DE.

Honestly I don't think Miro needs her. What would concern me about that is AEW trying to come off as WWE-lite. I wouldn't be averse to introducing Lana a lot further down the line, when the Miro character needs a fresh boost, but right now he's doing well after a lukewarm start, so I'd leave him as he is. On a personal level because he was a real dickhead last year when indie wrestlers were struggling during the pandemic. As a wrestler he's fine but needs to work outside of WWE to become a better rounded performer. The left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing, I guess. Smackdown creative must be banging their heads against the wall. I don't think he's being released, but something weird is going on with him for sure. He's been off TV for a long time now and keeps posting strange, cryptic tweets on Twitter. Not sure if it's a mental health thing, an illness or something else, but it's a shame he's not around as he's a really interesting character and a good performer. Vince has still done his best to neuter everything unique about him since the NXT call up, though, so maybe it's better he stays away. It's been rumoured for a couple of years now, no idea if there's any truth to it. If there was any time that everything points towards a sale, though, it's now. Have to admit I've always believed Vince would die owning the company, but maybe something is forcing his hand? WWE not owned by the McMahons would be really bizarre, but I don't think a new owner could do any worse as far as Raw is concerned. Agree, this is why I think Braun would benefit from going somewhere like Japan to hone his craft. He's only ever known the WWE style and it shows. He could be great, but he needs seasoning elsewhere.

Great news to see JRC signed up to a new contract, just hope the injuries clear up for him next season.

Japan does love a big Gaijin monster - just a case of whether Braun could handle the way wrestling works over there, I guess.

I'm with you on Braun. He had a good run in 2017/18, particularly during his feud with Roman, but has become less and less interesting since then. His last feud with Shane McMahon was embarrassingly bad, although that is more on creative than Braun. It's still strange that they terminated him though, considering he has the kind of beef Vince can usually only dream about. I was watching Black's twitch stream post-release and it's incredible how much thought he put into all of his promos and matches, even down to details like colour and lighting. The guy is seriously switched on and as you say, it's criminal how he was used. I know Vince Russo gets shit on a lot these days, and often rightfully so, but I guarantee if Black had been around during the Attitude Era Russo would have listened to his ideas and gave his character memorable and interesting things to do. Everyone remembers acts like the Brood and 98-99 Undertaker. Black has just been at WWE in the wrong era, unfortunately. AEW could do huge things with him though, and I hope they do. Black and Riott would be the two I would pick up if I was AEW. Murphy could do great things in Impact/NJPW. Not sure about Braun. He might just sit it out for a while and come back to WWE on a much lower deal. He strikes me as a WWE lifer.

So apparently the third hour of Raw got a 1.1 rating, which is abysmally low. Something like 400,000 viewers switched off after the second hour (keeping in mind the viewership was low as it is). Granted it was a holiday in the US, but even on previous holidays their ratings/viewership has never sunk that low. I mean, I get it as Raw is garbage and I'm shocked over a million people still watch such a terrible show, but if WWE are even starting to turn away their core viewers then they need to realise there is a huge problem.

Some surprising WWE releases today. - Braun Strowman - Aleister Black - Ruby Riott - Lana - Santana Garrett - Buddy Murphy The first two especially are proper WTF. Strowman is a main event talent who only signed a new contract a couple of years ago through to 2023, whilst Black literally just begun an angle after a month plus of vignettes last week. Whilst I don't care much for Strowman as a person, WWE missed the boat on him massively back in 2017. They should have put the belt on him when he was hugely over, didn't, and he's pretty much floundered since then. Black is a unique wrestler with huge upside, arguably the most interesting and well-rounded performer since the Undertaker when it comes to a 'darker' persona (Bray is a great promo but I've always found his matches extremely boring). It's no longer a surprise when WWE screws up what should be a surefire thing, but I do wonder how Triple H feels about it. He does such a great job building these performers up in NXT only to watch Vince completely wreck them when they get to the main roster. It must be disheartening, at the very least. Ruby Riott deserved much better than she got. Riott Squad should have been tag champions at some point and Ruby could have held her own with the likes of Charlotte, Becky, Bayley, Sasha etc. Another real talent wasted, but hopefully AEW will sign her ASAP to beef up their women's division. I actually have faith in AEW doing something useful with her. Lana, meh. Not a great promo and not a great wrestler. She was a throwback to an era when women just had to look hot and not actually be any good in the ring. With that said she played the manager role with Rusev well - she just had nothing to offer after that. Personally if I was Tony Khan I wouldn't be rushing to bring Lana in. The Miro character doesn't need her, and I don't think she brings enough to the table as a manager or a wrestler to be worth signing. Could be useful to a company like Impact or the NWA, though. Santana Garrett - I don't know anything about her. Buddy Murphy - who would have thought during the storyline with Seth Rollins and the Mysterios that Murphy would be released less than a year later? Everything seemed to be on the up for him, and then suddenly he was taken off TV and eventually released. Makes you wonder how people at WWE stay motivated - even if you do a great job and seem to be in a good place, there's absolutely zero guarantee that within a few months you won't be out the door - for no real reason other than "budget cuts" for a company that has made more profit in the past two years than ever in its history.

