To use an analogy that's like saying someone badly beats you up and dangles you over a cliff but then for some reason doesn't let you go. Should in that case you tell them to f off? Should you be thankful? I'm sure we both know that the answer is neither. See this is what gets me. At what point did they stop being badly advised? I struggle to see when that might be. On relegation, after the 5 managers season, after Coyle - it's hard to tell because there are so many poor choices. In fact there are so many poor choices you wonder how much is deliberate. After all random chance should suggest they get more right than they have done. Finally I don't buy that we are out on our own yet either. our last 3 managers have all had the same agent/agency which to me suggests the real dark forces are still at work. Especially since all 3 had poor to mixed reputations. This again counters the narrative that the owners are doing a good job at present.

This I think is what irks me most. Especially from NXT they most definitely DO have the talent to have some huge, huge stars but every time they come onto the main roster they generally do fairly badly. Interestingly it's better for women then men. The division is built on NXT - the 4 horsewomen, Asuka and Alexa Bliss being key examples. But for the men the use of talent is lamentable. Take Ricochet- the guy can do it all, brawl, wrestle, fly high and sells stuff well with the bonus of being able to do stuff no one else can do in an era of athleticism. To me that seems pure gold but he is lost in the shuffle. Terrible use of talent. Then there's been some clear successors to the old stars who've been used so poorly that they clearly aren't. Alister Black could have been the next Undertaker type figure, (ironically his run was sacrificed to boost an opponent of, yep the Undertaker) although the Fiend also could have held that moniker, or as Bray Wyatt if booked better. Sami Zayne looked so over in NXT he felt like he could be the next Daniel Bryan as the plucky underdog. Tag team wrestling is even worse. The Viking Raiders or Authors of Pain could have been the next LOD. The Raiders in particular are hugely talented, have the look and could do that role well. The Street Profits have a unique level of charisma and connection with the fans. The Revival were a brilliant classic heel tag team. That should be the basis for epic tag team feuds and stories for years to come. Instead they are doing stupid other sports competitions. The problem has been that NXT makes the stars and has the future very safely secured. The issue is the main roster seems to break them through bad booking and poor use. If AEW do take a bigger market share, WWE only has themselves to blame.

Spot on. That's like saying give credit to the person who provides our life support machine, when they were the ones who put us on it. Madness. Also I think I've been a tad negligent and missed the good owners time. In the last few years they have given us Coyle as manager (instead of Warnock), given Coyle a budget than an impoverished church mouse would be assumed of (a master class in how to make things worse) have not given any sort of challenge or accountability to TM, allowed TM to chose his own boss (I mean that's special in any area of life) and not communicated with the fans. Not my definition of good owners. Now granted that's not the initial levels of abuse they heaped upon the club but I'll say this. Such shoddy behaviour can only be considered good in light of the abuse before. In actuality it is still very poor. Do we praise the kid for mugging grannies instead of murdering them? Also using said analogy do we ignore the murders? I mean what they did to the club was horrific. They put us from a solid premiership club established in the top flight to a disfunctional debt ridden championship one and halved our fanbase. On that alone, such a game changing, future-altering irredeemable transformation (cause there ain't any other benefactors to get us out of it) is criminal. It's literally altered Rovers fortunes for generations to come negatively. It's denied us years of premier league funds, the opportunities to build towards success, to be able to kind of compete with the big boys, to maybe win trophies (or at least have a better shot). We've gone from having a secure future financially to an uncertain debt written one. Ok I get I am beginning to foam at the mouth but blimey, the fact I can list all these wrongs, that they have mucked up and given us all these consequences, shows how seriously they have shafted us. Outside of Stockholm syndrome I cannot think of any reason to be happy with them as owners or give them credit.

Don't get me wrong Vince has done a hell of a lot for wrestling, but I do think now he does more harm then good. Wouldn't have thought NXT would be a casualty of the virus because it got extra attention.

