Bournemouth is a huge place but lacks footballing or sporting tradition. One of the main reasons for that is because it has always been a resort or retirement town where people migrate to from elsewhere in the country. More generally that part of the world has never had footballing power. Whether it be Bournemouth, Bristol, Plymouth, Exeter or South Wales there really isn't much to show in accomplishments. Affluent and prosperous yes but a tiny club propped up with Russian and PL money.

Bournemouth broke the rules when they got promoted to the PL in the first place and unless I'm mistaken were never sanctioned for it so looks to me like their wealthy owner will be able to continue funding them beyond their means without issue.

Best wishes - I sit two rows behind and it was scary watching as so many people calling for urgent help so can't imagine what it must have been like for family/friends.

Exactly. A firm statement from our owners that no bids will be accepted for any of our prized players from any Championship club would suffice.

Even if he could sign a PCA with Bournemouth and Boscombe, why would he with the clubs in the positions and form they are? Bournemouth have won 2 in 10 and are stuttering. Rovers have been outperforming them for 3 months. How stupid would he feel if he signed an agreement with them now, we got promoted and they stayed in the Championship? He'd of course be better off waiting until the summer, see how things go and make his decision then.

He isn't going to sign the deal offered so far. If he was it would have happened by now. Which leads me to believe that the offer isn't a great one at all, but actually quite a poor one which is the same reason the others haven't committed to a club they are settled and playing well at. The onus is on Rovers to improve their offers and pay good players their worth, otherwise we will continue to face this sort of thing from nonentities like Bournemouth and Boscombe.

My worry is that a plonker like Waggott would drive Rothwell to Bournemouth if they were offering £2 million. Hopefully there are greater forces at work that prevent that happening. There would be nothing more pathetic than offloading an integral player to a direct automatic promotion rival in the late days of January but I do worry they will set it up so that it happens but they bring in a loan to cover for it which will smooth it with the fans. Of course Venkys could sort all this out very quickly by offering Rothwell a better deal. Their choice not to.

Massive win. Thought we might have missed our chance at half time and unsurprisingly Wilder made changes and they improved. The last 20 minutes or so showed real doggedness and determination to preserve the lead. So good to see supporters of other teams acknowledging now that coming to Ewood to play us is a huge challenge and we are a force. Another one ticked off, 18 to go.

Our spend has been minimal for the last 2.5 years since Gallagher was signed. Cash buys have been Kaminski, Pickering, Edun and Markandy all for relatively small sums. Since Mowbray took over we have had a net profit on transfer fees with Armstrong and Raya fetching over £20 million and spending of less than £20 million. That would likely be substantially greater had Dack not got injured and will be in the summer if/when Brereton goes. I'm sure you'll remind me again that free transfers like Ayala are still expensive outlays which I agree with. But you've just referred to Middlesbrough's spending without factoring in substantial costs on frees and loans they have incurred whilst avoiding FFP issues and selling their training ground.

So when we sell Brereton in the summer and get minimum £15 million for him that will take income from sales to upwards of £50 million in 12 months. Not to mention huge savings on wages since last summer after slashing numbers and costs. Plus the excuse of the pandemic really doesn't apply to this season as we have been allowed unlimited numbers at Ewood. Any other club brought in £50 million and still using FFP as an excuse? The alternative explanation, one which for some reason people are desperate to avoid talking about, is that Venkys are cutting back and turning off the taps on funding and trying to claw cash back after 2-3 years of backing Mowbray. That makes much more sense to me. A quick look at our opposition tonight shows you don't need £50 million in sales and training grounds being transferred to comply with FFP and still invest.

You make it sound as though we are operating to a prudent and sustainable business model. That simply isn't the case. The clubs finances are at risk and have been since the day they arrived. We make massive losses every year even with minimal spending and that will have to remain the case if we want to stay in the Championship and not slide into the lower leagues. Lets not also get on to the subject of abysmal income levels and assets soon to be out of contract - both of which would be resolved if the club and owners were looking at stable finances and sustainable footings. In a good year, assuming we don't stumble across a massive sale, we are going to lose £15 million a year in this league. That is sustainable as long as the owners are willing to plug the gap. You make it sound like what is happening at Derby can't or won't happen here - it will happen if Venkys do the same thing as Mel Morris and decide they've had enough. I think the only thing in our favour on that front is that there are 4 Venkys and they have deeper pockets than Morris.

