There's a theme developing here with Waggott - he talks the talk and promises much but the results of that are rather less impressive. He probably gets a rush of blood wandering the hospitality suites of Ewood before a game and can't help himself try to impress supporters. When the pressure was on back in January and the pitch was a disgrace he panicked and told people that he had lined up a multi-million replacement. In the end we get the usual make do and mend job. He's often promising to 'look into things' at fans meetings then nothing happens. So I'll believe it when I see it on contract extensions. Suspect he just tells people something they want to hear.

Did you miss the bit a few months ago about trying to sell Brockhall? Ultimately I agree that it is not a pleasant prospect. But I also see that those clubs still have the exclusive use and benefit of those facilities so on a practical basis it hasn't made much difference to them. Their grounds were 'sold' to their owners so that rental/Coventry nightmare wouldn't happen unless Venkys sold it to a third party. Those clubs haven't sold their stadia or training grounds for housing development like our mob were trying to do. Why do we need a summer of hardship? We've had a few of those - summer 2016 and 2017 also so this is the third time in six years that it has happened. Why can't we just have six steady summers, maybe sell someone for a good fee like Arma but reinvest half into new assets like Brentford did?

Bolton and Wigan had nothing to do with FFP. Their problems were caused by owners losing interest and stopping spending. I'm not interested in the so-called reasons why players wanted out or not. There's always an excuse. Bit like when Ben Marshall 'wanted out' and 'refused' a new contract and then later he admitted neither were true. I'm sure appointing a clown like Coyle would make any half decent player question his future at the club. Fact is that they were both sold for £10,000,000 and we signed Gordon Greer and Wes Brown to replace them and got relegated. No club in their right minds does that. I don't want Rovers to keep losing money. But I accept that if we want to even survive in this division that is going to happen. I am becoming increasingly tired with this inference that Rovers are a special case on losing money and having a high wages to turnover ratio. The name of the game in the Championship is that millions of pounds get lost every year. Don't like it then don't get involved with it. There is a way to avoid it - difficult - but it involves having a very productive academy or making big money on sales on a regular basis. We have the academy yet are allowing products from it to run their contracts down. We also have assets - Armstrong - sold for big money and yet still in this pickle. I'm not for one minute suggesting we spend £40 million. You're just being silly now. I don't accept that the club cannot even sign free agents or a few low price players and I do not accept that our policy of borrowing kids from Brighton and Leeds is sustainable, suitable or will lead to any sort of success. It is in itself at odds with FFP that you love to go on about - because if FFP is the big issue here then we need assets not loans.

Derby actually succeeded in circumventing the rules. They haven't recieved any points deductions. Sheffield Wednesday did get a points deduction which contributed towards their relegation. That points deduction was imposed after they were found guilty of back dating their accounts to fiddle their FFP calculations. It was not imposed for spending too much. The only club to get a points deduction for spending too much was Birmingham - they waited until they were safe in mid-table then gave them a 6 point deduction that made no difference to anyone. Birmingham and Derby are in the Championship still. Other FFP breakers such as Bournemouth, Leicester, QPR, Cardiff, Reading, Fulham don't seem to be doing too badly either. A transfer embargo now would make no difference to our present predicament. You can still sign players under an embargo - so we could still go with our begging bowl to Brighton for their loans and could even sign free agents provided their wages were within limits. So I'm struggling right now to understand how an embargo would be an issue when we are limiting ourselves so much to supposedly avoid an embargo. What difference would an embargo have made to our business this summer? Not made up but just amazing how so many other clubs manage to expertly avoid any difficulties with it whilst for the second time in four years we are now having to slash costs and cut right back supposedly in some desperate attempt to avoid sanctions.

Everyone on here offers their interpretation or opinions as facts. That's the point of a Forum. Do I need to add a disclaimer to every post that I make?

Crowds of 10,000 - so do many other clubs in this league Sponsorship down - why is this unique to Rovers? Wage bill far exceeding income - welcome to the Championship Spent more on transfers than received - no longer the case thanks to Armstrong and Raya You seem obsessed with the Ayala deal. He was a free agent. End of story. Whatever signing on fee he got as a free agent from Middlesbrough we do not know. Probably a lot less than the cost of paying for a CB from another club. As I keep on saying- what is more important - getting promoted/surviving in the Championship or complying with these rules and risking relegation to League One?