I think so. They weren't initially on my radar for likely relegation candidates- certainly not like Boro, Luton, Charlton, Reading, Wigan and Barnsley but they seem to be in serious free fall. It seems like they have a few injuries on top of selling their best 2 players which is something very few sides in this division could actually survive. Good win for Charon today but wouldn't say they are guarenteed out of it. I read 3 of their players including their main striker are refusing to play for them so not to jepodise summer moves which is a huge, huge blow. Given the striker in particular has scored a lot of their goals they are far from out of trouble too. If I were Barnsley or Luton I'd be optimistic that there are some prime candidates for them to overtake. Boro must also be seen as prime candidates to overtake too. To have that kind of squad and budget compared to the other championship strugglers yet be in the mix speaks volumes for how poor Woodgate is and how badly it is going. Probably his squad have enough quality to get them over the line but given the manager's inexperience I would imagine that it will be tight and give Boro fans some sleepless nights. A 3-0 tonking at home sets an ominous tone. Luton and Barnsley's small squad sizes do put them in a precarious position given the frequency of games coming up. The break in negative momentum will help but feel their resources begin stretched could well work against them. As for the rest Wigan go from looking totally out of their depth and on the worst away run ever, through to looking a decent outfit. Ditto Reading - look terrible or competent. I don't think either team will be troubling the top half of the table in the next season or two but their odd good performance will keep them safe. Stoke likewise fall into this category although with then I am surprised they haven't done better since the new chap has come in. So it's 3 from 5 imo and as much a battle as it is at the top.

Looks like results have really gone our way and with a convincing (ish) win plenty to be optimistic about. Still a heck of a lot of teams chasing that final promotion place though.

So Gally and Walton looking poor. It could be October rather than June! Good to see Evans get a goal. Don't really rate him as a player but every now and then he does something that makes you think there could be a player in there. A draw not good enough though for Rovers. Need a winner.

My worries with the team are twofold. 1) the full backs look very weak. I like JRC but in a role further forward. Bennett is just a liability there. 2) Beeston - no where near as good as Armstrong or Graham so it's disappointing to see him start ahead of them. If he starts with Gally shunted wide right then it's even more criminal. On the subs am disappointed no Chapman or Smallwood. Both may have limitations but both offer something very specific, with a very specific strength. Whilst that might not be enough to warrent a place in the first 11, with 9 subs, having said skills available doesn't seem a gamble and feels like it would be useful to have in our "toolbox" so to speak. Interestingly Mulgrew is back on the bench which could be a big option/impact sub for us.

He's had a bad season and shows what a difference a manager makes at this level. Very average teams like Millwall are looking towards playoffs with a good manager, Boro looking downwards because of a poor one.

And that could be the end of football as we know it, certainly for lower leagues, possibly for the premiership. Stopping going, seeing family and friends there etc., tradition and ritual is a much harder habit to break than turning off a laptop/TV. Geography is less of a concern for following a club. I use my time up in Carlisle all the time but even though the kids I worked with supported other clubs if they wanted live football, going to a Carlisle game was a prominent option - either you had to have sky or be taken to the pub as alternative viable options. However a subscription to watch at home at a cheaper price is a way more attractive option. You can see how that's going to go. It takes up less time, and requires less physical activity having a home subscription. In this day and age that's pretty attractive for culture. It really could kill the game.

Spot on. We need to not only get a load of points we need to make sure wherever possible those above us don't get points as well. A draw and we are no closer to Bristol with one less game to go and even more reliant on other teams to do the business. Hadn't looked at the table for a long time but checking it today and I'd forgotten how slim our hopes are. Think we blew it with that 3 games without a win spell just before the break. We're still reliant on other teams to mess up. Not that we give up. Whilst there's a chance, keep fighting. And a win would put us in an advantageous position Vs Bristol, if no one else. So yeah, huge, huge game and a real test of whether the hunger and ability for promotion is still there.

I just don't get it. The previous takeover in January, prior to the pandemic, was once again excellent and NXT was looking strong. It had adapted well to a longer format on TV. It was clearly differentiated from the rest of WWE and offering similar to AEW. If they change that then WWE is most likely giving a significant and loyal section of the market to AEW unhindered.

