Because there always has to be at least two players not playing in their natural positions.

Gallagher is injured as well?

Smackdown really hasn't been any good since that 2016-2017 period when they were on fire. Talking Smack was great too. Since then downhill and now total shit. No idea how it draws 2.5m viewers every week. Must be a lot of bored people on Friday nights in the States. Honestly the only time I've found Sheamus interesting was when he feuded with and then teamed with Cesaro. He bores me to tears otherwise and nothing's changed in his latest singles run. Cesaro will never be pushed as long as Vince is around. Should go to AEW where he'd be properly used.

I think it was between a 3pm and 5.30pm game which might be why it isn't easy to find.

Correct. Bowyer was simply unable to operate in a market where his budget was severely restricted and brought in a lot of dross as a result. In fairness to him I think most managers would have struggled in that situation, save for proper long-in-the-tooth types like McCarthy and Warnock who have been there, done it and know where to look even on a shoestring budget.

Pretty much. The reasons for keeping Mowbray are for the most part completely logical and understandable. We know what the owners are like and nobody could surely trust them to replace Mowbray competently. On the other hand it was these owners who hired TM in the first place, and if he is considered an improvement on those who came before him then there's an argument the owners have the aptitude or luck to once again hire somebody who improves on their predecessors. It's unlikely based on their track record but still possible.

I don't think the Brereton transfer is necessarily as strange as is sometimes made out. Obviously £7m for a youngster with potential is practically unheard of for a club at our level and with our finances, however there is some logic behind it. Young, English and in the current climate would go for a lot more than what we paid if the transfer worked out in any way. Obviously thus far it has not and signs are that it never will. I doubt Mowbray was the primary force behind signing Brereton, but I'm sure he had the final say in whether the signing went ahead or not, which puts the responsibility solely on his shoulders. I don't think Brereton was "forced" on Mowbray although perhaps was encouraged by certain parties (if Mowbray and Brereton's agent is the same, as I'm sure I read somewhere on here, then the link there is obvious enough).

I think unquestionably Mowbray would be viewed differently had we stayed up in 16/17 and things had then played out in a similar fashion to present day. I imagine the feeling would be more similar to how it was during Bowyer's final days, although Mowbray would still have credit in the bank from saving us from what looked like certain relegation under Coyle. Bowyer also saved the club from a perceived spiral after a disastrous 12/13 season, though, so the comparisons still aren't too far from the mark. It's difficult when you start playing with 'what ifs' though as it's entirely possible our signings and progress would be markedly different had we not been relegated. Maybe we'd be doing better now, or maybe we'd be doing worse. Would the likes of Dack or Armstrong be here? Would Brereton have been signed and become an albatross around the manager's neck? Would Gallagher have returned to us in the 17/18 season instead on loan or permanently for the same or a lesser fee? Would the likes of Travis and Nyambe have broken into the first team as they have done recently? Would Raya have become number 1 and eventually been sold? Chances are the likes of Bell, Smallwood and Rothwell wouldn't be here at all. There are a lot of questions there. So many that I don't think you can logically begin to realistically assess a likely scenario as so many things could have changed.

If the discussion over Mowbray/Bowyer spilled over 2 or 3 pages then yes it would be moved to a more appropriate place, but if it's contained to a handful of posts then it isn't a problem. It's as simple as that really. If you want to steer the topic back to the game then by all means do so, if you have a problem with the discussion taking place then as aforementioned the mods are available to be contacted via PM.

There isn't one.

Can't disagree with anything you say there, although I think it's also fair to take Bowyer's inexperience into account. Mowbray had already been in management for 13 years when he joined us. By comparison we were Bowyer's first real management job. As much as I agree we underachieved as a team with Bowyer in charge, I believe the manager himself actually overachieved somewhat relative to his experience and taking into account the dysfunctional way our club is run as a whole.

It's hard to say because at the time a lot of our outgoings were tied up in payments to players whose contracts we had severed. Etuhu, Murphy, Best, all the Portugeezers, etc. The likes of Hanley, Duffy, Rhodes, Gestede, Evans, Conway and Cairney were likely on a decent wedge. All brought in for relative pittance or nothing at all though. In terms of transfer fees Bowyer spent Duffy was probably the biggest? Can't remember exactly how much he cost off the top of my head but I seem to recall it was around £2m. Rhodes was before Bowyer became first team manager, and from recollection the likes of Cairney and Evans were both under £1m. We found some real bargains back then.

