He was doing the same on Saturday, Nick. I gather that many Villa fans have now had enough of him and were chanting for O'Leary to go after an inept peformance at Goodison Park, where they lost 4-1 to Everton. To be fair to Villa, they did put up a pretty good performance at Ewood the previous weekend, but couldn't bury their chances. It has though generally been a miserable season for Villa - humiliated against Doncaster in the League Cup, losing 3-0, and firmly positioned in the wrong half of the table all season. Like their Midlands rivals Birmingham, Villa fans like to think of themselves as being supporters of a "massive club". While it's true that they did win the European Cup in 1982, since then they've only had two League Cup wins (in 1994 and 1996) to show for the last 24 years. Dennis Mortimer, who played for Villa in the 1982 European Cup final win over Bayern Munich, said: "There have got to be question marks over David O'Leary and where he is going with this team. There is a lot of confusion surrounding the club and Villa could find themselves in an even more dire position than they are in now." Mortimer has also called for Doug Ellis to quit. "Ellis should have left the club five years ago and retired to a villa in Spain to let someone else have a go. This club has become very complacent under his leadership. We lived the dream in 1981 and 1982 and since then the club has struggled to emulate those times." One Villa fan, quoted in the press as an Independent Supporters spokesman, says that O'Leary has "run out of excuses" and has been busy this season blaming everyone else for their poor results, without wanting to take responsibility for his own mistakes. When O'Leary was appointed at Villa Park in 2003, he said that his aim was to establish Villa as a top six club. He became the club's 10th manager in 20 years - with 'Deadly Doug' not noted for his patience as far as managers are concerned. If Villa fans continue with their protests against O'Leary, it will be interesting to see if 'Deadly Doug' pulls the trigger. Also on the theme of moaning managers, I think the events of the last few weeks have demonstrated once again the arrogance of Jose Mourinho. His team were clearly outplayed over two legs by Barcelona, but Jose refused to acknowledge this fact. I thought Mourinho's behaviour at the Hawthorns recently was a disgrace when he refused to shake Bryan Robson's hand after the game. This is the third time that Mourinho has refused to shake hands with an opposition manager, having pulled the same stunt against Mark Hughes last season, and also against Arsene Wenger earlier this season at Highbury. When will Mourinho learn some etiquette and manners? Or is he determined to remain a pig-headed egotist? Mourinho was clearly guilty of hypocrisy recently when he condemned what he said was playacting by Barcelona players. A couple of weeks earlier he defended Arjen Robben's shameful playacting against Liverpool. There was a similar hypocrisy when Mourinho condemned Rovers' tackling at Ewood Park, and later defended Michael Essien for a couple of disgraceful tackles this season.

Personally I'd be in favour of doing the exact opposite Theno. I'd halve the cost of ticket prices and recover any drop in revenue by trimming a bit from the huge wage bill. Getting one or two of the overpaid dollopers like Amoruso off the wage bill would be a start.... You sometimes hear managers say: "The crowd made all the difference" or "The full house at the ground gives us a big lift." I'm not sure if Mark Hughes could say the same if there were only 10,000 at Ewood.... If it is true that the atmosphere/crowd is worth an extra couple of points at the end of the season, then it's worthwhile IMO to trim ticket prices.

Jan's favourite Scotsman was also the Sky pundit last Wednesday night for the Arsenal/Real Madrid game. Let's be fair to him - he's got to earn an extra few pennies these days hasn't he? I mean the poor guy was sacked last month from Newcastle with a compensation cheque worth only a reported £3million. Peanuts isn't it? How is he going to pay the mortgage these days? I'm sure the Newcastle fans who forked out the money to pay for his high wages and 18 months of failure under him, must be delighted to see him pontificating about the deficiencies of Arsenal, Liverpool and Real Madrid - when he couldn't get a damn thing right for them at St James' Park....

Edited.

That's true Radagast. It can indeed be a cruel game and I felt we deserved at least a point on Sunday, but although our approach play was generally very good, it's still Mark Hughes's job to look at and analyse the reasons why we lost. For me there are three main reasons. Firstly, a couple of key refereeing decisions went against us - which is out of our hands. Secondly, Rovers unfortunately went to sleep and were guilty of sloppy play a couple of minutes after Bellamy made the score 2-2 in the second half. Thirdly, Pongolle should have scored from a simple chance in front of goal, but he wasn't alert enough to get a foot onto it. There was one other bad miss from Rovers when David Bentley mishit a shot from a good position, striking the ball to the right of Robinson's goal when he should have done better. Whether the first goal from Robbie Keane after nine minutes should have been a throw-in to Rovers or to Spurs is out of our hands, but it seemed to me that one or two of our players like Andy Todd were slow to react to the danger. It was fine individual skill from Keane, but I felt our defence should have been quicker to block the ball. For the second Robbie Keane goal from the Mido free-kick, Brad will be disappointed that he was only able to palm the ball in front of Keane, who used his arm to control the ball before slotting it into the net. A well-worked Rovers goal just before half-time made the score 2-1. Steven Reid released the ball down the right for Bellamy, who used his pace to get in front of Ledley King and whip a good cross in for Pongolle to score with a diving header. Apart from that headed goal from Pongolle, I was disappointed with his overall contribution in the first half. I thought he was off the pace for much of the first half and his control and first touch let him down. Clearly the Frenchman still has quite a bit of work to do on his game. The equaliser in the second half came after a period of sustained Rovers pressure. A long ball from Savage resulted in Ledley King making a mistake with a header, deflecting the ball into the path of Pongolle who cut the ball back for Bellamy to score. For a period of at least 20 minutes in the second half, Rovers were the dominant side up until the equaliser and performed as well as I've seen them play this season. Unfortunately though we weren't able to turn our dominance of possession into a third goal. Spurs have only lost to Chelsea at White Hart Lane this season and after our equaliser I hoped we might become the second team to win at the Lane this season. It was hugely disappointing that a couple of minutes after equalising, Rovers switched off and became sloppy in possession. I thought Michael Gray didn't get tight enough on Aaron Lennon, who ran down the wing and crossed the ball for Mido to score. Fair enough, Gray might not have the pace of Lennon, but you could question Michael's initial defensive positioning which wasn't tight enough. And I suspect that when Martin Jol brought Lennon on in the second half he may have felt that Gray was a weak link to be exploited. In the closing minutes of the game, with Rovers pushing forward, Spurs played on the counter-attack and Mido missed one good chance in injury time. It would have been an even bigger injustice to have lost the game 4-2. Spurs are the only Premiership club never to have finished in either the top six or the bottom six of the Premiership. Since 1992, their finishing position has ranged from 7th to 15th. It's highly likely that Spurs will finish in the top six for the first time this season and may also finish above Arsenal to claim a Champions League spot. For Rovers, I can't honestly see us finishing in the top four, but a top six finish would represent an excellent achievement. It's frustrating though to think back to some of the silly points we dropped last month against West Brom and ten-men Everton at Goodison Park. Those two away performances were unacceptable, but apart from one or two individual mistakes Rovers can hold their heads high after Sunday's performance.

