That was nearly 4 years ago. The owners got excited after promotion and allowed Mowbray to spend. IMO when they reached January 2021 and we were miles off promotion and going backwards on another tailspin they cut communication and ceased spending. Some might blame the pandemic for that yet I remind myself of 2015 after Bowyer missed promotion and a very similar thing happened.

Hands up who thinks that at some point in the last couple of months Waggott/Mowbray have had discussions or meetings with the owners (not their dogsbody) and have agreed a plan and budget for January that we are now working through with a budget approved by the owners in view of our excellent form and position? Hands up who thinks that the owners financial team authorised an annual budget which has been handed down by the dogsbody to Waggott within which Mowbray has had to wheel and deal - this is the reason most signings have been loans and no new contracts have been signed and that Mowbray has lost his direct link to the top owners who won't know nor care that we are in contention for promotion? I'm in camp 2. Wheel and deal it will be as Waggo juggles the pounds and pennies in the budget authorised by the money men last summer to last until this summer. I'd be surprised if any cash was spent and if it is it will have to fit very strict criteria.

But there's a middle ground. I've not seen anyone suggesting we should go daft and throw ridiculous money around this month. But we will never be in as strong a position to make moves and attract players. We must also have a cushion with Armstrong and Brockhall with FFP rules. If not something is very wrong. No problem with the 'build' policy if that is actually what we do - but looking at the squad we are not building. Too many loans and out of contract players for that - we need to strike whilst we have a chance because as it stands the summer is going to be another big expensive rebuilding job - possibly with a different management team - and it won't take much to send us back to square one. Need to keep pushing, striving to improve and adding to what is a good young squad but needs depth. This starts with retaining the core then adding. If (as I suspect is the case) there is minimal money from Venkys or no communication to India to get cash (and I'm talking real cash for signings - not shuffling around on wages or a couple of hundred grand on one signing or allowing a couple of 6 month loans) then we need to ask what the point is and why they bother.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't recall a single occasion that the manager has flown around the world to meet with Balaji. I've no doubt he has a more 'hands on' role than the others in terms of interest in the club but when it comes to cold hard cash and funding it is clear that managers have always needed to get through to Mr and Mrs Desai. Snake Kean worked out quickly where the power lies. No visit to India since 2019 puts Mowbray on thin ice and no coincidence that since then buys have been low cost (if anything) and sales have started. All my opinion and belief based on what we've seen over the last 10 years. Some might call it a conspiracy theory but I think it makes perfect sense and until Mowbray can get around a table with them cash will be very limited, as will new contracts.

He went to India that summer and got approval for funds. It was the same summer he spent money on Armstrong. He went the following summer and got approval for Gallagher. Summer 2011 - Kean goes to India - decent money spent on Dann, Yakubu, Rochina, Petrovic etc. Summer 2012 - Kean goes to India - decent money spent on Rhodes, Best, Etuhu Summer 2013 - Bowyer goes to India - decent money spent on Marshall, Evans, Conway, Gestede Summer 2014 - Bowyer goes to India - money spent on Duffy, Steele Summer 2015 - Bowyer doesnt go to India - no money spent - Cairney and Gestede sold Summer 2016 - Coyle doesn't go to India - very little money spent after selling Duffy and Hanley Summer 2017 - Mowbray goes to India - gets contract extension, keeps all his squad together and able to sign Dack Summer 2018 - Mowbray goes to India - able to buy Armstrong and Brereton Summer 2019 - Mowbray goes to India - able to buy Gallagher Summer 2020 - Mowbray doesn't go to India - no cash spent Summer 2021 - Mowbray doesn't go to India - very little cash spent despite selling Armstrong and substantial cutbacks/unable to secure players to new deals

Apart from Mowbray can't contact Mrs Desai directly and because of that no extra cash comes from the owners. We all know she controls the money and we all know there's a reason managers have flown across the world to meet her.

Maybe. And as people often like to remind me on here there is more to FFP than transfer fees alone. For example - we are roughly break even on fees spent/received under Mowbray Also you are ignoring wages spent. I will bet their wage bill is substantially greater than ours and growing with Balogon and co. joining

One club has sold a training ground and £20 million player along with slashing the wage bill last summer and unable to keep existing good players, all supposedly due to FFP yet Middlesbrough no such problems. Amazing.

Would expect most of the squad to be off today. Quite often are on a Wednesday.

The old Newcastle problem comes back though - the reason they are throwing money at the likes of Chris Wood is because their options in January sat in the bottom 3 are severely limited. Burnley might get a big pile of cash for him - but they've 3 weeks to spend it and how many decent players are going to jump ship to them at this stage with 1 win all season?