Mowbray has more or less gotten us back into the position we were in under Bowyer before Venky's pulled the rug out from underneath him. A squad somewhat unbalanced that doesn't play great football but can grind out enough results to finish comfortably mid-table if never really challenge for the playoffs. I think Bowyer had a better team overall (with less money) and that was reflected in slightly higher league positions than TM has achieved (assuming we finish lower than 8th/9th this time around). At the time the general concensus was that Bowyer had run his race and we needed to replace him to move forward. Obviously Venky's made the wrong choices and ended up relegating us with Owen Coyle instead. History could very easily repeat itself so personally I'm very wary of TM departing. With that said my ambition for the club remains the same as it was back then, so I'm at the point where I'm wondering if TM can realistically get us into genuine contention for promotion. I think probably not, but am I confident in our owners appointing the right person even if Mowbray left? No, I'm not. I imagine it would be chaos, confusion and disaster again. It's a tough situation to be in as on the one hand my ambitions for the club are beyond what I believe Mowbray can achieve, but at the same time I'm well aware that if he leaves we're more likely to spiral downward than push on - because if there's one thing Venky's have proven it's that they don't take the managerial position seriously and will always opt for the cheap route. Sometimes you get half-decent managers in the likes of Bowyer and Mowbray, other times you get a Kean or a Coyle (although one could argue Kean was not cheap at all retrospectively). What you never get is a manager that will get the club punching above its weight, which is realistically what we are going to require in order to get promoted. It's just a shit situation and I don't see it being resolved until Venky's are gone, and right now it seems like they are going nowhere.

In fairness considering we're having to resort to playing JRC out of position in the Dack role he probably would be straight into the side at present purely due to injuries. Granted Mowbray normally has an incubation period for new signings but I get the feeling much like Cunningham earlier in the season he may have had to adopt a 'needs must' approach with Maddison with Dack, Holtby and Rothwell all on the sidelines.

Mowbray has plenty of positive points as a manager imo, the issue is that he seems unable or unwilling to improve on his flaws. The strikers on the wings experiment being the most obvious one, along with a questionable at best recruitment record which has unfortunately left us with some major work to do in the summer just to stand still let alone progress.

Hold on there, I was responding to somebody saying we would be in the top six if not for injuries. I never said I expected it.

Something often conveniently forgotten! TM has never had us in the top six during his entire time here. Not even for one match.

Even if we are it's only impressive as a statement without context, as those five seasons include when we were under embargo and had all of our decent players sold, a season where we spent 7 months under Owen Coyle's management (still with no money to spend), a season in League 1 and last season - and from memory we're practically identical in terms of points for that.

Let's keep this on topic guys, it's about the Championship not Chaddy! Mods are available via PM for any genuine concerns over behaviour and the report button can also be used to direct us to any posts that people feel are overstepping the mark.

Yeah, but since TM has arrived we haven't really sold anybody of significance. I don't know how much truth there was in Dack being the sacrificial lamb in January or the summer, but during the last period of Jan 19 - Jan 20 we've essentially splashed £12m on transfer fees with only Raya's £3m sale as a return, although that fee was likely gobbled up by a combination of Tosin and Cunningham's wages and loan fees. I'm still not convinced FFP is as big of an issue as is currently being touted. Up until last month it wasn't being talked about at all by Tony or anybody else at the club - I've previously linked an interview from September regarding the upcoming window where it literally wasn't mentioned once. So why all of a sudden has it become this huge barrier? Was nobody paying attention until January?

I'd go as far as to say Lambert is doing a genuinely bad job there to be honest. I appreciate he inherited a bad situation from Paul Hurst but most managers with anything about them at least improve a team slightly if not by much. Mowbray inherited a pretty shitty situation from Coyle but still improved us almost instantly and we were ultimately unlucky to go down. I believe Lambert did no better than Hurst when he took over for the remainder of last season. For Ipswich to be where they are and in the form they're in right now is appalling - League 1 is very poor so there can't be any excuses really.

We can spend roughly £13m per season via FFP. We literally spent a third of our entire FFP budget on two players who have flopped and we'd be no worse off without. It might be simple but it's also true.

Well if we hadn't splashed £12m on two absolute duds we'd be in a much healthier position financially, so no I wouldn't say it's much of an oversimplification at all.

Yes you're right, they did make one loan signing, so more achieved than us!

https://www.eadt.co.uk/sport/o-neill-on-ipswich-s-quiet-january-transfer-window-1-6502497 There's quite an extensive interview here from their general manager of football operations which goes into detail, but basically very similar excuses to the ones we got from Mowbray and Waggott this time around. Domino effect, valuations not being right, etc.