Angry Bruce warns bad boy Pennant I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the big club gets relegated this season. In the words of Kevin Keegan, I'd love it, just love it if they went down. Sunderland have obviously been dead and buried since before Christmas and Portsmouth now have a mountain to climb too. I think the remaining relegation place looks to be a straight battle between WBA and Brum. Come on the Baggies!

Nice one Bob. Keep up the good work.

I fear that Gav is going to lose this bet.... Unless John Williams does something radical in the remaining 13 games and lets in kids for free. (Or significantly increases, by thousands, the amount of free tickets given to schoolkids, for example.) Cletus - It seems like you've got a calculator ready and waiting after every match. Thanks for your posts.

For the past ten days rumours have indeed been circulating about a particular player (no names mentioned) - who is about to be 'outed' by the tabloids. Today the News of the World have carried a story involving two players allegedly having a gay sex romp together. For 'legal reasons' though, the paper has carried the story minus the actual players names. Although 'legal reasons' are cited by the NOTW, I suspect the paper may have also got cold feet in the sense they were worried about a backlash from the supporters of the particular club/clubs involved. A lot of people would have been angry at the players being 'outed', and unlike MPs who lie and claim to be family men while indulging in gay sex - one could argue that the players' sex lives are their own business and that sportsmen aren't in the same category as MPs when it comes to the public having the right to know about their private lives. It's possible that the particular club/clubs involved would have refused to speak to the NOTW again in protest at the story. And as well as the 'legal reasons' cited, the paper, as I said, may have been worried about a backlash. Anyway, for those who are not interested in reading some rather sordid details in today's NOTW story, please don't click the link below: http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/story_pages/news/news3.shtml I must admit that I've never thought of my mobile phone as a sex object - but each to their own I suppose..... Without mentioning any names, we know that one of the Premiership players is an England international and a household name, while one of the two players is described as a goalscoring midfielder.

Everton, having been in the top flight for all but four seasons in their history, have accumulated more points in the top division than any other English team. I doubt though whether Everton have ever previously had to rely on a fourth-choice teenage keeper alongside nine team-mates for the vast majority of the match, and yet were still able to pick up all the points against a side so utterly inept and devoid of ideas as ourselves. This was a shameful performance. We could have easily lost this match 4-0 - against a team with only ten men FFS! We started the game yesterday lacking passion, fight and commitment - attributes that are needed against a rumbustious side like Everton. Andy Todd is starting to worry me. He's making regular mistakes now in successive matches. In the 4-3 win over Man United, he was certainly at fault for one of the Van Nistelrooy goals. Against West Brom he was caught out of position with Kevin Campbell's header and he had a poor game against Everton yesterday. James Beattie had acres of space to direct his header into the net. To get caught out from a simple set-piece like that is hugely disappointing. In the second half of last season our defending was a great strength. I think only Chelsea conceded fewer goals in the second half of last season than us after Hughes tightened up the defence. This season though, even Newcastle - with the comedy pairing of Boumsong and Bramble - have conceded fewer goals in the league than Rovers. Ten days ago Robbie Savage said Rovers were on target to qualify for the Champions League! What planet is this guy on? The last two horrendously inept performances from us against West Brom and Everton have surely dispelled that notion from even someone as dim as Mr Savage. There may be those who'll say: "What's wrong with Robbie being positive - it makes a change from Souey's 'survival is the main aim' mantra?" - but I think if players are going to talk to the media (which Robbie certainly has a habit of doing) then it would beneficial if they mentioned realistic targets. Otherwise the player ends up looking like a fool. Aiming for a top six place is one thing, but to start talking about qualifying for the Champions League strikes me as being a tad premature to say the least. Savage, together with the rest of the midfield, were poor yesterday. Don Howe always used to preach that defending isn't just about the back four. The midfield have got to be doing their jobs properly, and we didn't do that against Everton. That's true. We seem to find it particularly hard to unlock teams like West Brom and Everton who get men behind the ball and defend stoutly. We're missing the type of player in midfield with a bit of magic who can conjur up a defence-splitting pass. An Eyal Berkovic type or a younger version of Tugay. There was one good counter-attacking chance in the first half yesterday when Bellamy attacked with pace and crossed the ball for Pongole who should have done better with his shot. At Liverpool I thought Pongole looked a good player. Yesterday the Frenchman with the dreadlocks played crap. Goodison Park, known by some as the 'Grand Old Lady' of English football and the only club ground to host a World Cup semi-final in this country, has staged more top-flight games than any other stadium in England. No doubt there have been many atrocious performances from various teams down the years on the famous ground. But, as I said earlier, probably none previously involving Everton playing with ten men and a rookie fourth-choice keeper for 80 minutes of the match, with the away side failing to trouble the keeper with a single decent shot for the vast majority of the game. Back to the drawing board for Mark Hughes & co. A couple of weeks ago Hughes spoke of his desire to take Rovers to the "next level". I'd suggest that this "next level" requires either serious financial investment from the board (funds which unfortunately we don't appear to have) Or alternatively the players backsides need to be suitably kicked into shape. They need to be reminded of their responsibilities to the supporters. It's not enough to turn up when they feel like it against Man United and to shirk their responsibilites in the following two games against West Brom and Everton. And as Roversmum said, I'd question whether rewarding these highly paid players with a sunshine holiday to Dubai is the right thing to do after the two diabolical away performances we've just seen. I'm not condoning what those supporters said, but I suspect given our politically correct policing at the moment, that those who incite murder and wave placards calling for the beheading of non-muslims, are inclined to be ignored by the police - while a few rather over-exuberant young lads at a football match mentioning the word 'paki' would feel the full force of the law if the police were standing next to them. I take it ES that you are similarly outraged by football chants of "We hate the French". Or is "We hate muslims" worse? That's the PC version Gordon! I think the old-fashioned phrase that was once used in this country (and one I naturally wouldn't condone) involved the word Ron Atkinson used....

