Indeed he has, but I would guess our overall transfer/wage budget still ranks somewhere in the middle of the division. It's something a better manager could get us into the playoffs with, but I don't think TM ever will.

Tony's penchant for overloading the team with strikers has been a consistent trait throughout his career - which is odd when you consider he played as a defender. I'm struggling to think of many permanent defensive additions he's brought in that have improved us. Raya, Lenihan, Nyambe and Mulgrew were already here. Downing I suppose you could count as he did make a good contribution, but other than that I'm struggling to think of anybody.

With our budget I don't think we'll ever have a squad that is top six in the division for ability. This represents a problem as I don't see Mowbray as an overachieving manager, just one who meets basic expectations. If we want to get promoted I do think we would need to change manager, but can understand the reluctance to do so as Venky's do not have a track record of appointing managers with the ability to overachieve.

I believe Kean and Eastwood both came in during the season (when Robinson was injured, maybe?) so it's a somewhat fair comparison. I don't think Raya or Fielding are significantly better than Walton so I'd still like us to do better than that. I'm not confident of Tony being able to do so, though.

It's sad to see how Rothwell has regressed this season. Being relegated to the bench seemed to knock his confidence at the start of the season and he doesn't seem to have ever really recovered. Either that or his performances at the end of the previous season were just a purple patch and what we're seeing now is his actual ability. Either way it's been a very disappointing season for Rothwell.

Have to agree, at most I think he'll be a 6-10 goals a season striker, which means we'll need more goals from the rest of the team.

I fear we've dropped a major bollock with this one. The manager does not help when he plays him out wide, but he's not that impressive in the middle either. It might just be that the system we play doesn't suit him, but we aren't getting £5m back for him so we either need to find a way to make it work or accept a likely significant loss (as nobody will pay him the wages we do either), move him on and look elsewhere.

Remembering Jake Kean and Simon Eastwood the answer is yes, they coud. I would much rather we look for an experienced goalkeeper than try to promote one from the academy earlier than we should. Walton is just an average Championship keeper - generally OK but prone to mistakes. If Brighton want him back it won't concern me, but I would be concerned if we ended up with an Academy keeper between the sticks next season.

An unfortunate reality check. Glad to see the back of Wigan after the dire 0-0 in December where Dack got injured, and now this. We played some pretty football at times today but had zero end product. Perhaps not surprising considering the starting line-up, which was concerning. If Armstrong is struggling fot fitness or something else I hope it is sorted soon, as we can't rely on Gallagher, Holtby and Brereton to provide us with goals - and for the record the latter two were decent today, but they aren't goalscorers.

In fairness I would be stunned if we went up with this team. There are a few legit gems but they are surrounded by a lot of inconsistent players and some genuinely poor ones, and we don't have the kind of manager who overachieves - just one who more or less keeps a team where it should be based on the talent available.

Subs don't seem to have helped us today at all. We seem to have been noticeably worse since Tony started making them. A shame as we needed some fresh impetus on the pitch, but I feel we brought off some players we shouldn't have. With that said for all Holtby's talent he rarely seems to complete much more than 60 minutes which is a problem.

We're no great shakes either unfortunately, an inconsistent team in a poor division. We're close to the playoffs simply because so many teams are in the same boat. I'm not going to crucify Walton for one mistake as he's been decent for the vast majority of the season, but as I said many months ago I personally wouldn't bring him in as guaranteed no. 1. I still think we need slightly better if we have serious playoff aspirations.

I think he's more stubborn than slow. When push comes to shove Mowbray can change things around and it normally works, but he's so bloody-minded in his approach that it takes a lot of pressure before he finally concedes and makes an alteration.

Tony needs to have a serious think about SG once the season is over. The way he's been used this season hasn't been effective enough, Statistically not a disaster but still far from what we need. Mowbray needs to figure out how to utilise whatever strengths Gallagher has and how best to incoprorate that into our starting eleven. As it stands the lad looks frequently lost and ineffective when he's on the pitch, especially when he's asked to play a wide role he clearly isn't suited to.