Well it doesn't half seem like a can of worms has been opened there. I can't say I'm surprised. Wrestlers or wrestling strikes me of being like footballer culture where lots of young men are given money and fame, without perhaps the maturity to go alongside it (NOT that this condones any of it if the alleged is true). Add in that unlike football you have a locker full of women athletes close to hand as well, and it feels like it could be a perfect storm. It's sad news, and terrible if true (which it sounds like it is), but I don't think it's that surprising. On the topic of wrestling now that there has been time for people to catch up with the last two big WWE events here are my thoughts on them. Backlash was decent. Drew continues to excel as world champion and provides good quality matches and Lashley worked well with him. Shame about the ending as they were having a really good match and it spoilt it. Orton-Edge was better than I thought after the debacle of Wrestlemania, and was actually a good match. Two very watchable matches. For the rest it ranged from decent to meh. Asuka v Jax was good bar the ending, and the rest was ok without really being PPV worthy. Two good matches worth seeing but overall these PPVs don't seem to have the wow factor, impact or level of performance I would expect from a PPV. Worryingly I'm not sure if that's solely down to lack of fans either... In Your House Takeover I enjoyed. It was good, really good, although not one of their best by a fair way. The action ranged from solid to excellent, and had 3 excellent matches: the women's triple threat, Lee vs Gargano and Priest vs Balor. All were great matches making it the best non crowd event we've seen. The women's tag was solid too. I'm not a fan of these shot elsewhere events, so the back lot brawl didn't do it for me at all, and was a weak showing considering the calibre of the performers. Cross beating Champa so easily too was also a bit of a surprise. That said none of these matches were bad or dragged, so 3 great matches and 3 decent, makes for the strongest non crowd event yet by a country mile, and an enjoyable one at that. That said it it's the first time I've come away with reservations about NXT booking. As in multiple reservations. They are: 1) Gargano and La Rae turn - it's huge given they are both pure baby faces and yet with neither picking up the win, there's no momentum to their change. Such a huge change in terms of star power and more importantly the type of characters they were needs to see some in ring success to mirroring the size of the story and character shift. 2) Cross beating Champa so easily. Champa is one of the top stars of NXT. If he can beat Champa so easily it doesn't give Cross much further to go. Win a title and then what? Who's there to feud with, who can credibly beat him, if he can kibosh Champa so easily? A win after a more titanic struggle would have been a much better story and given Cross a lot more room for development in NXT. As it is, there's limited story line scope and limited plausible opponents for him. 3) NXT can't make traditional faces any more. I'm a week behind with NXT (and don't know the results!) due to seeing it on the network, but it seems like Balor and Io are the latest two to turn heel, and then turn back to face in the space of 12 months. Now don't get me wrong being a heel and then turning face is a good way to go (The Rock being the best example of this) but I have two issues with this. Firstly it's not the only type and way of having a face character, and secondly the turning back to face is happening far, far too soon. It's not that long ago that they were bad guys, and their betrayals are still quite fresh. This limits the amount I for one can get on board with them as faces, and in general I think it detracts from their face turn. Add to which if you keep changing someone's character so often it gets confusing and farcial (e.g. Big Show in later years.) More to the point turning becomes less of a big deal. And turns really ought to be a big deal, What worries me most is that none of these ideas are dependant upon a crowd being present and makes me wonder if NXT is losing its touch. Rant over.

It's American Football-esque. Agree with you that that is daft.

True. But not in every match to the same extent. For example a team may have 4 quality players on the bench but previously could only bring on 3 of them. That advantage was there Vs all teams. Now they can bring on 5 which increases the size of the advantage considerably imo. For example Vs City you know they have a brilliant squad but they could only use 14 of those players against you. Now it's more. So think whilst the gap was always there, this rule makes it bigger.

See this is what a 8 week (or more?) break does to you. It makes you forget depressing things like our left back options. I don't rate Bell there either if I am honest. And he and Williams only seem viable choices for the role because of how horrific Bennett is there. I mean you talk about a bad set of choices, this one must be right up there.

Y'know I'm no expert on tests, but even for farcical ones like this, surely there is an expectation it is "passed" before taking over a club. I mean it's a whole new level of piss-take that you don't even have to pass the test and complete the documentation. Forget the fact the bar is lower than a crouching ant, it's even more rediculous, and defeats the "legitimacy" that you don't even have to comply or pass the test to get hold of a club. To say the EFL or whoever's behind the test are shameless is an understatement.

Yeah. Storylines don't work as well when there's no crowd to play off. Perhaps because it is more like a real sport the elements that for me have worked best are the competitive matches like the Rollins-MacIntyre, and the cruiserweight tournament because the main driver in both of these, over the story, is who will win the match. Even then it's not quite the same but it is interesting to note that where the outcome/winner is more important than the story, the interest is higher.