"McClaren for England," chanted Middlesbrough fans again yesterday after another shockingly inept performace by 'Boro at the Riverside. Flopsy probably doesn't agree with me about much, but we're both united in our view about Steve McClaren. I've always thought he's hugely overrated as a coach. Another Brian Kidd. McClaren was fortunate enough to take over from Kidd at Old Trafford in the middle of the 98/99 season, when given the quality of United's midfield at the time - Keane, Scholes, Giggs and Beckham all at their peak - even Graham Taylor or Stan Ternent could have come in as United's coach and they would have won the Premiership. But McClaren was hailed by sections of the media as some kind of Messiah after United won the treble. The same media who at the start of the season said that 'Boro were top six contenders and an outside bet for the Champions League. They now find themselves just one place above the relegation zone. Watching the highlights of 'Boro's shocking display against Villa, the body language of the players told a story in itself. Many of them are playing without pride, passion, desire and commitment. They are playing like a side doomed. I certainly think that relegation is a possibility if they carry on in this vein. Yakubu and Viduka look immobile and don't appear to be on the same wavelength. Look at the money McClaren has spent on strikers - £8m for Maccorone cheese. The midfield looks unorganised and doesn't track back properly. The team are leaking goals like they are going out of fashion, they need a replay to defeat non-league Nuneaton Borough and some of the fans are throwing their season tickets away in disgust at the lack of commitment they see on the pitch. "Crisis? What crisis?" says McClaren. Knowing the dimwits at the FA, they'll probably be thinking about appointing this plonker....

I don't want to irritate Dave Birch, a guy I like, but as I've been too busy to post over the last couple of days, I'm going to (belatedly) put my two cents in now. Or twenty cents maybe - I've been known to prattle on a bit. Graeme Souness can have no complaints whatsoever about his sacking at Newcastle and since the summer of 2003 I think he lost the plot as a football manager, first with us, nearly sending Rovers crashing into oblivion before thankfully being taken off our hands by Freddy Shepherd. Instead of John Williams having to sack the man, we got over a million quid in compensation. I bet Williams couldn't believe his luck when Freddy called. At Newcastle, Souness claimed to have the most talented group of players he had ever worked with. (A squad that under Bobby Robson had finished 3rd, 4th and 5th in the previous three seasons.) Freddy Shepherd made it clear that he wanted Champions League football, hence sacking Sir Bobby for finishing 5th. Souness knew exactly what he had to do. Within a year and a half, he turned them into relegation strugglers after spending over £50m. Souness will point to injuries and "lady luck" as an excuse. In his first season, Newcastle didn't have such bad injury problems but they still finished 14th in the League - Newcastle's lowest ever position since the Premiership started in 1992. This season Newcastle have put in a series of wretched performances, including one particular horror show in the Carling Cup against Wigan reserves, when the players looked totally disinterested and uncommitted. Five thousand Geordie fans at the JJB stadium stayed behind to chant for Souness to go. Freddy Shepherd decided to wait another couple of months before pulling the trigger. Souness said of his sacking: "I am obviously saddened at the way things have worked out at St James' Park. I have enjoyed living and working in Newcastle. My family and I have been made to feel particularly welcome by the Geordies." Made to feel particularly welcome? The Geordies couldn't wait to see the back of him and celebrated his sacking like a Cup final win. As for being "saddened", Souness seemed to have a grin on his face as he drove away from St James' Park with a pay-off reported to be in the region of £3m - £5m. A few weeks ago, in a thinly veiled attack at the manager, Freddy Shepherd told everyone at St James' Park that the moaning had to stop. But Souness ignored Shepherd and carried on repeating the injuries excuse. Shepherd talked of Europe while Souness talked of relegation. He had to go. Against Man City on Wednesday night, Newcastle had Scott Parker and Emre fit again, but they still put in a shocking performance. They didn't trouble the Man City goalkeeeper once and were guilty of the same defensive blunders that had characterised their season. Souness wanted more signings in January, but Shepherd thought he'd wasted quite enough of Newcastle's cash - £8m on Boumsong, a player available on a free transfer six months earlier, £10m spent on the Spaniard Albert Luque, who looked disinterested whenever he stepped onto the pitch. Further millions blown on the likes of Babayaro and Amdy Faye. As Mark Lawrenson said: "The worse Boumsong became the more pig-headed and determined Souness was to dig his heels in and keep on playing him. Boumsong has become the biggest joke in the Premiership." While at Rovers and Newcastle, Souness spent over £17m on Rangers' players - including Amoruso, Ferguson and Boumsong. Astonishingly, Souness told Rangers fans that he was benefiting his former club and they ought to be thankful for the high transfer fee he paid for Boumsong as it eased Rangers' debt. Souness said: "I think David Murray should get a tremendous amount of applause for signing a player for nothing and six months later getting £8m for him." Who has been Souey's worst buy in his managerial career? - You decide. Fifteen howlers from Souness.... Liverpool. Torben Piechnik (£500,000) Danish defender who was totally out of his depth in the Premiership. Paul Stewart (£2.3m) Frequently on the injured list, or when fit, just plain crap. A few years ago he was voted by Liverpool fans as their worst ever buy. Istvan Kozma (£600,000) Hungarian joke of a player. Bought by Souness because "I saw him play well for Dunfermline." Oh right. So having a good game for Dunfermline means you can suddenly play for Liverpool then.... Julian Dicks (£1.5m) Overweight thug who was a disgrace to the Liverpool shirt. Mark Walters (£1.25m) Another player bought from Rangers. Souness called him the new John Barnes. He might have been the same colour but that was all they had in common. Given a free transfer to Stoke. Southampton Ali Dia Picture the scene. Souness receives a phone call. "Hello Graeme. I'm George Weah, World Footballer of the Year." "Hello George." "Listen Graeme," "My cousin Ali is a brilliant player (struggles to avoid laughing). He'd love to play in the Premiership and he'd do a great job for you at Southampton. Would you be interested? "Yes George. When can he come to Southampton?" "I'll send him on the plane straight away Graeme," (struggles to avoid laughing again.) "I look forward to seeing him George. I'll stick him on the bench on Saturday." Saturday comes and Southampton play Leeds. Ali Dia comes on as a sub in the second half and is so shockingly diabolical - so horrendously inept - that Souness has to substitute him within minutes. A rare example of a sub coming on and having to be substituted shortly afterwards for being so crap. George Weah my arse. Souness fell for it though. Ali left to go to Gateshead, where he couldn't get a game in the reserve team. I kid you not. Ali Bongo, sorry Ali Dia, was so bad that he was deemed not good enough for Gateshead reserves. Blackburn Corrado Grabbi (£7m) Oh Dear. You would have hoped that Souness would have learnt his lesson about signing players without seeing them in the flesh. But on the strength of a video from a dodgy agent, Souness splashed out £7m on the long-haired Serie B player. Given a free transfer to Ancona. Barry Ferguson. (£7.5m) Souness used a large chunk of the Damien Duff money to sign Barry "He's going to be a top top player" Ferguson. He was given the Rovers captaincy and turned out to be a soft two-faced @#/?. A few weeks before handing in a transfer request in the middle of the season he told the press: "I'm extremely happy at Blackburn and I definitely want to stay at the club. The training under Mark Hughes has been excellent." A couple of weeks later, Ferguson refused to pull on the Rovers shirt for an FA Cup tie against Cardiff. A total disgrace to our football club. Lorenzo Amoruso (£1.4m.) Italian hulk. Ama-useless was another signing from Rangers. I bet David Murray was laughing all the way to the bank. Javier De Pedro. (Free) This is what Souness had to say when he signed: "The fans should be excited because he's a quality player. Two years ago he played in every game for Spain in the World Cup. He's a left-sided player with bags of international experience and he scores his fair share of goals from set-pieces. He's got terrific ability with his left foot." The reality was that De Pedro was an overweight Spanish tub of lard. At least he came on a free transfer though. Six months earlier Souness wanted to pay money for him. Dwight Yorke (£2m) When Yorke joined Rovers, Souness said that he reminded him of Kenny Dalglish. Yorke though turned out to be a lazy Caribbean slug. He was completely past his best when he joined us from Man United. Joined Birmingham, where he wasn't good enough for "Big Club." Newcastle Jean-Alain Boumsong (£8m) 8 million quid for the biggest joke in the Premiership. Amdy Faye (£2m) Bought from Portsmouth. Newcastle fans think he's a useless clogger in midfield. Offers no creativity at all. Albert Luque (£10m) 10 million quid. Bloody hell. Celestine Babayaro (£1m) Can't defend. Just like most of the Newcastle team.... Maybe the mods could have a poll as to which of these 15 is the worst? I reckon it's a toss-up between Grabbi and the comical Ali Dia.... A few season ago, at Rovers, Souness was talking about wanting to retire in the next few years. Well he's got his retirement package now. A few million quid in his back pocket courtesy of Freddy Shepherd. Do I feel sympathy for Souness? I feel sympathy for the thousands of people in the West Midlands who lost their jobs last year when MG Rover collapsed. I feel sympathy for other people across the country who've lost their jobs through no fault of their own and find themselves on the dole with kids to feed and bills to pay. I don't feel sympathy for a manager who brought failure upon himself and walks away smiling with a cheque for 3 million quid. Not bad for 16 months of failure is it? What other industry apart from football rewards people in this way for failing to get results? No wonder he was smiling as he drove away from the club. Which chairman would want to employ this man now?

