DE.

Those diagonal headers though man, those beautiful diagonal headers.

He'll only get better through experience - learning what to do and what not to do, and that isn't going to happen with 20 minute cameos and constantly being rotated in and out of the team. He's 25 years old in January, he isn't a youngster who needs coaching, he's a player close to his peak in terms of age who needs consistent game time. If we aren't going to give it to him then he needs to go somewhere he will get it, and I'm confident he'd produce a lot more for another team playing him regularly than in our disjointed mess of a team.

Regarding Rothwell I imagine some of it is down to inconsistent game time, and maybe the pressure of knowing he needs to impress or he'll be out of the team again. Contrast to the likes of Bennett and Armstrong who can play badly game after game and are still constantly selected. We saw at the end of last season that when given a proper run in the team Rothwell does have an end product. His confidence has probably taken a bit of a hit with the way he's been handled so far this season. He needs a proper run in the team to really show what he can do.

Flair was maybe the wrong word to use, but when he first got into the team he was constantly pushing forward and looking for ways to get up the pitch. Nowadays he seems more neutered and as a result has become less effective. Still a good player who has a ton of potential, but whilst he was a breath of fresh air when he came into the team he now seems more hindered in his approach. When I read comments from Mowbray about analysing the amount of times he gives away the ball, etc, it annoys me because I'm sure a lot of those times he's looking to try and release a player in a forward position rather than pass sideways or backwards like most of the players around him. Completing a pass doesn't mean much if it isn't leading to anything. I fear that he's being coached to be risk-averse, like every other player in our team, and in time that will dilute the better qualities he brings to the table.

I think our squad is pretty poor overall with a few exceptions. Walton/Leutwiler - both poor keepers who cost more points than they save. Bennett - works hard but seems to have gotten worse over time. A weak link when played at RB. Nyambe - can be decent but many flaws to his game. Doesn't create assists, doesn't score and is defensively suspect. Athletic and definite scope for him to improve but it isn't going to happen under Mowbray. Lenihan - injury prone so will miss a good 10-15 games every season at least. A mid-table Championship defender, prone to rash mistakes but one of few players we have willing to put their head onto a ball. Tosin - far from the finished product, good with the ball at his feet but again has dodgy moments defensively. Also not our player and little chance of us signing him long-term. Williams - has purple patches of good form at CB, has a knack for scoring goals from that position. A poor LB though. Bell - League 1 calibre left back. Nowhere near good enough for this division. Works hard but lacking quality at both ends of the pitch. Cunningham - best of the bunch by far but out for the season and as with Tosin doesn't belong to us. Johnson - started off well but form has dipped dramatically and now appears to be out of favour entirely. Will only decline as he continues to age. Downing - still a good player but at the tail-end of his career, no long-term future. Evans - only seems to play well for his country. Never been anything more than functional at Rovers and often a passenger in games. Wish we'd let him go rather than give him a new contract. Smallwood - lower Championship/League 1 standard midfielder who has been almost completely frozen out. Another who shouldn't have been given a new contract. Rothwell - a good player but unfortunately the manager seems to have it in for him. Davenport/Chapman - stuck in u23 limbo with no signs of that changing. Holtby - obviously a very talented player, perhaps the most naturally gifted at the club, but seems to have fitness issues and struggles to play in Mowbray's "style" of football. Travis - solid midfielder who again appears to be one of the manager's punching bags. Looks very different now from the lad who broke into the team nearly a year ago. Seems to be having the flair coached out of him so that he can become an Evans/Smallwood clone. Buckley - not seen enough of him to comment but there seems to be some potential there. Dack - our most effective player by a mile. The only player who regularly plays and scores/assists. The lynchpin of the team and would be massively missed if injured or sold. Armstrong - pacy but lacks intelligence. Not smart enough to play up front and not consistently effective enough to play on the wing. Gallagher - looks like a huge waste of money so far. Granted he keeps getting shunted out on the wing so difficult for him to get into any kind of consistent rhythm up top. Brereton - a lot of money down the drain. Disaster of a signing. Samuel - injury prone and not good enough for this division. Graham - our best striker by a mile but being purposely phased out by the manager and at 35 years old is not a long-term solution to any of our problems. Probably gone next summer, maybe even in January. So of the players that actually belong to us, I'd say only Rothwell, Holtby, Dack and Travis are genuine top six calibre players (although in Rothwell and Travis' case it's more potentially top six player rather than what we see regularly at the moment). The rest are mid-to-lower table cloggers who, imo, will never get us anywhere close to the playoffs. We need practically an entirely new defence (GK included), a new set of strikers, and proper wide players who aren't strikers being shoehorned into that position by a manager who has completely lost his way. I kind of wish I hadn't gone through our squad as now I feel depressed. We really are so far away right now in terms of manager and squad, and I don't see the overhaul required coming with our current owners at the helm. There are some bright sparks at u23 level (Rankin-Costello, Buckley, Grayson, Butterworth) but we are still going to need a lot more to realistically compete at the right end of the table, along with a manager who improves players rather than ruins them.

