Tony Mowbray chose those attackers though. He decided to put 35 year old Downing on the wing ahead of Rothwell who was on fire at the end of last season. He chose to put Gallagher ahead of Graham despite the latter being our most consistent goalscorer for three or four seasons now. Stupid decisions which have once again cost us.

A draw would have been a poor result, a loss is absolutely pathetic. Mowbray should be ashamed of that starting line up, particularly the omission of Rothwell which IMO is absolutely disgraceful. Just shows Mowbray is the same cowardly manager he was throughout most of last season. Hilarious (not really) that he managed to crush optimism an hour before the match started with his team selection. I'm sure we'll get the usual defence of "it was the first game, weird results happen", etc, but this isn't a weird result. This is just typical Rovers under Tony Mowbray. Overcautious, turgid, bumbling, and defensively shambolic. 90 minutes in and we're already at our 2 goals a game average conceded. Excellent job. Defenders are coming. Would appreciate a timeframe on that Tony as judging by today's efforts by the usual suspects at the back reinforcements are needed ASAP, not at some time in the distant future after we're done overloading midfield and attack to the point where players like Rothwell, Graham and Brereton are on the subs bench. It's what I expected but I'm still fuming. Not sure if it's obvious or not.

I'm glad I didn't!

Not sure how motivated he's going to be at this point. Seems like he's going to have to score five goals and assist another five in the next 20 minutes to convince Tony he's a first teamer. Even then he'd probably be back on the bench next week.

Now that Charlton have generously helped us get back into the game let's bring Rothwell and Nyambe on and get going.

The posted team/formation looked very similar to me. The same old turgid 4-2-3-1 with a few new names.

Well at least it's not a HT 0-0 at Ewood. 45 minutes into the new season and we've already conceded a goal, against a newly promoted side at home no less. When are the defenders coming again? Good thing for Charlton Downing is in the team ahead of Rothwell, otherwise we might have actually scored a goal at home in the first half. Might want to bring the lad on in the second half Tony, he can actually play. I would say haul Bennett off as well but we know that is never happening. He won Jason Lowe's immunity card in the 2017 summer raffle so he's golden.

I bet Tony has had more sleepless nights thinking about about dropping Evans than dropping Rothwell. In his mind that's probably the biggest gamble he's taken today.

Well it won't be Leutwiler, Evans or DG so take your pick from the remainder of the bench... probably Buckley if I had to guess.

I doubt it. Imo Boro knew that too which is why they let him go. His natural talent is obvious but if he can only play once in a blue moon it just doesn't matter.

That's exactly was it was unfortunately. I assume Chapman is still injured or unfit?

Gutted for Rothwell, he deserves to be starting. Unfortunately his manager is a coward. "More defensive cover" against Charlton at home ffs. Still a good chance of winning today but if that's our preferred 11 we can forget top six. That defence is an abomination.

Seems inevitable at this point that it's going to be swept under the rug. EFL will probably justify it as something like a goodwill gesture to get the new owners in and keep the club going. Even though FV are coming in well aware that Bolton are highly likely to be relegated again anyway.

Yep, after Kean Venky's have repeatedly gone for the cheap, easy option and it has cost us. In fact I'd wager we've lost more financially than we would have if we'd hired a decent, proven manager, especially considering our relegation to League 1 in 16/17. Lambert is the exception to the rule but he wasn't around for very long. I get the feeling it might have been the same with Warnock tbh, but I doubt we would have been relegated if he had been at the helm during the 16/17 season.

Bury are claiming they have funds in place and technically they seem to have more senior players available than Bolton, so I wonder what the sticking point is there?

ROH are in a dire state at the moment. It's pretty sad to see. They banked their future on the Elite/NJPW connection, and now obviously the Elite have started AEW and brought in a ton of indy talent to fill their roster, whilst NJPW are realising they can book and promote their own events in the States without ROH and still make the same if not more money. It seriously wouldn't surprise me to see ROH out of business in a couple of years, especially considering competition from the likes of AEW, MLW, NJPW's american expansion and obviously WWE's regular sweeps of independent talent to compete in NXT. It's going to be a tough time coming up for them.

I can forgive a penalty when it's saved, generally, but there's no excuse for a striker to miss the target from 12 yards imo. Especially one on the type of wage Assombalonga is on!

Cracking opening fixture, highly entertaining although neither defence covered themselves in glory. Luton will be chuffed with that result regardless, showed that they are no pushovers and well up for the challenge. Assambalonga's penalty miss undoubtedly the turning point, it would surely have been over if he'd converted that.

Terrible pen from Assombalonga!

Luton showing there why having a poor defence and a dodgy keeper is so costly!

Unfortunately our default position in the first half of games seems to be contain and keep it tight. Which would be fine if we didn't concede so many second half goals, particularly away from home. The tactic Mowbray has seems to work quite well at Ewood - although the amount of HT 0-0's at home last season was a little bit ridiculous - but it clearly doesn't work away from home so we need to work out a better away to collect points on our travels.

I'm curious as to how their first match at home is going to go. I get the feeling if tomorrow's match was at the Breezeblock it wouldn't be on - safety standards, etc. They're somewhat fortunate that they're away from home and don't have to worry about any of that stuff yet.

Completely agree. We need to come out all guns blazing, get in their faces and make them sweat. I'm skeptical as to whether this will actually happen though as it is not the Mowbray way. I mean, we should have been ready to come out and hammer Southend in our first game of 17-18 - much stronger squad, some feelings of injustice over being relegated with 51 points, bought the best player in the division in Dack, etc. Didn't happen though. I'm not sure I ever remember us coming out against any team and going for the jugular under Mowbray. Possibly against Rotherham at Ewood in 17-18 when we won 2-0? I remember being very impressed with our first half performance in that one. Then there was Bury at home in February where we came out looking like we'd been on the piss the night before and got booed off at half time. Much better second half though!

This part is the most ridiculous: Do you need a bit of help from the owner? Do you need more funds to have a real crack at this season? PL: Of course we do. We've brought in two free transfers and one loan. Maybe one short-term (Wilson). You don't need to be Einstein to see that. Is that enough to get out of the division? PL: No, it's not. Absolutely not. --- Nice. Am sure the Ipswich players appreciate hearing that! Also... --- Are you feeling the pressure of getting Ipswich up? Be that from Marcus or the supporters. PL: You've got to be kidding me on? Pressure? I played for massive clubs and managed massive clubs. That's been my life. That just comes across as an insanely arrogant response.

No sympathy from me. Knew exactly what he was getting into when he pitched up there. He might as well have quit at the start of the summer if this was going to be his attitude tbh.