From Philipl's first link: "Craig Bellamy's a lovely lad," says Jeff Winter.... Blimey. I thought only Craig's Mum and Dad would say that. Anyway, I think Jeff Winter made some valid points. A few of our refs do seem to favour the big clubs. Perhaps with one or two of them it's a subconscious thing. They know at the back of their minds, for example, that if they send a Man United player off or give a penalty against United, then Ferguson will be blowing his top afterwards and he might try and make it difficult for them to referee future Man United games. Then there are other refs who tend to be "homers" - that's favouring the home side rather than a description for a Lib Dem MP. It was interesting at the last World Cup in Japan and Korea in 2002, that the host nations - South Korea in particular, who reached the semi-final under Guus Hiddink - were the beneficiaries of several controversial decisions. In their quarter-final match against Spain, the referee ruled out what seemed to be three legitimate Spanish goals against the Koreans. Some people will defend refs whatever mistakes they make and will say: "Stop whining and accept that referees are only human, they make mistakes, its all part of the game, etc". But there's so much at stake in a World Cup these days. Indeed, there's a huge amount at stake for any match at the highest level. The careers of managers are on the line and the hopes and dreams of millions of supporters depend on what happens on the pitch. Last year the German ref Robert Hoyzer was jailed for two years and five months after admitting match-fixing. Together with fellow ref Dominik Marks, they were found guilty of fixing matches in return for large cash sums. The Croatian ringleaders of the betting gang made a couple of million Euros in the fraud. One of the matches Hoyzer fixed involved Hamburg against lower-league Paderborn in the German Cup. Hoyzer sent off one Hamburg player and awarded Paderborn two disputed penalties. Hamburg were leading 2-0 but went on to lose 4-2. After the match, the Hamburg manager Klaus Topmoeller was sacked - proof that the careers of managers depend on refs getting decisions right. I think the majority of refs in England are impartial but as in any bucket you're going to get one or two bad apples. I suspect that in continental Europe, the taking of bungs by refs is a lot more widespread than in England. "Never trust a German or a Frenchman," as my Dad used to say.....