NXT won the ratings war for the first time this week with 916,000 to 893,000 for AEW. They obviously promoted a lot of main roster stars showing up and it was the go-home show to both Takeover and Survivor Series so if they were going to win any week it was going to be this one. Decent numbers for both shows regardless which is exactly what everyone should want as both NXT and AEW are great shows, streets ahead of what is churned out Mondays and Fridays by WWE. Takeover: Wargames was a very good PPV, as it the standard for Takeover events. Both WarGames matches were excellent, with the women's one in particular being the highlight of the show. The rest of the matches were solid. It'll be interesting to see if Survivor Series is improved by having NXT talent prevelent throughout. On a side note Code Rhodes has trademarked Bash at the Beach (event coming up in January), SuperBrawl and Slamboree - all historic WCW PPV names. I'm kind of surprised WWE doesn't already have these locked down under trademark themselves but regardless it's a smart move by Cody to have these names available for use as they have historic recognition.

As of yet no evidence to suggest any of those three would have the same impact as Dack tbf. I think many will only understand how crucial he is to our team once he's gone. The only way we improve by selling Dack is with a different manager at the helm imo. Otherwise I fear the worst.

If Dack leaves whilst Mowbray is still manager we will really begin to tank. I dread to think who he'd bring in to replace him.

Armstrong and Gallagher probably shouldn't be in the team right now. The former certainly not, the latter definitely not on the right wing. Unfortunately Graham should still be starting up top with a combination of Dack/Downing/Rothwell/Holtby behind him. I think Graham may well leave in January though (weren't there rumours of A-League interest a couple of months back?) and Mowbray won't want to look foolish by having £14m of players he's brought in warming the bench.

I believe that's something like 20 goals conceded in the last 10 games.

True enough if the performance is a one-off, not applicable if we make the same mistakes week in and week out. I'm sure what he says in public is different to what he actually thinks and possibly what he's said to the players, but it doesn't send a good message out to the fans.

Labouring to a win against the worst team in the league, at home, and another two conceded to boot. Bradley Dack once again saves the day for us and the manager. The sooner Mowbray is gone the better.

♫ we're staying up ♫

Because he's simply not intelligent enough to play up top on his own. He gets caught offside repeatedly because he isn't smart enough to time his runs properly. Mowbray didn't mention that being "analysed" though.

Unable to put any defenders on the bench, but Mowbray reckons we recruited just fine defensively ? oh well. Good to see Rothwell starting in a match he should be able to influence.

Yeah of course - but were we playing "the Mowbray way" when Johnson was in charge, or is that something that's changed from last season?

So are we saying TM promoting Johnson to a first team role at the club has effectively ruined our u23's whilst bringing no obvious benefit to our first team?

Strange considering we're going backwards. Perhaps he needs to buy Elliot a Satnav for Christmas.

I think Kean might have had a couple of decent matches, but then Steele had a few where he looked okay too. Overall two terrible keepers either way. It's funny I was going to mention age but there's only a year between them!

Jake Kean was probably worse overall but had a lot less time to repeatedly screw us over. Nowadays playing in the National League I believe.

The fact the comparison point right now is the lowest point in our recent history (purely in terms of squad, league position and manager) says it all about how things are going.

When Gary Bowyer was sacked we had played 16 games, were 16th in the league with 17 points and 0 GD. As of now we have played 16 games, are 18th in the table with 18 points and a -4 GD. Tony is fortunate that both the owners and from what I've seen the fans standards have dropped significantly in the last few years.

In fairness it was destroyed the moment Bolton were allowed to start the season in the state they were in. All of the games they played with their youth team were essentially a gimme 3 points for practically every team that played them.

A five point suspended points deduction for Bolton for both the Brentford and Doncaster matches.

Yeah pretty much. I tend to do other clubs eventually but I'd feel bad if I didn't start my first game with Rovers! I'm in 2040 in my current FM18 game - Rovers are the best team in the world by this point and Venky's are long gone, so life is good I've been playing this save for nearly a year though. I don't get that much time to play FM, and when I do it's usually mixed with watching something or writing, so my games tend to move a little slowly.