I expect a far better display than we saw last night. I think that is highly likely, it could hardly be worse, but we are also accustomed to dismal away performances and results on dark wet/cold midweeks. I'm convinced there is something psychological in it and the team will always be more up for it on a Saturday. Add in that it is a derby game with a big following and I think that will take care of that.

Of course that doesn't mean we will get a result, and I expect we won't, but what I expect is the old 'hard luck' tale of putting in a shift, playing some nice stuff at times, not being played off the park, doing the basics for 99% of the game but falling short by virtue of them being much more ruthless and trained in the dark arts, plus they are always well up for this one whereas our team of softies I don't think have it in them to cope when the going gets tough.

I suspect it will be a bit more complex than just change of manager and therefore he's back in favour come the summer.

We want him gone and off the wage bill. So Eustace's views are likely to be secondary to the club's focus of cutting costs. Even if Ipswich don't want to make it permanent I am sure he will have plenty of other suitors in the Championship willing to pay a fee for him, and Venkys will sell if so.

Also the question needs to be whether the player wants to return to this cesspit. He's already been jettisoned once supposedly surplus to requirements and is now experiencing what life is like at a club that actually wants to be successful and tries. I imagine after years being here it is something of an eye opener and not a reason to come rushing back to circus Brockhall.

Well I'm out. No game at Ewood tomorrow for the first time in many a year.

I'm ashamed to even be associated with this club.

The events of today alone leave me sick to the pit of my stomach.

If it wasn't bad enough their shenanigans with McGuire, their disgusting conduct, lies, deceit and leaving the poor lad in the shit (just like O'Brien), forcing a good man and manager out of the door, the Adam Wharton sale, zero investment in January

Within minutes of (eventually) confirming JDT is no longer manager they are labelling it as a 'new era' under the next patsy whilst those culpable continue in the shadows.

Yes that's right, Venkys still owning it, Waggott still CEO, Suhail still 'consultant', Lowe, Johnson, Benson still on the coaching staff and they have the audacity to broadcast this as a 'new era'.

I despise them, they are scum, and I'm not going to play along with their game.

4 minutes ago, booth said:

Didn't he say something like... I offered to go in the Summer when a hand grenade was thrown and the project changed to staying in this league and developing players. I'm more ambitious.

Something along those lines yes, but I interpreted that as him offering the club the chance to get rid of him for free, both because the project had changed and they might want someone else to oversee it, and also because if they were in cutback mode it might be attractive to them to save some more money, and not that JDT was desperate to leave and from the summer.

In the end they said no and persuaded him to stay on, I suspect they also told him that the issues with India were a temporary matter that would soon be fixed and that by January we'd be back on track. I think going off his comments he went into January expecting business to get done, and only after they've let him down again has he concluded there can be no future here with liars and con men.

4 minutes ago, simongarnerisgod said:

will eustace be able to bring his own coaching team in?????????

I think we already know the answer to that one. Which makes the appointment all the more immaterial.

Allardyce will be the typical outsider looking in and having a view or perception of Rovers based on that. He'll have seen and heard all the usual stuff; owners who have learned lessons, once great ex-PL club stable in the Championship, in need of some slightly better management, two recent play-off pushes, a good season away from promotion. Probably in a drawer alongside the likes of Birmingham, Sheff Wed, Cardiff but just up the road from his home.

For those reasons he and many others would have a look at us, but once around a table with the 'consultant' (NOT a director), the 'CEO' and whoever else gets involved in these things he'd realise that it is amateur hour and run a mile. I think he and Hughes would be aghast at what this club has become having left it in such good condition were they to get beneath the facade and see what it is like after a decade of mismanagement.

Don't know, don't care

Even if he's brilliant it won't be enough, not with these owners and stooges doing everything they can to hold us back and undermine us.

Indeed, but unfortunately whilst owned and managed by such people it is the club that obtains the reputation and the damage that comes with it.

It just sums up the contempt the owners have for the club and its fortunes. 

A blind man could see Tomasson was going last Saturday, yet here we are almost a week on and nothing.

I can only assume that they either can't be arsed giving it their approval or they are squabbling over compensation.

Meanwhile this sorry state of affairs the day before a crucial game.

Another finger up at the club and its league status.

If correct that Eustace or another waiting to take over it isn't helping their job to keep them waiting all week until too late to prepare for the Stoke game.

Fly people over from America and muck them around before sinking their transfer, can't even get rid of a manager in a timely manner.

Just a despicable club.

Plenty of managers will want to manage Blackburn Rovers, even for the awful people who own and run the club.

But not many proven in demand managers will. They can wait for a proper club to come along.

Not many decent managers will come here and those that will won't last more than a year or so until they get worn down by Venky nonsense and leave. 

Conversely if the new manager gets on a plane to India he'll be here as long as he wants to be (Mowbray, Kean)

2 minutes ago, Atko's Engine said:

Alex Neil is just Mowbray Mk II. All of his success was a decade or more ago, since then he's just been a serial merrygorounder, achieving very little.

Eustace, whilst arguably more of a gamble, would be a more exciting (in context) & forward-looking appointment imo. I think he was discarded from Brum just as he was taking off, and if you look at the link I posted a few pages back he does seem to be inheriting similar circs here to those he inherited there.

And fwiw I think the Coventry link to Waggott is coincidental. Given their respective times in the game, I would guess Waggott knows Neil better than he does Eustace.

On what basis would Eustace be 'exciting' or 'forward looking'

I'm just genuinely unclear what it is that he possesses that has led you to conclude this.

It appears to me to be the fact that he hasn't managed many teams or for very long.