People have come on the Forum and given their opinion or interpretation of the FFP situation. That doesn't mean it is correct or entirely accurate. Venky's current management of the club is on similar lines to what it was in 2017 under Coyle. Selling assets, no money, cheap loans and a manager who shouldn't be here. You can credit them for pumping in essential funds to keep the club in business and meet their liabilities and commitments. But all this trajectory is going to deliver is further decline and loss of assets on free transfers. Stupidity and short sightedness. Next news is we lose Lenihan and Nyambe on free transfers and you will be using FFP as an excuse on why we can't do anything. Sort one and the other follows.

Middlesbrough are losing millions a year too. When they came down from the PL they squandered their parachute cash under Garry Monk, spending tens or millions largely on dross. This was in 2017 so not long ago. Then they fired Monk and his staff, brought in Pulis for a year or two. Then he left and they had Woodgate then sacked him and got Warnock. I think the reality of the situation is they have an owner with a desire to spend and ambition to back his manager as much as possible. We have excuse makers, liars, charlatans who will hide behind any excuses they can find and FFP is a blessing for them to do so. I simply don't accept that Middlesbrough are able to do business as I identified above yet despite selling Armstrong, spending very little on fees for players in the last 2 years and slashing the wage bill that we are still treading carefully on FFP. Does it not occur to you that Venkys might have just got fed up of spending and turned the taps off again? Thanks also for confirming my point which was that the transfer fees are always reserved for the strikers. Rothwell a free agent, Davenport a minimal fee, Rodwell free, Palmer and Reed loans Mowbray now saying he will only get funds if it is on a striker. More reason to believe the owners will only sanction cash on a player if certain requirements are met.

The fact you mention Rhodes brings me back to another relevant point to this discussion though. Cast our minds back to 2012. There was some horrendous business done with Murphy, Gomes, Etuhu and co. coming in on free transfers but substantial wages (sounds familiar). Then all of a sudden, unexpectedly, out of the blue, late on in the window they suddenly spend a club record £8 million on Rhodes. A welcome addition who over the next 3.5 years would prove his value in goals but nonetheless an eyebrow raising deal for someone with little pedigree and none above League One. Plenty would argue that £8 million and his wages would have been better spent on 3-4 other positions signing decent players, but it seems that was never realistically going to happen and the Rhodes cash just materialised late on, either through change in circumstances or someone deciding to have a spend. Certainly similarities with the Brereton deal. After we got promoted from League One a sensible approach would have been to invest sensible fees in multiple positions to prepare and improve us for the Championship. Armstrong was a good one to get done and a decent fee but had already shown his qualities in his loan spell. Other than that what did we do on incomings? Little as I can recall. Then again, just as deadline day approaches we seem to have a big pot of cash that all goes out on one young British 'up and coming' CF, this time Brereton. Eyebrows raised, Forest can't believe their luck, yet all the hard currency goes on one player when it would probably be more sensible to spread it around. I'm not saying the owners are in this to make a profit, that will never happen due to their mismanagement, but I am saying that the only times they have stumped up the cash for significant transfer fees has been when someone at their end is persuaded or is confident that the player in question is going to quickly increase or at the least hold their value. To be fair it worked well with Rhodes and Armstrong. But they don't seem willing to spread that around the pitch. Like buying a couple of solid quality CBs or a game changing force in CM. People we can build a team around for a few years. Those positions have received pitiful investment regardless of who the manager has been. A bit like the figures are in our favour now we've just sold a player for £15 million+ and cut the wage bill massively?

Sorry if I've missed something but I'm not sure what Rhodes has to do with what I was on about. I was merely stating in my original post that in my opinion the only substantial fees Venkys have paid out on players in recent times have been on three strikers who they were persuaded or convinced were projects - young, English, likely to score goals - and thus would be most likely to attract big bids and big profits on their investments. Some might say that is a sensible way to operate - and I agree - to a limit. Of course signing people expecting them to improve and grow in value is sensible - but that has to apply across the board and be secondary to the priority of getting a squad for promotion. Since 2018 I think we are now looking at a profit on transfer fees with Armstrong and Raya out and Armstrong, Gallagher, Brereton, Pickering and Kaminski in. So it's really only the wages they've lost on - a lot of money - but they never seem to be too bothered about that. There have been a couple of other insignificant fees - a few hundred grand on Pickering, Kaminski and Davenport - find me a Championship club that hasn't at least found those sort of fees from time to time. The rest have all been loans or frees. Yes - I've credited the owners for allowing larger wages than they have to and larger than many rivals could afford. It seems to be the cash outlays that they don't like. This includes expenditure on facilities and The wages can get heaped onto the payroll or the debt mountain and doesn't require them to agree to sanction extra spending.