Pasha the bloke who appointed Owen Coyle? Says all we need to know about his competence and understanding of the job. Not to be trusted.

We should consider refusing to play the Middlesbrough game. Hull did it and got away with it, Burnley too. I am absolutely furious at the situation with Sky moving the game to Monday and in doing so causing us to lose Brereton for 2 games rather than 1. If I was running Rovers I would have told Sky to go and speak to Chile and if they couldn't resolve it then we wouldn't be playing Monday night. This is (supposed to be) a serious business here with game changing rewards on the table and we are supposed to just accept losing our star player for an extra game due to some idiot at Sky HQ deciding to put us on Monday night? The Markandy development is a blow but lets not overreact. He hasn't been part of the squad that has got us here and we don't know if he is even ready to contribute this season. Mowbray himself was desribing him as a young player to polish up and develop over a few years so seems premature either way to pin our promotion hopes on him and his fitness. It is a shame yes and quite concerning that it has happened so soon into his time here but I would be more worried if we were losing the Breretons, Travs, Lenihans or Rothwells given their contributions. This brings me on to my next point - that there is still ample time remaining this month to make other additions to address the scenario so lets see how serious we are. Even without this injury I would sincerely hope further business was going to happen because those two signings alone are unlikely to be sufficient and now one is out long term and the other isn't match fit. I'm worrying there is a lot of negativity creeping in here. Everyone is going to get injuries, everyone will lose an odd game, we are still firmly in the mix for automatic promotion yet I am reading a lot of doom and gloom, talk of the play-offs being the aim and panic about QPR/Boro. I want to see us fighting to the bitter end because 2nd place is up for grabs. I hope to see more from the Club over the coming week or so to bolster the ranks.

Not a chance on this earth that we would be able to pay Lawrence the wages he will be accustomed to. If we were the only show in town he would still expect us to get close to what Derby are paying him - a lot - but up against Bournemouth and QPR no chance.

Is that supposed to make me feel better about the situation? I can't help but think these 'year options' that Waggott loves to use are actually becoming a hindrance. It appears to me the club treats those options as a route to force players to stay for another year on the same salary and in doing so jeopardise chances of those players signing up for the longer term albeit on better wages. What I mean by this is in Rothwell's case - 12-18 months ago we could have offered him a pay rise and a new 3-4 year deal and he might well have committed. Instead we did nothing, relying on the 12 months option to compel him to stay but now we are 12 months on - still no new contract and looking like being serious money out of pocket. Players will not see activating a 12 month option as an act of a club keen to keep them long term. Players will see proactive clubs offering them 3-4 year deals as looking long term. A 12 month extension is activated if I was an agent I would be advising my player to start looking elsewhere for next summer.

Mowbray was rabbiting on in his last press conference again about copying Brentford - that is to buy cheap, develop and sell high. Meanwhile Armstrong was sold on the cheap and Brereton, Rothwell, Lenihan, Travis, Buckley, Kaminski and others are out of contract within 18 months. And he manages to do it with a straight face.

There seem to be a lot of people out there who are frustrated with the referee and his decisions are attempting to reduce the blame or importance of those because Rovers had a poor night. I can't agree with that. Goals change games. If the Brereton penalty is given and scored everything can change including the sides performances. This is how promotion winning sides grind out results when not playing well so it really is unacceptable from the officials and it has to stop. I wish Mowbray would kick up more of a stink about it because otherwise, like the Boxing Day debacle, it gets swept under the carpet and on the show goes. Mowbray admitted that he sent them out second half to get an early goal and that was obvious, but once Hull got through that first 5-10 minutes they took control again. If we go in at half time level or even ahead after the penalty Hull have to approach it differently and we are not under the same urgency to get a quick equaliser. Those who shrug their shoulders at the referee and say it doesn't really matter in the scheme of things because we were poor miss the point- a major decision (probably a red card) at that stage in the game changes everything in our favour. To not get either and then finish the night 4 nil up on bookings absolutely stinks but I'm used to such things now.