Absolutely. Great becomes good, good becomes decent and decent becomes meh. As a lot of content is just decent these days this means a lot of content at the moment is meh. I also feel bad for wrestlers who deserve the crowd reactions for some of the great stuff they do. Not watched AEW but just thinking of the Drew MacIntyre Vs Rollins match at MITB - it was excellent and deserved a crowd reacting to it. Like the examples you give as well, wrestling is designed to get crowd reactions. So no crowd, you're missing a big chunk of its purpose.

Hard to disagree with that whatsoever. At least Lashley has won a few matches whereas Miz and Morrison get a dumb handicap title match after getting whupped by Strowman. Where's the logic in that. Title feuds should be easy to book even without a personal element - the challenger is hungry for the title, the champion desperate to keep it. But yeah I agree there is very little build with this stuff which doesn't make it that exciting. Not sure all storylines have to link but they certainly have to hold together - and the Rollins cult and Becky not saying anything really doesn't. It seems pretty odd for me too. I'll be honest there's not been a mainstream (non NXT) feud at the moment that really excites, or interests me, so I think we are pretty much on the same page on this. Also where is the slow build? Things are really rushed which makes it all the harder for good storylines to be told. Also again at the risk of sounding repetitive, no crowd doesn't help. Take the Otis Mandy storyline it's not my kind of thing either but I could get more caught up in it if others were there enjoying it. What makes it really frustrating is they can do it. The men's Royal Rumble match was a good example of this - I was so annoyed at Brock bulldozing through each entrance that I was genuinely delighted when he was eliminated. And they do it fairly well on NXT so it can be done.

Good posr. I think there are a number of factors in this. Firstly no fans and non-reaction makes everything less good. I'm a week or so behind with NXT due to the delayed reruns on the network but what has been obvious is that it has badly missed fan reactions when those wow moments have happened. From Thatcher turning on Riddle through to the women's ladder match, fan reactions would have hugely added to these moments and matches. It's turning great into good, good into ok and so on. Secondly this becomes even more pertinent on the other brands because a lot of it isn't great slipping to good but ok to meh. I do think Raw and Smackdown struggle for a whole host of reasons on quality but the lack of fans really hurts it and exposes the lack of quality. I do wonder if the main brands suffer from a few key issues. storylines are changed, not concluded, swapped meaning the narrative arc is poor and fans are less invested. Characters seem to be going one way, then they go another so the build is often weak. Match quality is hugely variable which given the standards that they can have makes the variability all the more frustrating and noticeable to fans. I much prefer the format to just the weekly squash shows of the 80s and 90s, but when you can have good quality and it is mixed it is all too noticeable. So there is an extent to which match quality can be sacrificed for storyline (although not too much and this has been a problem in the past imo) but if the storylines aren't there as cover as well then it's going to hurt. Mixed quality PPVs are another huge issue. What makes NXT great is you can guarentee a Takeover will be at least an 8 out of 10. Contrast that with the main PPVs and you see a marked difference. For example Hell in a Cell this year had an exceptional women's cell match but the men's was dire. It makes a huge difference if the quality of the PPV is mixed. If there were bankers then people would be more invested in the weekly shows to see the build up to these. Finally I think there are just way too many talented wrestlers who don't get time to shine. Whilst far from perfect on this NXT does give the athletes more time to shine and put on their best, and it shows in the quality of their shows. The main rosters have far too many people so they don't get enough time. Fans are therefore less invested in them and the whole product suffers. Ricochet is a huge example of this for me - he can do it all and then some but he is totally lost in the midcard shuffle. Fewer wrestlers each with more time to shine would also make a huge difference. Those are a few thoughts for me on why it doesn't work as well and why NXT does. Hopefully things will improve post lockdown. But I agree there are real issues.

I think the most blatant and recent example of the latter category is Scott Dann. When on top he looked imperious, when we were struggling Bambi on ice. Another player who'd gonl in that category for me is Evans.

Think I am with you. He was such an intelligent footballer that you thought he would do much better in the game. Just like some player's pace or power carries them to a better career, I really thought his intelligence would do that.

Bit harsh imo, well on the Kidd signings anyway. None of Roy's signings made any kind of impact. Contrast with Kidd's signings, and Gillespie, Carsley, Jansen all were a success at Prem level in the future and were good for us. McAteer overpriced but was ok as a player. FWIW I agree with your overall point. For that kind of money we should have been in the top six. Over paid and not enough quality for the money we spent. And that's before what you consider what it did to the team dynamics etc. Oh, and an additional point - buying these young players when we had Duff, Dunn, Johnson, Beattie (know we sold him) and a few others coming through. Seems an odd one that does.