I think that's right Phil. Letting kids in for free might be a case of short-term pain for long-term gain in terms of Rovers' finances. In the short-term the revenue will go down, but the long-term benefits of letting kids in for free are worth pursuing. It also has to be said that the initial reduction in revenue will be a drop in the ocean compared with the £20m per season we get from Sky. The longer-term benefits will mean having more seats filled, an expanding fan base and hopefully an increase in shirt sales and food and drink purchased at the ground. As well as more kids becoming involved with Rovers, I would hope the policy would attract more Mums and Dads to the ground too. There were some interesting attendance figures at yesterday's FA Cup matches. Bolton, whose game with Arsenal was screened live on BBC1, attracted just 13,000 to the Reebok Stadium - a very disappointing attendance for Bolton against one of the so-called 'Big Four'. Coventry City on the other hand had a very impressive 28,000 at their home tie against Middlesbrough. I'm sure there will be far less than that at the replay up in the North East. Coventry slashed prices for the FA Cup tie and have a scheme where young kids are allowed in for free at the new stadium they moved into this season, the Ricoh Arena. Most people would agree that West Ham are a bigger club than Coventry, but the Hammers only had 23,000 at Upton Park yesterday while Coventry were rewarded with a 28,000 crowd, a good atmosphere and a replay to look forward to. As well as sponsorship from Ricoh, an electronics company, the new arena at Coventry has been funded, in large part, by Coventry City council and includes shopping facilities, a casino and exhibition halls. I can't quite see Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council offering to fund a renovation of the Riverside stand complete with shopping facilities and a casino.... I was disgusted by the recent comments of Arsenal managing director Keith Edelman who boasted about their forthcoming gate income: "We will have 60,000 fans at the new stadium and we’ve got higher-priced tickets and more premium tickets than any other club in the UK." We're constantly being told by club chairman that football is just like any other business. Well if that's the case, can you imagine the chairman of Tesco's boasting: "We've got the highest prices of any supermarket in the UK." Can you imagine a pub landlord boasting: "We've got the highest beer prices of any pub in the country." Or the chairman of Dixons saying: "We charge higher prices for radios than any hi-fi retailer in the UK." The comments from Keith Edelman demonstrate both the club's greed and the comtempt they have for ordinary supporters. In justifying price hikes and naked commercialism, Arsenal and the other big clubs like to employ the vernacular of the marketplace. And so the supporters are repeatedly referred to as "customers" The club are exploiting the supporters' emotional bond to the club because they know that if this were a normal company, its constant price hikes would long ago have become unsustainable and uncompetitive. I hope that Arsenal miss out on a place in the Champions League next season and Keith Edelman is sweating at the prospect of not having 60,000 at every match. A lot of people forget that after the Hillsborough tragedy, the Taylor report, as well as recommending all-seater stadiums, also said: 'There should not be a corresponding rise in ticket prices.' Well what a sick joke that has turned out to be. Since the advent of the Premier League in 1992, some clubs have taken the opportunity to raise their prices by 600% or more - Chelsea being a classic example - they were charging Rovers fans £48 for a ticket for our match with them at the Bridge in October. Chelsea also had the audacity and greed to double prices for their disabled supporters to £49 per ticket. If you thought Peter "I'm a lifelong red" Kenyon was the biggest double-crossing slimy @#/? in football then you might be right - but he does have some stiff competition from David "I'll take the cash, thanks" Gill - managing Director of Manchester United. In public, Mr Gill claimed to be strongly opposed to the Glazer takeover. In private he was a strong advocate on the board for accepting the Glazer offer and keeping his £900,000 plus bonuses job. No doubt in the coming few seasons there will be further price hikes at Old Trafford to pay for the Glazer's folly. The Taylor report has clearly been selectively interpreted by the big clubs who have seen it as a 'Golden Fleece' opportunity to bleed supporters dry. They've simply ignored the bits in the Taylor report that they didn't like. Old Trafford, soon to be extended to a 75,000 capacity, is a lifeless mega-stadium these days and sadly Arsenal are determined to go down the same 'prawn sandwich' route of Man United. There will be an increasing dichotomy of supporters: the shabbily treated 'genuine' fans who care for the club and the increasingly pampered corporate sections. No doubt David Dein and Keith Edelman will say that high prices at Arsenal are justified because the club needs to compete on a European level. But if they were to compare their ticket prices with other top European clubs like AC Milan, Barcelona and Bayern Munich, they would find that those clubs all have average ticket prices substantially lower than Arsenal's. One of the things that makes English football great is the passion of the supporters. But the warning signs of thousands of empty Premiership seats each week is a clanging alarm bell that clubs are losing sight of this, and the clubs risk not only damaging the relationship with increasingly disenchanted fans, but also the future of the game itself. If Chelsea, Man United and Arsenal are determined to treat supporters with contempt in their voracious appetite for greed, then they should bugger off to form their own League and let the rest of us get on with watching real football with real fans. In the meantime, Rovers should take a look at what clubs like Coventry have been doing and adopt a radical pricing policy that cuts the cost of tickets, particularly for kids. If that doesn't work, then at least the Rovers have tried. But as Blue Phil knows only too well, the demographics are against us. An increasingly sizeable Asian community that, thus far, hasn't shown enough interest in watching football, may cause long-term problems for the future.

URGENT APPEAL: Wanted: removal of the imposter who flies on the pitch masquerading as a footballer The imposter pictured above has caused serious damage to the beautiful game and is likely to do so again if he's not swiftly removed the next time he fraudulently ventures onto the pitch. Anyone who spots this man, believed to be a Finn, with an Eastern European appearance and a prominent Roman nose, is advised to call 08701 113232 and leave a message for Mr Hughes - urging him to eject the imposter from the pitch. Three elementary schoolboy errors, in particular, from Messrs Gray, Tugay and Kuqi have cost us a place in the Carling Cup final next month. After about seven minutes, Michael Gray made a horrendous pass in his own half, gifting the ball to United who went on to score. Five minutes into the second half, Tugay dwelt on the ball for far too long in his own half. I think it was a foul on him by Fletcher and I was annoyed by the ref's decision, but it was still poor play by Tugay to try to hold onto the ball as he did in that position. The third appalling mistake came just minutes after Saha's goal, from the man himself Mr Kuqi. What can one say about this individual ? He's plainly not good enough at the highest level and is an embarrassment in the blue and white shirt. He had the ball in a great postition, with Bentley to the right of him in acres of space, umarked in the box. Kuqi only needed to find Bentley with a simple pass for what would have been an excellent opportunity for Bentley to score. Kuqi, however, decided to make a complete pigs ear of things instead. As Revidge said (on another thread): "I'm still struggling to recall a performance as bad as Kuqi's last night when he failed to win the ball, hold the ball up or retain possession once." I'm hugely disappointed with the result, more so than when Rovers lost to United at the same stage of the competition, in the semi-final of 2003. But as soon as I saw the line-up, with Belllamy missing and with Kuqi and Bentley up front, I feared the worse and so it proved. I can't fault most of the team for effort though. I feel particularly sorry for Brad who didn't deserve to be on the losing side. The difference was that United had £60 million of talent up front in Van Nistelrooy, Rooney and Saha, while Rovers had two players who cost nothing - Kuqi and Bentley. The difference was palpably obvious last night. I hope that the board/the trustees can somehow raid the piggy bank (if I'm allowed to say that now - Halifax Building Society have banned them) - to raise some pennies for a new quality striker that we desperately need. Some of Graham Poll's decisions were crazy and I agree with Mark Hughes that Poll seems to enjoy the "celebrity status" a bit too much. This is a ref with his own agent who has had a national newspaper column and likes to appear on chat shows. He should concentrate a little less on publicity and a bit more on getting the decisions on the pitch right. "We were all getting frustrated with the referee," said Hughes. "It is unfortunate these days, there are only so many Premiership referees and possibly some of them enjoy the celebrity status they have and I think tonight Mr Poll thought 61,000 people had come to see him."