I was reading an article the other day and was surprised to see Grabbi's name pop up. Moise Kean was talking about him. Had no idea Grabbi was Juventus' under-15 coach. Sounds like he's much better at that than he was as a player!

Just finished AEW Double or Nothing. An excellent show, really really good. It was nice for a decent live crowd to finally be at an AEW event again, and it definitely made a difference.

Put a tenner on Chelsea earlier as I had a feeling City would choke. Really interesting game, Pep did a Mowbray and tried to be too clever for his own good. Tuchel kept it simple and his team looked more comfortable as a result.

The kind of structure Brentford have - which has produced consistent results year after year and resulted in them ultimately playing in the Premier League for the first time in their history - is so far beyond Venky's that it's depressing to even think about. Compare the dysfunctional mess we call a 'structure' to Brentford's model and it is night and day - the difference between an owner who genuinely wants the club to succeed and owners who are content with just keeping the lights on and paying the bills.

Can't say Brentford didn't deserve it. Not a single shot on target for Swansea and they just didn't look up for it at all.

Swansea haven't turned up at all yet.

I would assume that usually statistics are compiled after a shortlist has been drawn up or a suitable player has been identified as a potential transfer, in the same way you'd do before sending scouts out to look at them. I doubt there are many if any professional clubs blindly running general statistics on all players for transfer purposes. Possibly such systems exist at bigger clubs where money is less of an object and they are looking to snap up younger players from lower leagues showing potential, but at the vast majority of clubs requests for data will be pinpointed on specific targets which the club would already have identified as being within their wage/transfer budget. Otherwise, as you say, compiling those statistics would largely be a waste of time and resource. There are obviously human elements that data can't account for, though, which is why in-person scouting and face-to-face meetings still exist. Data is really just a foundation to help decide what actions to take going forward.

Bias is one of the biggest problems when it comes to data analysis and is often unconscious, which is why typically there are teams involved checking to ensure unconscious bias isn't clouding any conclusions or shaping the way the data has been modelled. With that said it's also not uncommon for data to be purposefully manipulated to suit a specific viewpoint, particularly when funding or similar issues are in play. Not saying Andy is guilty of that for the record, just a general point to consider when looking at any data analysis.

Problem is, when there's no real pressure from the top it usually leads to mediocre performances from all below, unless you have an extremely driven manager and set of players. I think it's obvious we don't. Mowbray and the team being under no pressure, as performances seemingly have no bearing on job security, means mid-table at best and a relegation battle at worst - and let's face it, under this lot it wouldn't be much of a battle.

The idea of us paying more due to the international call up may have some merit to it. If there was any significant clause like that in the BB transfer Rovers probably thought they wouldn't have to pay it out for years, if ever.

I thought Mowbray had some idea of what he wanted at the beginning of the season, when we started off with our counter-attacking 4-3-3. Problem is it only worked against poor teams that didn't realise they needed to defend against us (and keep 11 men on the pitch). The better teams still beat us, and when the poorer teams realised we couldn't break down a solid defence our goose was basically cooked for this season as Tony had no Plan B. Instead he just resorted to a messy, possession-based smorgasbord of our past, stodgy tactics which made the first month of the season seem like some kind of collective hallucination.

So does that mean Brereton becomes the second Chilean to play for Rovers? I wonder if he speaks Spanish. Better be brushing up on it if not!

Honestly Chaddy he probably didn't have to - I doubt there was ever any initiative from India to remove Mowbray, Waggott or anybody else. I think people at the club saw the taps seemingly being turned off, Mowbray's general demeanour (probably expected the sack), took our performance this season into account and assumed he must be going. After a few years of relative stability it's maybe easy for some to forget we are still ultimately run by people who have absolutely no idea what they are doing and haven't learned a thing in ten years. If he is sacked it'll probably be part way into the beginning of next season, with pre-season done and the transfer window already shut, meaning the latest cheapo option off the scrapheap is given a much more difficult task as a result.

IMV it just shows, sadly, that even the people at Ewood (who a lot of this speculation probably came from) have absolutely no clue what is really going on. I doubt there was ever any intention to remove Mowbray last week or any time recently. It was just people at the club putting 2 and 2 together, whilst seemingly forgetting we are run by people who have no idea what they are doing.

I don't see why Arma would go along with a new deal if PL clubs are genuinely interested (or even Championship clubs who actually have a chance of getting promoted). Worst case scenario he's out of contract next summer, leaves on a free and gets a hefty signing on bonus and probably higher wages too as clubs no longer have to concern themselves with a transfer fee.

His Dark Side of the Ring episode is definitely worth a watch.

Spending was halted for Bowyer in summer 2015 - wasn't sacked until October. Turning off the taps alone is far from a good indicator of the manager leaving imminently.

If Mowbray is staying, as appears to be the case, then I fully expect Bennett to end up clinging on as well. I hope not but I have zero faith in this manager or our owners to make any decision that benefits the club at this point. The lot of them seem to be actively attempting to regress us as quickly as possible.

So next season will probably be the second season Bennett has been relegated with us, then. What a legacy. At least one of Lowe's relegations was from the PL.