Quite happy for Fulham to win 7-0 from time to time if they have 5-6 game winless runs in between. Just need to focus on ourselves. Maintain our form since November through to May and we go up. Are likely to need 40 points to get there - 2 points a game (ish). Still think Fulham will win it comfortably and the only chance of automatic will be by finishing above Bournemouth.

We need to beat Cardiff and Hull if we have automatic aspirations. Both are struggling poor sides. In a few weeks we have Middlesbrough, Swansea and West Brom and people will be on here happy with draws in those so we need wins on the board if so.

For all the talk, fancy websites and the rest underneath it all they just want to brush fans off with standard copy and paste emails. I hope you keep pressing them Tony as without it will just be brushed under the carpet until the next fiasco crops up.

The point being? I was saying that Frost covers were needed because the undersoil heating wasn't working. Not too bothered where the covers came from.

So there weren't frost covers at Ewood then? I'm sure I can dig some photos out that show there were.

Thought it was EFL but not sure. Either way the point is the same

I'm not surprised fans aren't allowed in as I'm well aware of the rules the Welsh regional assembly have imposed. I'm surprised that the only way the game can be broadcast to fans is by moving kick off away from 3pm to avoid the 'blackout' imposed by the league, which is designed to protect the sanctity of 3pm games and avoid gates being destroyed by live streaming. I would have hoped some common sense could prevail and recognition that these are exceptional circumstances forced by the Welsh authorities and not for commercial reasons. But as I say, I expect both Rovers and Cardiff are quite happy with an earlier kick off for travel and organisational reasons so it matters not.

Ridiculous that in the unprecedented circumstances such as these - which sees the Welsh assembly adopting different rules to England - that we still have to follow the 'blackout' rule for 3pm kick offs. You'd have thought they might have made an exception given this isn't being done for commercial reasons but out of necessity. Then again maybe the early kick off appeals to Rovers and Cardiff -- get the game done and everyone can be home early.

Stoke seem to have a decent link with City at the moment. Have had a few of their youngsters recently.

Taylor Harwood Bellis joining Stoke according to their local media

'From all reports' - again - what 'all reports' are you referring to? What appears in the Lancashire Telegraph that has been fed to them by Waggott the liar? The Club haven't said anything - other than making other clubs aware of the situation and effectively inviting interested parties to come forward. 'Half the stuff I say doesn't come true' - examples please? Who have we signed? - you don't seriously mean the 6 month contract for James Brown do you? I think you'll find the vast majority of people expected a struggle this season and on the other page there was a poll I think with 15th the zone people expected us to be in. Even the manager has admitted he's surprised at how well we've done so far. If the club take my money I'm entitled to question what is going on and no - as I've said many many times - I will not just blindly accept what they say without question or criticism especially when it involves half our squad being out of contract in the next 12 months and our best academy products walking away for nothing. Because lets not forget - this isn't limited to Nyambe - if it was it might be put down to a 'one off'. This is actually most of the squad.

Those clubs will offer him a competitive salary and a 4 year deal. We aren't offering him a competitive salary and probably not close to 4 years.

Where do people think Nyambe is likely to go? I've heard 'rumours' of a move to Leeds. We've been through all this nonsense before with Raya, Cairney and others. Generally when other clubs at a similar or higher level want one of our players it is for a good reason. If the replacement we aim for was a better player/option then the clubs chasing our players could save themselves a lot of time and money by going directly for the replacement.

Wigan drawn away to Stoke. Can't say I envy them.

My take was that we were the better side in the first half, and probably should have got ourselves ahead with a few good chances missed, although Wigan themselves went close on a couple of occasions. As the half went on I thought the game deteriorated. Second half I thought Wigan stepped it up and the game became more aggressive and bad tempered. I thought they ended up the better side after we were forced into changes. The concern for me was that after equalising we did the old habit of surrendering any momentum or initiative from the goal to the opposition. I would expect having equalised so late in the game to be the side pushing for a winner yet after Ayala scored it was like a switch had been pressed and Wigan seized the initiative, pressured us and went and got the winner. Only one side looked like winning it after we made it 2-2. This is something that has happened frequently before this season under Mowbray - we press for and get an equaliser and then once we've scored we look like a different side - seemingly switching off or losing momentum having scored. Whether that is thinking it is 'job done' or not being able to cope with the opposition responding to a goal I don't know. I've seen a few people saying that we were in total control, should have won comfortably but for Pears' errors and can't agree.