Just in after a typical midweek away trip with numerous motorway junctions closed making life much harder than it needs to be. Very angry and frustrated tonight but only part of that is down to our performance. Of greater annoyance right now are the officiating and the feeling of being cheated, especially when we remember the events of Boxing Day. Of course Hull laughing all the way to the bank - having been shot at on confidence and missing numerous important players 3 weeks ago to tonight bouncing with their takeover and a much healthier home crowd along with most of their players back whereas we have done the opposite - now missing 2-3 important players and performances dropping off. I think that is now Barnsley, Huddersfield, Wigan, Cardiff and Hull where we have been quite poor. We got away with it v Barnsley and Cardiff and took a reasonable point from Huddersfield but have paid the price v Wigan and Hull with what ended up quite comical defeats. Another 4 yellow cards added to the tally - whether these are justified or not they are going to be biting us on the arse in the near future because we are picking lots up and it seems to me (and I'm going to look it up when I get chance) that we out-do the opposition on bookings in nearly every game. By the end I think we ended up all over the place seemingly with little structure or formation - Lenihan out wide right, Rothwell almost in centre defence? It was a flashback to the bad old days of chuck on 3 subs end up confused and unable to turn a game around.

Don't agree that we should be forgetting Fulham and focusing on Bournemouth. They are only 5 points above us. Given the situation in November/December we have slashed the gap considerably and have picked up more points than they have over the last few months. Fulham have shown throughout this season that whilst they have a ridiculous collection of ability in their ranks they have slipped up on several occasions. I don't care if they win every other game 7-0 if they slip up in a few along the way. I do think that Fulham will win the league as they should do with their spending but we certainly shouldn't be settling for 2nd in this position. We will need to finish above at least one of them and Bournemouth to get promotion. I do worry that there is a setting of the bar too low. From this position we have to be going for automatic and be disappointed if we don't accomplish that. Top 6 has to be the minimum expectation from here. 75 points is likely to be enough for top 6 which means 26 points from 20 games - a little over a point a game and basically survival level form from here on in. It would take relegation level results across the next 20 games to not hit 75 points. We just need to keep doing what we have, starting with a poor Hull side tonight. Of course games will get more difficult soon but we are above the likes of Middlesbrough and West Brom for a reason and that is because we have been better than them this season. No reason why we can't beat them. Luton away is my biggest fear of the coming weeks - I expect us to struggle at a horrible ground surrounded by horrible people.

A couple of interesting takeaways from those comments for me: 1) Despite saying an awful lot there, a the base of it all is admission from Mowbray that he has no direct communication with the owners in India. This is important. Mowbray tries to cover for that important fact by adding Suhail into the mix and claiming that through Suhail he has 'direct' access to the owners. That isn't true. If you go through someone else then you don't have direct access. Now normally that would not be an issue. I wouldn't expect many managers in the top 2 divisions to be able to pick up the phone and go direct to the majority shareholders. In our case there has been a noticeable shift in how things are done over the last 18 months and that, I believe, coincides with Mowbray losing his direct link to India and instead having to go through Suhail. 2) Admission from Mowbray that Suhail had a 'big part' in him joining the club. I think this is the first time there has been public acceptance from a senior figure at Rovers that Suhail is and was central to major appointments. I remember when Suhail's job was advertised and described basically as a link to smooth communications with India. I don't remember the job advertisement including responsibility for recruiting managers. Some might be reassured by this, others unsettled by it. I don't necessarily think it is a bad thing having a Venky representative on the ground alongside the manager and keeping him in check but I would wonder how on earth someone like Suhail (footballing background?) came across Mowbray and what the process was leading to that appointment. I've heard it several times before that Suhail is 'Balaji's man' and I also think it is important that Mowbray does not specify which of the owners Suhail is in 'direct' contact with. My point for many years has been that the only route to getting serious stuff done is by going to Mr and Mrs Desai. I think Mowbray knows this which is why he jumped on a plane to go and meet them in India and other managers have done the same. I don't think it is a coincidence that shortly after those visits to India Mowbray was able to spend considerable sums of money on players, whereas in recent seasons it has been a few hundred grand here and there. I suspect this is cash that Suhail has persuaded Balaji to put in from his spending money.

If we put aside the question of whether Rovers could or couldn't have forseen/prevented this issue earlier - either by not getting into bed with Recoverite to begin with or by reviewing things in the summer rather than allowing us to get half way through the season - the idea that they can just stick something over the top of the existing sponsor logo and expect people to buy it I think absolutely stinks. There's absolutely no interest in making the club even appear professional and projecting a positive image of it. I mean most of us see it with the corner shop operation at Ewood on matchdays and the rapidly deteriorating state of Ewood - not an ounce of pride from those running the club - but to expect players and fans to represent the club wearing replica shirts as shown in those photos - just couldn't give a stuff could they? Going back to the days of Probiz stickers being slapped on the kits or the generic stock training gear made to look like an away kit. Just a couldn't be arsed attitude at a time when momentum and performances are such that any club with ambition in this position would be able to attract much better sponsorship and would ensure it was presented well.