Middlesbrough lining up loan deal for Cameroon international midfielder James Lea-Siliki from Rennes - having missed out on Heerenveens Mitchell van Bergen, who opted for Stade Reims. They also still believe a deal for Sporting Lisbon striker Andraz Sporar is on track (Graeme Bailey). No FFP or Brexit issues for mighty Middlesbrough who aren't going cap in hand for injured Brighton reserve players.

What about them? I firmly believe that the cash buys you refer to were only sanctioned on the basis that all 3 players were expected to turn around substantial profits quickly. Armstrong did, could have been much more but suspect they are happy with their £10 million on him or whatever we ended up getting. The other two less likely but it is clear what the intention was/is with them. I don't think any of those cash purchases were sanctioned because Venkys believed those players were going to immediately improve the team or club. Don't get me wrong - Mowbray has had good backing and we've little to show for it - and yes Venkys do provide for a wage bill that some rivals could only dream of - but I don't think they are sat at home keen to see Rovers grow, prosper or succeed. I think Mowbray goes over there, persuades them to stump up some cash because it will turn a profit or whatever so they roll with it. Now the taps are off again because they are bored/disillusioned or whatever so we all have to suffer the consequences of the next phase of their confusion. For half of Brereton and Gallagher they could have rebuilt the Riverside, deep cleaned and upgraded Ewood, bought a new screen, installed a Desso Pitch and improved the fan experience. Yet there's nothing. Nowt to do with FFP just a general couldn't give a stuff attitude and do the bare minimum to get by.

Too busy rolling to finish reading my sentence which included the words IMPROVING IT. I acknowledge they pay bills and wages on time, as they are contracted to do, and as they have to do unless they want the Club taking off them by administrators. They will not spend on IMPROVING the club. Facilities, staff, structure - left to rot for a decade. That's why its the mess it is. Like having a house. Paying the mortgage on time and expecting gratitude and credit for it whilst sitting back letting the place fall down and diminish in value due to neglect.

Venkys want to run the club like a corner shop operation. Spend nothing on improving it, take no interest in it but pay the staff on time and make sure you trust the manager to run it for you. Absolutely incompatible with modern business of this size and complexity and especially in the weird world of football They haven't learned a thing on that front since the day they arrived. Just replaced Kean and Anderson with Mowbray and Waggott. Mowbray is at least a manager albeit a mediocre one and Waggott at least some background in running a club. Neither good enough, neither should be here yet Venkys let it rumble on whilst chucking millions down the drain.

Adam Armstrong now starting games and scoring for Southampton in the Premier League v Everton and Man Utd Harvey Elliott starting games for Liverpool in the Premier League. We had both last season and Mowbray delivered a relegation battle and an eventual 15th place finish. Makes me wonder. How on earth this mon is still in a job. But then again this is Tony Mowbray FC. He's more important than anyone and anything at Ewood Park. Outrageous really but the spin doctors down there assisted by the local media have already erased last season from memory and used Covid as the excuse for anything that happened in it. Meanwhile the rest of the football world lives in reality and gets on with things.

The permanent striker thing is just a red herring. They are feeding Sharpe scraps like this to keep the twitter legions and Telegraph readers quiet until the end of the window and keep them thinking that the Armstrong money will be getting reinvested and there's a chance we might get our own player of decent quality through the door. Incapable of issuing contracts even to our own academy products, let alone players coming in. I'll be happy to be proved wrong but suspect we get to deadline day with the 'working on' line keep getting pushed then the window slams shut, no permanent signing comes in, then it will be talk about revisiting deals in January which is 'only' a few months away then when the time comes there's no money and it's a bad time to do business. Having us on this lot. Remember - always tomorrow, never today Signings, tickets, pitch, improvements, contracts - always being worked on, planned, intended - rarely materialise under the con men.

Excellent start to the season? 2 wins, 2 defeats and a draw is excellent? Decent or better than expected yes. Lesson to learn here is that no matter who he has or what combination of players he uses we still concede goals. It comes down to coaching, organisation and resilience. In short supply here with this mon who thinks he's Pep.