We had a rough start and some scary moments towards the end of the half, but have been fairly comfortable overall. We're struggling to create any decent chances in open play - our best efforts have come from a couple of direct free kicks. Bennett & Gallagher are by far the worst performers out there, really struggling today. Brereton and Nyambe have been our best attacking threats, with Holtby having some nice touches as well. We need to get Armstrong on the pitch and hope he has his shooting boots on, as this Wigan defence has gaps to be exploited. Our does too, though, so we need to keep them as far away from our penalty box as possible.

He seems to think converted strikers can do the job instead... which has largely not been the case. Arma perhaps the only success story as far as that philosophy is concerned.

Looking a lot better now after a shaky start. Just lacking any major goal throat which is where we miss the likes of Graham, Dack and Armstrong.

Sadly it looks like NWA Powerrr is done. A lot of releases recently and Zicky Dice (their TV champ) has also been granted his release. With Dave Lagana resigning due to the Speaking Out movement it's not looking good.

Yeah for sure, it's amazing that Joey Ryan's schtick was never really questioned and anybody who did was called boring or stuck in the past. At the very least shitty, creepy gimmicks like that should now be - to quote Matt Hardy - obsolete. The fact Gallagher went straight past suspension to outright sacked is what makes me think there's more evidence to his case than the others.

I agree on Joey Ryan, I always thought the gimmick was weird and creepy but I guess the assumption was that the performers had agreed to being a part of his act, whereas the accusers didn't. The thing with Gallagher is that a fair few low level NXT UK guys have been involved in this but none have been released yet. For Gallagher to be so quickly dismissed suggests to me there is something more to his story. Perhaps he admitted to it or at least indicated he did something he shouldn't have. Either way I don't think we'll be seeing him wrestle again any time soon.

Yeah but there have been other WWE guys accused and none of them fired, only Jack Gallagher. Reading between the lines that has to say something. Nah his gimmick plays on the gay aspect but he's straight and judging by the tsunami of accusations a serial sexual predator who has hidden behind his gimmick to act like a creep. You can dismiss one or two accusations as misunderstandings or attempts at defaming him, but there are so many at his point - most made by female wrestlers who have no obvious reason to lie - that it's very unlikely he's being set up. The guy is just a piece of shit, full stop. Of course every case has to be judged on its merits, though. The Matt Riddle accusation, for example, was made by a woman who had been stalking and harrassing him for two years. That's not to say it isn't true because we don't know, but it's the kind of accusation that requires serious investigation by the authorities before anybody makes any judgements.

Jack Gallagher & Jimmy Havoc I believe have both been accused of rape with substancial evidence. Gallagher was straight up fired by WWE which I think tells you enough. Havoc has gone to some kind of rehab facility and I believe has basically admitted to his actions. Dude is well known for being a horrible human being.

There have been some guys speaking up as well (largely talking about other men being the abusers, though) but yeah the Cornette stuff was treated more like "ha ha" than outrage. With that said the Cornette stuff is nowhere near as clear cut as the allegations against the likes of Joey Ryan, David Starr, Jimmy Havoc, Jack Gallagher, Dave Crist, etc. These dudes have basically been outed as legit sexual predators/rapists which is seriously fucked up. Sammy Guevara has also been suspended from AEW for a comment on a podcast from 4 years ago where he joked that he wanted to rape Sasha Banks. An incredibly stupid and immature thing to say but it's weird to see that comment getting more attention than the actual stories of rape and sexual abuse.

I should note that the Cornette stuff is pretty flaky and far from proven.

He already has - he and his wife were accused of sexual harrassment by some people who were in OVW. The jist of it was the Cornette liked to watch his wife with other guys, and they would pressure guys into being with her, threatening to essentially blackball them if they didn't go along with it.