frosty

One of my favourite accounts that I follow, definitely. Great content all round. Also enjoy Adam Hurrey (@FootballCliches) and Duncan Alexander (@oilysailor) but yep, the account you mention is brilliant.

I really don’t think ‘he almost went to Leeds’, as she’s claiming. There’d have been mention of that here at some point if so, but there’s been nothing of the sort. I get the impression that in Chile they just like linking him with transfers.

If Football Manager is anything to go by (and it usually is), you register 25 players for the Premier League but youngsters aged 20 (or 21 - one of the two) or under don’t have to be registered and can just play whenever. You can register some if you like, if they help with meeting the home-grown quota or anything similar, but yeah they don’t need to be. Didn’t Leeds have a 15 year old on the bench against Arsenal a few weeks ago? There’s no way he would have been on any registration list they submitted back in the summer.

Ferguson long-term would surely be a disaster, if they had him as caretaker until the end of the season then I’m sure he’d do just about okay and like last time after Silva left he’d probably get an instant reaction and pick up some results, as many caretakers do, through being a different voice if nothing else. Long-term though I just don’t see him as managerial material and, while I’m sure cliches such as ‘he knows the club’ and ‘he just gets it’ would get wheeled out, let’s not forget he’s been on the coaching staff and part of the last few coaching set ups that have mainly failed or at least underperformed.

I don't see how JRC could be used in any position more advanced than RWB in a 3-5-2, there's only the three CMs and two forwards ahead of him. To be honest even if he was able to stay fully fit I don't think I've seen enough from him to suggest he could be effective in any advanced position. Backup RWB only for me (when he's fit).

There is no way Barcelona or Real Madrid want Brereton, surely. I've always thought even Sevilla - who win the Europa League whenever they feel like it and are otherwise fairly regular in the Champions League - would be a remarkable move. The guy at FFT is a Rovers fan and has done loads of pieces about BBD and tweets about him tons, so doubt it gives any more credibility to the link, but it makes for a great headline. If he did end up at either though - maddest transfer of all time.

Agreed, thought the exact same. After BBD’s winner against Barnsley he announced the goalscorer as just ‘Brereton Diaz’ - never heard a stadium announcer refer to a goalscorer by only his surname before. Unless of course he thought ‘Brereton’ is his first name which wouldn’t surprise me….

It’s on the 2nd, not new year’s day! Tough game, good result for them tonight. Just praying we can grind out one more win and then we’ll be ready for a two-week breather from the Championship.

As superb as Jansen was, he 'only' scored 23 all season that season. I was thinking Armstrong last year as he was mega prolific early on, but the season started in mid-September so won't be him....

Genuinely unbelievable this, seeing us one point off automatics and 8 points clear of 7th place (our former glass ceiling) is crazy. Well done Rovers!

The below four are off plus Cardiff-Derby. I didn’t realise there were that many either.

That penalty and second yellow in the Arsenal-West Ham game was a dreadful decision. They mentioned the follow through but there was none. From what I've seen follow through normally refers to if a player wins the ball but, say, his studs are up and ends up catching his opponent dangerously. Here there was literally 'contact' (hate that word but fits here) after Coufal clearly took the ball. Terrible.

Difference is last summer we lost players that should have gone years ago, Evans and Bennett etc.....I always said we'd never do anything in this league while we still had those kind of players, i.e. 30+ and happy to play out the remaining years of their career in mid-table of the Championship. Younger, hungrier players is the way to go. This time we'd be losing key first-team players who've shown they're capable of getting us in a play-off position at least and hopefully cementing us there.

Can't believe this is actually happening, we just haven't got results like that since we came down almost a decade ago. Brilliant, well done Rovers, keep it up ⚽

Looks like it could be Ryan Lowe.

The first few rows of that stand behind the left goal as the camera looks are very sparse too nowadays. Must all be sat on Pendle Hill. Edit - same thinking as renrag!

Grayson was the go-to League 1 manager for a while to get a promotion, and did alright at Leeds and Preston after getting them into the Championship. His last few jobs have been poor though so maybe he's had his day (though he's still relatively young at 51). Everything Dunn gets involved with manager/coach-wise though seems to go downhill......

So this is the first Championship game against Peterborough since one of many low points we've had since our PL relegation, the home defeat against them in 12/13. 0-3 down at HT and a good few chancers wearing the shirt - thankfully the odious Orr and Murphy were hauled off at half time and, if I remember correctly, neither were seen again thank god. 2-0 Rovers after being 0-0 at HT.

There’ll be a big break next winter for the World Cup won’t there? I’d imagine that’d be the case for at least PL and Championship just like the current international breaks. So he wouldn’t miss any hopefully.

Absolutely piss poor that is. The former players can get in the bin as well (Cairney and Tosin obviously excused).

Can't believe it looks like Conte will be going there. Thought he'd hold out for an elite job, he's miles better than Spurs. Great coup for them though.

I wanted Bowyer out long before he did leave, it was obvious halfway through 14/15 that we were never going to be near promotion (or even the top 6) despite having two 20+ goal strikers as well as other very good players for the division like Cairney, Hanley and Duffy. A better manager would have had that squad in the top 6 (and wouldn’t have persisted with Lowe and Williamson in CM). But in the horrific 12/13 season he inherited just as big of a mess as Mowbray did yet we stayed up without too much trouble, despite looking like we were on for a second relegation at one point. The FA Cup run in 14/15 is streets ahead of anything Mowbray has done in the cups as well, and he’s had more seasons. Based solely on their records here I’d have to go for Bowyer over Mowbray but ultimately it speaks volumes about the last ten years that the choice of best manager of that time period is between them two.

He’s gone to FC United on loan.

There's no way they'll go straight from Bruce to someone like Conte. They'll probably have a stage like City did where they had Hughes as manager, and signed players like Gareth Barry, Joleon Lescott, Shay Given etc - good, reliable PL players that'll get you up the table a few places, but no established top players yet. I know he probably wouldn't be an option any time soon but somebody of the ilk of Brendan Rodgers I'm picturing. Maybe establish them in the top 6 or so over a couple/few seasons. At that point they may be able to attract a Conte or similar.

Looking at the standings there’s barely any chance of them qualifying. They seem in a bad way compared to the team of a few years ago. The South American qualifiers are extremely well balanced compared to Europe, with no Andorras or San Marinos for an easy 3 points, so hard to see them going on a good run. Still got Brazil and Argentina to play too.