous way of describing such details. No issues with managers using contacts they have Hughes with Savage and Bellamy, Souness with Tugay and Friedel. The issue is when they aren't up to standard or the details of the deal seem questionable then it's unsurprising that people start to grumble and ask questions. As it is for the reasons above the deals seem at best unwise and at worse negligent.

Agree the hope kills you. Even then the 3 away games you list there's room for optimism. None of the three teams have been infallible and we could in theory well take at least a point in each of those games. The problem is though in theory and practice we are more than capable of losing a lot of those winnable games as well as getting the three points. Factor in our mental fragility as well and though theoretically possible I very much doubt we will get in the playoffs.

Thing is you may have given your reason for why 2020 isn't a good year to use but your reasoning is to put it bluntly, wrong! It's untrue, it's false, it is not factually or logically correct. 1) The global pandemic impacts ALL clubs. (The clue is in the global part...) It's not as though Rovers are the only team affected by it. 2) Combined with point 1, many clubs seem to have done alright in the pandemic. Liverpool were still awarded the Premier League, Leeds the Championship - these things didn't not happen because of the pandemic. Closer to home Stoke, Boro and Reading have all turned round their fortunes within a global pandemic. All of this evidence proves success was possible in a pandemic. 3) What are said effects that have made it harder for Rovers rather than others? Empty stadiums, less spending power? Given bigger clubs have tightened their belts if anything this may have levelled the playing field a bit financially. Or perhaps the pandemic didn't allow for squad changes to be made? Surely a club with a manager in post for 4 years may have had more pieces in place than those who have had less time? I struggle to see how pandemic effects make it specifically worse for Rovers. Yes I am sure that said poster is longing for us to be even more chaotic and struggling even more. Top of their wish list. Also the idea that the only options are Mowbray or mess if a false dichotomy. There are other options as well as those two choices. Appreciate you probably mean to say it could be worse if TM goes (not that you would ever take anything literally) but it has to be acknowledged those aren't the only 2 options on the table.

Rev I can guarantee that's exactly how we will play this one if it comes about.

Mate, it didn't even warrant a mention in Chaddys match report until someone challenged him on it, so not thinking it is a red card is hardly surprising. Comical Ali had more objectivity than said poster. My take too. Especially given the media focus on it and the level of injury. I mean it's the most obvious penalty and dangerous play example ever (whatever card you deem it to be, though imo it has to be red.) Saying he didn't deem it worth anything is the equivalent of admitting you aren't up to standard. Career suicide for the chap. So a retrospective ban is likely. This would leave us short defensively again.

My thoughts on the game: Positives: Kaminski! When TM gets a transfer wrong he gets it very wrong. Fortunately the reverse is true and Kaminski is a better of a signing at a steal of a price. Great performance. Nice to see Lenihen show his old form. Good to see there's a player still in there. By error or design we may have found a system that works/suits our main assets 4-2-3-1. Think if you have Dack and Armstrong in their best positions then you are going to be strong offensively. Gally seems to be a decent impact sub not sure that's enough for his wages but it's at least some use for him. Three points and a clean sheet is really great. Even if we needed a piece of absymal reffing to help it is great we managed to see the rest of the game out. Negatives The Buckley Johnson midfield issues. Johnson is a bit injury prone and inconsistent and the Buckley sub really didn't work. The first half was very unconvincing. A better team would have punished us. We start so slowly of late, and whilst we got away with it today it needs to be addressed. Especially the errors in defence. They really need to be cut out. The penalty and red card. We were super lucky imo on this one. Deffo a penalty which would have changed the game. TM bangs on about it when we don't get things our way so we were very fortunate to get away with it. And if it's mitigating circumstances when we lose, it certainly should be when we win too. To me it was a red, high and studs up - intent is not a factor. Would certainly have given it/wanted it as a red if it were the other way round, also as a neutral too. Think we were very lucky on this one as it was a lucky escape. Can't decide if positive or negative: Boro weren't that special, they crumbled when we scored. We won. And these lot are fighting for promotion. They're nothing special but are in the mix. That's encouraging because we beat a team in the mix and they certainly weren't anything to fear in resilience or quality. So it's encouraging because the teams near the top aren't that good. It's discouraging though because as mediocre as Boro are we still aren't in or realistically likely to get playoffs. It's discouraging to think that even though there is nothing to fear in this division that we still can't make any headway. Which is probably where to end this post - nothing to fear, nothing to be excited about but a welcome three points and win in our mid table jaunt.