Yep, you're right. Post ammended.

High above a hill overlooking the A1 road into Tyneside, the 'Angel of the North' keeps a watchful eye over the proceedings in Newcastle. A couple of miles away at St James' Park though, it's not so much angels wings but a dark cloud that is hanging over the club and in particular their rather beleaguered manager Graeme Souness. Newcastle face Cheltenham in the FA Cup next Saturday and a defeat away there would surely be the final nail in the coffin for Souey's reign in charge. Cheltenham, most famous for it's horse racing, might prove to be the venue where Freddy Shepherd's reckless gamble in sacking Bobby Robson and appointing an abrasive Scot in his place, comes to it's final sorry conclusion. (Sorry for him that is - not sorry for the rest of us.) For the first time since the Championship winning season of 94/95, Rovers have won three consecutive away games - and for that Mark Hughes deserves a lot of credit. About fifteen minutes into yesterday's match, Paul Dickov should have made it 1-0 to Rovers. In his media interview afterwards, Hughes praised the save from Shay Given, but in all honesty it was a weak effort from Dickov who should have directed his shot more towards the right-hand side of the goal away from the Irishman's reach. I haven't always been Steven Reid's biggest fan - sometimes feeling that he's inconsistent and doesn't create enough - but he deserves praise for his performance on Saturday. He made some good quality runs forward and looked pacy and dangerous on the counter-attack. Tugay also had an excellent game in midfield. The partnership in defence of Nelsen and Zurab generally looked strong and stood up to Newcastle's sporadic attacks. The weak link in our side is the big lumbering Finn/Kosovan up front who struggles to trap a bag of cement and resembles a barrel-chested pub player who has all the grace and subtlety of a rhino. However, with 15 minutes to go, it was the big Kuqi Monster who rose high to head down Lucas Neill's cross towards the back of the net - with a helping hand, literally, from Pedersen. Last week on the M/B it was suggested that Pedersen should be moved forward from the left-wing to a position up front and that happened for the final 35 minutes in the second half after Dickov was taken off with his unfortunate shoulder injury. For me, Kuqi has never been Premiership class, but I'm grateful for the part he played in yesterday's goal. His scoring record is fairly mediocre - 6 goals in 27 League and Cup matches this season, but to be fair to him, those 6 goals were all important ones - two away to Middlesbrough, two at home to West Brom and goals in the 3-2 win against West Ham and the 3-2 Carling Cup victory over Charlton. If Mark Hughes manages to get another quality striker onto our books before the end of January, then a top 6 finish for us is a possibility. A couple of months ago I thought that was a remote prospect, but credit to the team for doing well in recent weeks.

Gibson reveals: "I'm the fake Sheikh" The Sven-gate scandal took an astonishing twist today as Middlesbrough chairman Steve Gibson came clean and admitted that he was the man in the Arab robes behind the exposure of Sven Goran-Eriksson. A contrite Gibson decided to tell all when he realised that his scheming had got wildly out of control. "I was the Sheikh," millionaire Gibson admitted. "I realised that Steve McClaren had to go, but I didn't want to pay the useless bugger any compensation." Gibson's elaborate plan involved discrediting Sven, thus opening the door for McClaren to step into his shoes as the new England boss. Gibson's plan came unstuck last weekend though after 'Boro were humiliated in a 7-0 drubbing against Arsenal. "I realised then that even the FA aren't stupid enough to take the useless git away from us." Gibson assured 'Boro fans that his sting operation, in conjuction with the News of the World, hadn't been that expensive. "Don't forget that it's going to cost us millions in compensation if we give McClaren the boot. I got the Sheik robes on the cheap from a fancy dress shop and after than it was just a case of booking a few flights to Dubai." Gibson said that the plan involved Sven digging a hole for himself that resulted in his position becoming untenable. "The hope then was that the FA would want Steve to take over from him. That's what I was desperately hoping for anyway. All the 'Boro fans have been chanting 'McClaren for England' and it would have been the perfect way to get shot of him without having to pay any compensation." Last night, Gibson was having dinner with McClaren and trying to patch things up. "Steve and I have a good understanding. I understand he's a rubbish manager, and he understands he's shortly for the chop," he told the waiter.

Is it possible to argue though that the money the trust provides (around £3m per year I believe) isn't enough to take us to the next level, where Hughes wants us to be? I'm grateful for the £3m per year, but I must admit when the trust was first set-up I was hoping for a figure of around £8-£10m per year, which would give us a chance of competing at the highest level. It seems to me that the board/the trustees have a choice: Do they want to dig as deep into their pockets as they can to give Hughes the financial backing he's looking for, enabling us to push for Europe, or do they want to be tight with the pennies and run the risk of losing Hughes to another club? The latter option would send us back to square one, our best players would want to leave and we'd be in a relegation battle again next season. A blind man on a galloping horse can see that we need a new striker. Our options up front aren't currently good enough and the lack of a top quality striker to go alongside Craig Bellamy might be the factor that hampers us from going to the next level, where Hughes wants to take the club. Before Hughes arrived in September 2004, we were in the bottom three with a demoralised and unfit squad of players that was heading for relegation - with the potential loss of around £20m per year from going down and the possibility that we would never recover from such a catastrophic blow. It's now up to the board to demonstrate their gratitude to Hughes for what he's done so far - and to dig deep to give him the backing in the transfer market that he's looking for.

