JHRover

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.

The interesting thing will be what Rovers (Waggott, Shadow Man and Mowbray) do re. Nyambe now that they have 3 weeks to get some money for him or he goes for nothing. Whatever the reasons it is clear that unless Rovers change their approach he won't be staying. The awkward part is the league position and the fact that Nyambe has been a central part of the team and defence that has been the best in the league over the last couple of months. It is awkward because you start changing that - as we saw yesterday - and things can rapidly unravel. All very well bringing in a replacement but you'd be doing well to find someone who is going to improve what we've had since November. The 'loan with a view to buy' is typical Waggott. No cash required now, an option without commitment to pay down the line. Always tomorrow, just like all his other plans and claims. If Rovers are keen to claw in some money now then they do so taking a huge risk at a critical time. The other obstacle is that interested parties may well just wait 5 months and get him for nothing than pay cash now. Therefore expect to see increasing attempts by Rovers to push him out now. This will include public advertisements as to his availability, mysterious injuries and absences and rumours of unhappiness. Text book stuff its been going on here for the last 10 years. Best get used to it folks because unless we get promoted there's going to be the same thing happening with Kaminski, Lenihan, Travis and Buckley in the next 18 months. Amazing they must all be making unreasonable demands and have daft agents. Or maybe the problem is at Rovers end?

Don't think I've ever seen us win at Wigan. My first visit there was the 5-3 defeat at Xmas (Santa Cruz game) Since then think we've had a couple of draws and 3-4 defeats. I'm expecting a strong side from Mowbray and expect us to beat them. We are a league above them and a better side.

Yes I have considered that possibility. Then I naturally come to the next question rather than merely shrugging my shoulders and blaming those nasty agents (everyone's favourite villain in football). Why would it possibly be that someone like Nyambe - who has been here since childhood, made the grade to first team regular, playing every week in a side pushing for promotion - actively want to leave this club? There are only two acceptable explanations - that he expects to be able to get a move to a club higher in the pyramid (i.e. Premier League - very unlikely IMO) or that he knows he can get substantially better money at other clubs. Assuming he doesn't have PL clubs lining up for him that means Championship or abroad. Who in the Championship can and will offer them more than we can given our losses and investment from the owners? Other explanations might include that he doesn't want to play for this manager or he is unhappy at the club - neither of which seem to be the case going off his performances this season. Of course you might be right - but then I want to know why and what is going to be done about it - we cannot lose 2-3 key players every year on free transfers with a shrug of the shoulders blaming the player/agents. We need to look at this with great concern not just 'oh well, plenty more fish in the sea' (which we can't afford because we haven't brought any money in because all our assets have walked)

I said it at the start of the window and I'll keep saying it every day until the end of it. I find it bizarre to say the least that there are even notions of selling any of our first team players at this point with the form we are in. I am probably more surprised than anyone at the form we have been in and the position we find ourselves in and with that in mind and the standard of the division at present this is the best opportunity we will ever have (at least until we get decent owners) of getting promoted. With the prize on offer it would be bonkers to start shuffling the deck, selling or replacing key first team members. It just isn't necessary if the aim and ambition is promotion. We aren't just talking about another flirtation with the play-offs here - top two is achievable. No surprises that this Dutch lad is 'loan with option to buy' - another crafty move by Waggott no doubt. Get Nyambe out the door for a few million to whoever will pay, bring in a loan until the summer to keep people quiet and then worry about whether we can ever pay the transfer fee down the line (probably not). Seems to me that there are insidious elements in the media (some perhaps close to home) who are absolutely determined to fan speculation at the Club. The only outgoings should be Poveda, Clarkson and perhaps one or two of the kids. There should of course be some incomings - no problem with the Dutch lad if it is a loan to compete/eventually replace Nyambe but doubt that will happen.