Heck of a piece of PR when the main incident in question is completely ignored! Sure, the manager's reaction at the end of the game is mentioned but the incident and it's implications aren't. There's having a Rovers slant and there's a complete lack of objectivity devaluing said opinion. When the main incident going outrageously in our favour is totally ignored it leaves you in the latter camp.

Mate you even admit he is telling porkys about the Premier League stuff. And that's a huge problem as it makes the fans out to be entitled, ubeducated and unreasonable, which isn't true. It tells a narrative of unreasonable expectations so fans will never be happy - it completely excuses his failures by making it seem like fans have too high expectations. So yeah, I think it's a poor do because it's false, besmirches the fans and aims to manipulate the outside view of the situation. Put it this way you wouldn't be so chill if Kean or Coyle said it... As for a section of fans always not being happy I'd love you to name names on this one. I am sure that some posters moan more than others (perhaps I fall into that category) and maybe more than is warranted but the never happy stuff isn't true either. No one wasn't happy when we tonked Derby and Wycombe. No one wasn't happy we got promoted. No one was unhappy with how we did under Hughes or Souness. No one was unhappy with our cup run under Bowyer. Some fans are mainly negative but no one is never happy. Further holes in this are that those who like a good moan often have a particular focus, it's not about the whole situation (think of how many villain players we have had on here) which is very different from being unhappy at the whole situation. Also if we accept your premise that fans are always unhappy then bringing it up now is a poor argument because they have been there the previous 4 seasons and he hasn't though it is an issue. In fact if all clubs have them and it's a natural part of football it's a daft thing to complain about as it's a natural part of the game - like complaining about the weather. Honestly, I think it was a really low comment. It tarnishes fans, it associates all fans who aren't pleased with him into this group of unreasonable and self entitled group - which really don't exist. I get you like the manager and want to defend him, but this wouldn't be the hill I'd chose to defend. It's clearly a wrong move by TM and whilst there are other things he can be defended on, defending him on this suggests you think he can do no wrong.

Ok Paul, in what context should we take the fans aren't happy because they remember winning the Premier League? I won't go over all the reasons why it is a lie again, but the statement clearly is both false and manipulative, so what context makes that acceptable? Some of it may well be factually correct but it is hugely distorted! For example he is right saying we have had had a ton of centre backs out, but the reason is he assembled crocks there. That's like someone complaining no one would interview me for an education job but ommiting they can't get or pass a DBA! It's half a story and ultimately is their fault. Yes I am telling you that those is no section of fans who are never happy because we aren't winning the Premier League. Also the some never happy is a straw man argument. By this logic should we not reduce criticism of Ince, Coyle etc. See above it helps when you don't just assemble crocks. Also when you have a ton of midfielders stockpiled but no defenders, again you might think the manager is somewhat culpable. Hang on the morality of what he says and the reasons why are both good questions but they are seperate ones. One doesn't prevent the other unless you are trying to gloss ove the wrongdoing. Disagree on the good job and the good guy comments too. We'll gloss over the good job element for now (a whole other debate) but good guys do not make these sort of lies up. Morality may be tricky but statements which are so blatantly untrue and manipulative clearly.arejt the remit of good guys. Also if anyone didn't know that statement clearly could sit alongside many of Keans. Not saying he is the same but the statement is Kean-esque. You are trying to defend the indefensible. I hope you are right though TM.isjt making it classy

So let's get this straight - 4 years later after innumerable (ok 8 😎 windows), a healthy amount spent and no forced departures we still have no idea what the best formation is for our team? Doesn't that say everything about TM's tenure and why he has to go? Edit no idea how the emoji got there or why it won't allow me to delete it...