Outrage as Ruth Kelly approves appointment of disgraced Swede Education Secretary Ruth Kelly arrived at her desk this morning to be confronted with further angry demands for her resignation following shock newpaper revelations that her department had approved the employment of Sven Goran Eriksson - described by one tabloid newspaper as "more dangerous to our children's futures than a staff common room full of sex offenders". As one enraged red-top put it: "The first priority has to be the protection of children. Some of the nation's kids have had nightmares after the tripe Sven dished up against Northern Ireland and Denmark. Imagine this: a world where your children's lives have been shattered by England's repeated failure to advance further than the World Cup semi finals; a world where a smirking Swede stuffs his face with champagne while negotiating a £5m-a-year deal to manage Aston Villa as kiddies the length and breadth of Britain are haunted by another ignominious penalty shoot-out exit." Kelly's protestations that she did not personally endorse Eriksson as England manager are likely to fall on deaf ears, with enraged parents dragged before news cameras to vent their spleen. As one father-of-two put it to a suitably fired-up Sky News team: "You expect your kids to be able to watch an England team play something at least approaching proper football. My eldest still hasn't recovered from the Brazil fiasco at the last World Cup. He still asks: 'Daddy, why doesn't that nice Mr Blair do something about that horrible man in the glasses who speaks in a funny voice? He gives me the creeps, daddy." At FA headquarters, meanwhile, a spokesman claimed that there had been a misunderstanding in communication between Eriksson and the Arab shiekh. "When Sven said that Rio Ferdinand was 'lazy sometimes' what he meant to say was that Rio is a greedy lazy @#/? who won't get out of bed for less than a hundred grand a week." Back in Westminster, as Ruth Kelly prepared to clear her desk in anticipation of being held fully responsible for Sven Goran Eriksson, one former minister said: "I think her position is untenable, to be honest. She's lost the trust of her Cabinet team." Sven Goran Eriksson was unavailable for comment this morning, but we were told by an assistant that he was tied up in bed with a blonde bird while rolling on a huge pile of money.

Hopefully someone will be able to send a video of Saturday evening's Lancashire derby to Alan Green. His opinion that Bolton are an ugly aggressive side will be reinforced. I thought Bolton could conceivably have been down to eight men in the match. Fadiga was booked for an ugly challenge and then threw the ball away - which some refs would have felt was as an offence that merited a further booking. Indeed, Steve Bennett sent off Danny Murphy at the Valley for doing the same thing against Arsenal on Boxing Day. I thought the worst tackle on the night was by the young abrasive Dubliner Joey O'Brien on Lucas Neill. Some refs would have seen O'Brien's lunge as a straight red rather than a booking. Big Sam complained afterwards about the refereeing of Mike Riley - but if anything I thought Riley was lenient towards Bolton. It seems that Sam wants to adopt a 'siege mentality' at the Reebok - berating officials and claiming that Bolton are being victimised by referees. The truth is that his Bolton side are not playing by the rules and are doing everything they can to rile the opposition on the pitch. Sam has been tipped as a future England manager - but his recent antics have indicated to me that he wouldn't be an appropriate choice. And I suspect some of the men in grey suits at the FA won't have been too happy with Allardyce's TV interview afterwards - where he read from a sheet of paper the number of yellow and red cards that Riley dished out.

Neither Sven nor the News of the World come out of this episode with any credit. The tactics of the NOTW were sneaky and underhand. Even Max Clifford has criticised the paper for the article and says that they have been guilty of a "major own-goal". "I think the article was very small-minded and the News of the World were crazy to run with it. I'm not surprised that many readers are taking Sven's side," says Max. "Many might consider not buying a paper that's putting unnecessary pressure on the manager with just five months to go to the World Cup. The whole thing could easily back fire on them. Unless they can add any major revelations about Sven that will affect the football side of things in their next edition, I really can't see how they can justify what they are doing. "Yes, it's good publicity, but in the long run what's the point of trying to unsettle the squad? If people start reacting against them it will be difficult for them to climb down," says Clifford. Andrew Davis, of the Independent England Supporters website said: "The whole thing reeks and looks like it's designed to cause maximum disruption. It's very badly timed. You can rest assured that if we won the World Cup the paper would be running page after page praising Eriksson." However, I wouldn't want Sven to be painted as an angel in all of this. Eriksson, after all, is the guy who stabbed Jack Walker in the back after shaking hands on a deal to come to Rovers. And before Ferguson performed a u-turn on his retirement, Sven was all set to walk out on England to join up with Man United. Sven continued to have secret meetings with Peter Kenyon after the chief executive moved to Chelsea. The FA rewarded Sven for this disloyalty by giving him a massive pay rise. And now it seems Eriksson is happy to undermine David O'Leary's position by discussing a move to Aston Villa. Telling a fake sheikh that Rio Ferdinand is "lazy" and that Wayne Rooney has a bad temper is hardly a huge revelation. Most of us knew that already, but Newcastle fans might be upset to hear Sven's comments about Michael Owen - who Eriksson claimed is unhappy at the club and only joined Newcastle for the money. "Sven has been naive and stupid," says Alan Hansen