What didn't go wrong? For starters breaking up GAS - Gally and Sutton was a bad start. It only lasted a few games with Davis instead of Gally, before the swap came back in, but it set the tone for a hard season. A ton of injuries, especially to these two, also massively didn't help. I think losing Flitty for most of the campaign was a huge blow. If the season before petered out because the squad was too thin, the opposite was in effect this season. We had far too many players, which resulted in little consistency whatsoever. For example we had 6 strikers on the books, which back then was huge. I think manure only had 4 recognised strikers for example back then. We had a squad of 30+ which, even with a huge injury list, didn't really allow for much continuity or for us to have a proper style. Take the striker situation - Gally and Jansen play very differently to Sutton, who plays differently to Ward and Blake, who was different to Davis. Between the volume of personnel, and the injuries it was very hard to get a style of play, to have a plan A or B, or any kind of continuity or other marginal gains that comes from a settled squad. It also started badly as Hodgeson's two big signings didn't work out Perez and Davis. One didn't settle, the other wasn't mature enough to deal with the big price tag, and apply himself properly. I also wonder with Perez whether he was a bit too different from the traditional wingers of Ripley, Wilcox and Duff which gave us the success of before. There was a notable drop in quality at the back. Peacock and Dally weren't Hendry's quality, or necessary quality whatsoever. Another clanger was that Dailly, brought as a centre back spent the first half of the season rotating between different full back positions, which can't have helped him or the team. Sure, Kidd was hopeless, but Hodgeson gave him a heck of a bad start, with a ton of failed signings and breaking what was fixed rather than building upon it. The last minute signings of his reign, Blake, Marcolin and Konde, added nothing but expense. All in all, it was a poor situation to hand over. I can't remember at what point Sherwood left in the season but between his leaving and Flitty's injury, there was a huge loss of leadership. Throw in no Hendry in their too and that's a lot of leaders and maturity to lose from a squad. Kidd did pretty badly too. Whilst he had an eye for a player - most of his signings were solid - I do think it was too many, and tactically and his man management was pretty inept. The number of games we lost or didn't win was poor, and even now I can recall there seemed to be an it's ok we can fix it next week sort of atmosphere about the place. Certainly I recall that being the vibe of the interviews on Radio Rovers (which I miss, even if they do make certain posters on here seem unbiased) from that season. As for tactics they also seemed way off. That fateful Forest game I remember us whacking it long to Jansen and Gally, and wondering who on earth thought that was a good idea. If the long balls to Rhodes vs Millwall was a stupid idea in the FA Cup, this was its predecessor. Clueless. The more I think on it the more I do wonder about the injury situation. Really Flitty, Gally, McKinlay, Sutton and Flowers all missing for huge chunks. (Although with Flowers we got an upgrade in the performances of his lifetime from Filan, but still.) I find it hard to imagine that so many key players were out for so long. Did having another 25+ players to compete with or the club culture make a difference to how quickly we got them back? Was there thoughts, it's ok, we'll just buy our way out of trouble rather than improve what we had? Speaking of culture that seemed to be very different too. The 97-98 Rovers team were the original in your face Mark Hughes type Rovers. The defence, midfield and strike force was all up for a good battle. We weren't thugs on the pitch but the team could mix it. I remember in beating Arsenal away in 97-98 Gally was badly fouled and half the Rovers team came steaming into the confrontation. That up for the fight and togetherness just wasn't there the following year. Perhaps changes to personnel or change in management and culture,(or probably both) but that gritty togetherness and up for a scrap attitude was badly missing. Realistically there is no way we should have gone down. We had a ton of money, a good core team, a bunch of promising youngsters coming through - the best bunch in mu lifetime. We even managed to buy some good players too, well under Kidd anyway. So it seems like, even with unlucky injuries it should not have gone wrong. That suggests to me terrible man management, tactics and culture. Even looking back now it's hard to see it all as one full season such was the turnover in players. The season before was one of my favourites, and yet it seemed a lifetime ago at the end of the 99 relegation. It seems a huge transition from the hardy and spirited team of 97-98 into the promotion team of Souness only a couple of seasons later, which suggests far too much change was going on for Rovers good. Just a few thoughts from the perspective of a (then) 16 year old lad as to what went wrong.