Just in the nick of time for us being on Sky every week for the promotion run in we are going to turn out in that mess. Poor. Really poor. Granted if there are issues at Recoverites end those may be of no fault on Rovers' part but even so slapping a big black vaping sticker over the top of the Recoverite logo and expecting people to pay full whack for it is poor stuff.

Don't get into deals with these sort of companies. Seemed strange to say the least when we announced Recoverite as our main sponsor - an Australian firm with no presence in the UK. Then again since Venkys arrived I'd go as far as to say the only decent shirt sponsor we have had was Dafabet. This was a substantial deal by all accounts with an established player in English football who have also sponsored Everton, Dingles and others. That particular one was the brainchild of Dave Biggar (Commercial Director, ex Everton). Other than that we've had a frankly woeful run of shirt sponsors. Crown Paints dropped us, then we had the Princes Trust (because nobody would pay to go on our shirts), then short term deals with RFS, Probiz, Recoverite and now Totally Wicked, along with the strange case of Zebra Finance. No coincidence that these sort of companies get nowhere near sponsorship of rival clubs who have the expertise to source better. Then we come back to the situation we have had now for 4 years of having no Commercial Director and the proof is in the pudding with this sort of thing going on and only 'used car salesman' Waggott to sort it out. A club of this size, seeking a sponsor to adorn our world famous shirts, should have much better. Then we come back to FFP and once again scant evidence of anyone at the club actually taking this seriously - if FFP was such a major issue then shirt sponsorship is a major route to generating funds yet it is treated like an irritation. Finally it comes back to the lack of shirts available in the club shop. Frequently I see people sending tweets to Rovers asking when new stock will be in the shop (no response) and apparently most average sizes have been out of stock in all 3 kits for nearly 2 months now with no plan to restock. That is ridculous. A potential promotion season and no kits left to sell in November. No wonder we can't attract sponsors is it? If you were being asked to put millions into the club in return for having your name on the front of the kits you would want as many kits as possible selling to maximise your audience. Why would anyone serious put money up if the club can't even get its stock levels right?

Lets see what happens to Bristol City - because they lost £38 million last year alone and no news of a ban or points deduction. Also as I've said many times before there is no such thing as a transfer ban. There are transfer restrictions whereby the League will interfere and only allow free transfers until losses are reduced but that isn't necessarily a problem - if you ensure you have a quality squad under long term contracts as you can get through an embargo using those players and sell them for big money to achieve compliance. Don't think I've ever supported or suggested we should be paying anyone £50k per week but when we have billionaire owners pumping in £20 million a year it would be nice to keep our good players on solid contracts to protect the club There are two sides to FFP - outgoings and incomings. There is an obsession with outgoings - transfer fees and wages and reasons why we can't do things - yet very little attention paid to incomings - increasing those and maximising player values to achieve compliance. Paying Nyambe £4k a week and letting him leave for nothing might sound good to those who don't want to pay him £8k a week but then deprives the club of millions more pounds in transfer value - such a short term attitude but then again with a CEO like Waggott and manager who has no idea what the plan is beyond May that is only to be expected.

Don't agree. He might or might not be a good signing. I simply don't know. He might be highly rated but playing in the u23s league is a different game to playing in the Championship or hopefully soon Premier League. My concern would be whether he is a signing going to come in and hit the ground running - which really is what we need right now. If we are a club going places and pushing for the PL then signing a soon to be out of contract player from Spurs U23s is not a 'coup'. It might be a good signing, I hope it is, but we are Blackburn Rovers, pushing for the PL here. We can spend millions - if the owners really want to. That would not 'risk the club' - we are £200 million down over the last decade and counting - the only way to stop that is to get over the line to promotion. Truth is I haven't seen anyone demanding huge money be lavished on expensive players - just recognition from most that we are in an unusually strong position to kick on and attract better players than in our usual mid table nothingness. Middlesbrough, West Brom, Forest have all added experience and quality to their squads and more will follow. This is a really competitive division and we need to compete. I come back to what I said last night and have said many times before. I am of the firm belief that the only way any substantial funds are released from the owners - be that transfer fees or wage increases - is when it gets the OK in India at the top table. That hasn't happened for a long time.