More of what Blue Phil calls 'schadenfreude'..... Earlier in this thread Jim mentioned some stats for when Michael Owen plays for Newcastle. Without Owen in the side, they've had an appalling set of results this season. But when Owen has played for Newcastle, they've won the majority of matches. There were further chants of "Souness Out" at Craven Cottage yesterday. Just been reading a few messages on a Newcastle website - and the Geordie natives aren't happy. To quote one chap: "The 1-0 defeat leaves us sitting a pitiful 13th in the Premiership table with supposedly relegation-threatened sides as our closest rivals. Everton, Aston Villa and Fulham have all been under the relegation microscope this season and now we sit shoulder-to-shoulder with all three, nervously glancing at the teams below. This was our eighth league defeat on the road this season and no other Premiership side has lost more than that away from home so far - not even the clowns from wearside." "And now that the £16m get out of jail card cannot be played, there's no hiding place for Graeme Souness and his staff." "There's just nothing there - nothing to feed off, no hope that things will improve, nothing. Only more injuries to prolong Souness's plea to judge his side when it's fully fit. But it's no longer enough to simply blame the on-field demise of this club on the injury situation. There are more fundamental issues to be addressed in the areas of team selection, scouting, transfer policy and tactics." "At present we give the impression of not being up to scratch in any of those departments, with the consequence that we are regularly out-thought, out-fought and outplayed by mediocre opposition. The away fans could barely even raise themselves to provide decent backing to the team - sitting instead in a depressed silence, pummelled into submission by the sheer awfulness of the tripe we dare to call football." "Going back to the injury problems though, these weren't all random acts. There's certainly a large chunk of ill-fortune attached to those on the sick list, but also enough self-inflicted blows to level charges of ineptitude or worse against those current running the show. Bringing players back from injury too early, dubious acquisitions and a lack of interest in the club as a whole all tell the tale of a man under pressure for instant results." "Souness has been shown to be a short-term fix that failed to address the heart of the problem. Some of his mission has been accomplished - notably the rooting out of dressing room miscreants - but regardless of the how and why, the reality is that this job has defeated him. There seems to be no end to the circle of under-achievement. Something has to be done to break out of that, improve our league position and remove the indifference of many supporters to their team."

He's exactly 6ft - and a slim 11st 7lbs, Rev. I've always wanted a 6ft blonde with slender legs.... I agree with shillito15 though that Pedersen needs to do much more in games. Yes, he scores some cracking goals, but at the highest level you need to do more than that. I wouldn't want MGP to be sold though because it would send out the wrong message to the players and to the supporters. It would signal a lack of ambition and would fuel further disenchantment among fans. When Sparky first took over, Pedersen was dropped from the team for more than 3 months and didn't feature in any matches between October and December 2004 last season. He was brought back into the side for the FA Cup 3rd round tie against Cardiff in January 2005 - where he scored - and has been a regular in the team since. The fact that he was dropped for more than 3 months after Sparky took over indicates that Hughes felt that a lot of work needed to be done on the training ground to bring him up to Premiership level. While MGP clearly has a talent for scoring spectacular goals, he needs to continue working hard on all other aspects of the game - becoming more involved in midfield, improving his running with the ball and delivering better quality corners and crosses from the by-line. Both he and Emerton can be frustrating players at times. Good wide players can be a key to success and at the moment both of them aren't consistent enough.

Well it seems as if he's been close to the cliff a couple of times now Simon, but on each occasion he's done just enough to avoid being pushed - for the time being. As Frosty says, if Shearer hadn't scored late in the second half today, I think Souey would have been gone. A couple of weeks before Christmas, Newcastle were drawing 1-1 at home to Aston Villa and David O'Leary's side were awarded a penalty with two minutes to go. Gareth Barry (rumoured to be a Newcastle transfer target) blazed the ball high over the bar. Had the penalty gone in, Shepherd may well have given Souness the push. There was another narrow escape for Souey last week, when Lee Clark's injury time equaliser at home to 'Boro saved his bacon, with the crowd baying for blood. Chants of "Souness Out" were ringing around St James' Park after Hasselbaink put 'Boro 2-1 up. I gather, reading the match reports, that Mansfield, just outside the relegation zone of League Two, created the better chances in today's match and were unlucky to lose against the Geordies. According to the BBC's match report: "Mansfield outplayed and outfought the Premiership side for much of the game." Well there was no schadenfreude on my part, Phil, to the news last week of Michael Owen's unfortunate injury. I wouldn't wish any injuries on others, but I must admit, that like Jan, I do find myself enjoying Souness's discomfort. Primarily because the last 18 months at Rovers under his management were a shambles. They say that football is a game of two halves, and for the first half of Souey's reign at Ewood, it's true that he generally did a very good job for us. (If one ignores the Grabbi debacle for a moment - one of the most disastrous buys in Premiership history.) Souness got us promoted and won the Worthington Cup. But in the last 18 months, the wheels came off spectacularly - and that's where my main gripe lies. This was a man who nearly sent my football club crashing into obvlivion. 10 home Premiership defeats at Ewood during the 2003/04 season - with some truly horrendous performances at home. The goals from Jon Stead late in the season fortunately saved us from relegation and disaster. I doubt that Rovers would have been able to recover from what would have been a catastrophic blow of relegation and under Souness, we started off the 2004/05 season in exactly the same poor vein. We were in the bottom three when Hughes took over and looked firmly like a relegation team. As Hughes himself said: "Within a few days of arriving, I realised the team needed to be a lot fitter." A damning indictment of Mr Souness - who was failing in his duty of preparing the team properly. Our team spirit was poor, with bust-ups, training ground squabbles and players being ignored by the man in charge. Garry Flitcroft learnt that he was being stripped of the Rovers captaincy through the media. The team was a shambles, tactically poor and unfit, with players being played out of position. Dominic Matteo as a left winger. Square pegs in round holes. The manager tried to blame "lady luck" for his own tactical ineptitude and during our relegation battle he was busy swanning off to the Sky Sports studios in London to appear as a pundit, pontificating about Chelsea and Arsenal's deficiencies when he couldn't pick the right team at Rovers. So that's where my scorn lies. He was a man, as I said, who was responsible for nearly crashing my football club into oblivion - a position from which we may never have recovered if Mark Hughes hadn't came along at the right time and turned things around. Thank You Freddy for taking this man away from us. Yes, Souey got us promoted and won us the League cup. For that I'm grateful. But I'm also disdainful of his last 18 months with us and I wanted him to fail badly at Newcastle - which is exactly what he has done so far. Newcastle were a club who had finished in the top 5 of the Premiership in each of Bobby Robson's last three seasons. Freddy Shepherd though believed that finishing 5th in his final season and missing out on the Champions League was "unacceptable". Under Souness, Newcastle have become a mediocre mid-table side who struggle to beat Mansfield. Part of me wants Souey to get his P45 at Newcastle. The other part of me wants the shambles at St James' Park to continue for as long as possible. Anyway, I've got a bottle of champagne in the fridge ready for when Souey does eventually depart. And if Jan wanted to share the bottle with me, she would be most welcome.