I'm expecting a narrow defeat here. Middlesbrough have had a bit of a sticky start to the season. A good draw at Fulham, narrow win at home v Bristol City, narrow defeat at home v QPR and a draw at Derby. Not a great start but solid. We seem to have had the better of Warnock over the last few years. I remember us beating his Rotherham side at their place last game of the season, then when he was Cardiff manager we seemed to do ok against them, often drawing, then last year we picked up 4 points against his Middlesbrough side. Expect a low scoring affair. I can't see us keeping a clean sheet. Quite looking forward to this one but that's more to do with having a day out, a nice drive and seeing friends rather than visiting the Riverside or watching Rovers, neither of which I find particularly enjoyable these days.

This isn't true. Media and commercial income has continued throughout and even increased by way of additional payments from Sky/PL clubs to bridge the gap. Ticketing revenues collapsed yes but this applies to every club and given the numbers we have turning up is a smaller loss than most have had to cope with. Many fans, myself included, have had enough of lies, contempt and bullsh1t from the club. Like promising a price reduction last season then 3 months later hiking prices for all during a pandemic. The club chose to do that. They have to live with the consequences. 25% less sales it is.

There is a mystery- like how we can sell a player for 8 figures, demolish the wage bill by releasing 15 players and yet still not be in a position to even be able to sign a few free agents, restricted instead to a handful of teenage loans. Operating in line with FFP also means ensuring assets are under contract, not what is happening here. Red herring this FFP stuff. This is on the owners and management not the rules.

It seems the stumbling block is the club offering any sort of lump sum or contractual commitment. Unable to extend players contracts. Unable or unwilling to pay out any fee. I find myself hoping that the reason for this is that Venkys are at the end of their tether and are packing their bags. Or, a slightly less exciting prospect, that Mowbray is on his last legs and they are refusing any further backing for him (albeit risking our Championship status and squad in the process). We should be so lucky. The more likely scenario is they just haven't bothered picking up the phone or having a meeting about Rovers recently so in the meantime the club limps along on its own meagre resources. Shambles.

Am I alone in being absolutely sick and fed up and bored stiff of this whole farce? The club is an embarrassment. I remember the good old days when we used to be better than the likes of Leeds. Better first team, better academy, above them in the pecking order. Yes, that was the case not 20-30 years ago but 4-5 years ago. We used to turn up at their ground and outplay them. Recently. Now we are gratefully accepting Leeds' kindness in allowing one of their youngsters out to us for the season. I suspected as much when we got Leeds to come to Ewood pre-season - I knew they would have their hopes pinned on Leeds returning the favour by sending someone our way for the year. Some call this good management. I call it corner cutting. Reading the Leeds' Director of Football comments on the move: "We feel Ian can make an impact here in the future and we've been very impressed with how Blackburn have developed players such as Harvey Elliott at Liverpool" Life comes at you fast doesn't it? As I say, only a few years ago we were better than Leeds, now they see us as a destination for their kids to go and develop. Some people might be impressed or happy at the Leeds' director of football seeing us as a good place to send their prospects. I'm not impressed or happy with it. I think all it does is highlight how they have rapidly progressed and how we have rapidly regressed in the space of a few years to the extent that they are now a million miles ahead of us. This is the way Venkys and their stooges want us to be. Basically a farm for the big boys down the road to send their prospects to develop then take back and enjoy the benefit of. If that's the way you want to do business so be it. But there won't be many more Adam Armstrong fees and there certainly won't ever be a promotion off it. I can't accept that.

Could always get a bargain with the 'meal deal' which is £8.50 for a hot dog and a pint.

We are in an embargo now. Or at least we might as well be. We could still sign teenagers on loan if we were under one. There are clubs under League restrictions and embargoes who have done more business than us. Remember the last time we were under an embargo? We still signed players (albeit poor ones). Nonetheless we handed out permanent deals on OK looking signings at the time - Danny Guthrie and Hope Akpan, and a very solid loan in Tom Lawrence. So all this talk about avoiding FFP trouble - what's the point? Where has it got us? We still can't sign anyone by the looks of things. Unless the truth is that Venkys have decided that no contracts are being issued and no signings authorised. This would make a lot more sense.

"I see some shoots of hope. The players work extremely hard, but it's a man's game," "They're babies in a man's league. "I probably let them down by not getting in the big 6ft 4in centre-half we were after, who could have been a man and help us keep clean sheets. "We knew what the budget was but we didn't get our targets. You can't build a club off loans. They have to invest in footballers they can keep and build on. "It's important that this group of players get support. I have not seen a team better than us this season but, if you can't put them in and you can't keep them out, you're going to struggle. "If they stick together, with the support of people, they can. The club needs to grasp the opportunity of keeping their young players." Tony Mowbray - September 2016 after leaving Coventry City in ruins. Anyone spot any similarities?