He might be a good un I'm just not clear how he has earned such a solid 'exciting' reputation from 1 season battling the drop at Birmingham

5 minutes ago, KentExile said:

One of the main criticisms of Neil by fans of clubs he has managed, has been an aversion to using or developing younger players, and Rovers have a squad full of them.

Eustace was in 2nd place in the Championship when sacked

They were actually 5th, two points above 11th having played an extra game than everyone else by virtue of a Friday night fixture.

1 minute ago, Oldgregg86 said:

It really doesn’t matter who we appoint . Yeah we might get a new manager bounce and we might stay up for another season but the club as a whole is set up to fail . This is just kicking the can down the road. Eustace, rowett, hughes, Mowbray Ben benson. It really doesn’t matter until we get thinks right at boardroom level

Agreed. Its all pointless but its the oldest trick in the book to divert attention away from upstairs failings and distract the masses with a new manager

Then let me guess come the summer it will be about 'new structure' and 'learning lessons' from past mistakes and a change of strategy.

All a load of shite, designed purely to keep people quiet and distracted.

Amazing how perceptions are in the game isn't it.

Neil:

Championship promotion with Norwich, a season managing in the PL

3 top half / play-off pushes with PNE

Promotion from League One with Sunderland

Mid-table/mediocre with Stoke (where everyone struggles)

Eustace:

1 season, 17th with Birmingham, much fanfare

I'm struggling to see why some would be happy / content with Eustace but not Neil.

1 minute ago, Fraserkirky said:

Think I would prefer Alex Neil over Eustace actually.

Me too, got a decent to reasonable record at 3-4 Championship clubs, not that I'll be happy with either.

3 minutes ago, Dreams of 1995 said:

As you don't follow Blues you won't be aware of what was going on during his time there JH

There were just as chaotic as we were now. And he kept them in this league despite all odds

He did nothing that Lee Bowyer, Aitor Karanka, Pep Clotet and Garry Monk didn't also do there - bottom half survival.

He might be more well liked by their fans, suspect that's more to do with the unfairness of his sacking whilst they were sat in a good position and replacement with a clown.

Anyhow, I'm not buying it, not accepting it and not falling for it.

15 minutes ago, Crimpshrine said:

This managerial change is perfect timing for Waggott. 

Unpopular sale of Adam Wharton, more transfer cockups, terrible form on the pitch, protests looming, toxic atmosphere, Venky's court hearing postponed. Anti Venky feeling growing. Massive pressure on the CEO.

Change the manager and many fans will be in 'give him a chance ffs' mode.

Pressure off for now. Retire in the summer. Crafty bugger that Waggott.

Precisely, it wipes the slate clean for them upstairs.

Forget about the January debacle, forget about £25 million banked and nothing spent, forget about it all and focus on the dugout.

It's all JDTs fault and look we are sorting it out by making a change. Get behind the new bloke FFS!

I'm not buying it for a second and hope nobody else does, but sadly a lot will because they'll start getting carried away by a new bloke in the dugout.

Eustace or whichever other desperado takes over will have to firefight until the summer and then the next round of fun begins. More cutbacks ordered, no money to spend, projects to polish up for a profit, nonsense with India.

Nothing can or will change.

I really wonder if I'm missing something with Eustace. I'm baffled as to why he carries this reputation as a highly sought after desirable manager.

His only proper stint as a manager (other than at non-league Kidderminster) was a little over 12 months at Birmingham where they finished 17th, 10 places below us.

Anyone who claims they played 'good football' clearly needs to check their sources because they didn't. Not that this is essential as we need some organisation but I do think these 'reputations' in the game are exacerbated by media reputations when in actual fact there's very little on the cv to be impressed with.

They had a good start to this season with some late wins but we were just outside the top 6 in December under JDT - so what?

McCall is Paul Heckingbottom's right hand man.

I suspect if we did go external he'd be high on that list. Head coach, academy background, localish, available.

What a sorry state of affairs.

I'm also convinced that secretly both Waggott and Pasha will want JDT gone and will have been expecting / hoping for his resignation for quite some time.

I bet he quickly saw through both of them after his arrival and realised what was going on here and after the cushy number with Mowbray his ambition and drive wasn't in keeping with their plans to plod, keep India happy and collect their wages.

JDT was obviously a Broughton man and not at all what the other two had in mind when they were looking at Mowbray's replacement.

I think Waggott will now move into 'damage limitation' mode of trying to deflect all our ills and issues away and onto JDT.

And I think there will be all sorts of dirty tricks to that end, to sway public opinion against the outgoing JDT and portray him as the problem, today's meeting being the first step.

I'm just wondering how they'll try and spin it next. Probably Damian Johnson and as you were with the staff and costs, dressed up as 'popular ex player making the step up'

'Get behind Damo FFS'

Mowbray was competent. But because of that and him succeeding Kean, Berg, Appleton, Bowyer and Coyle he is of course seen as a massive success.

Fundamentally his highest finish in 5 years was 8th.

He had time and he had backing and that was the best he could do. 

Compare and contrast to what others have done in a fraction of the time elsewhere.

A big +ve in the Mowbray analysis is the players he brought in and developed. Of course the Armstrongs, Rothwells, Diaz's all good. But I'm sure if the owners and board had actually applied pressure and demands on league position and results rather than just leave him be for 5 years we might have had less player projects and perhaps some higher finishes.

The cynic in me suggests he knew his route to longevity here was to convince the owners he was protecting and developing their 'investments' and once he was out of the way it was 'cashing in' time leading to today's mess.

That some people still pine for him 18 months on after his frankly disgraceful public comments and admissions sums up for me the depths and low standards the Indians have dragged this club to. Anywhere else and he'd just be consigned to the drawers of mediocrity.