The two Venky stooges running the operation at Ewood have bonuses and pensions to build up and they know their quickest route to doing that is to cut costs, sell players and sell more season tickets. I'm increasingly convinced that the lack of contract renewals since Gregg Broughton departed is a direct result of them wanting 'high' earners out and off the wage bill so that the stooges can collect more pay for 'saving' the Indian imbeciles money (of course it doesn't actually save them money, it just means they have to spend it later). It will soon be season ticket time and their ruinous selfish and short term policies are going to achieve another drastic fall in sales. They will come up with some sort of scheme to try and force existing ST holders to renew quickly before their summer transfer 'plans' unfold and everyone sees what the 'ambition' here is. Until then they will play the 'Ismael revolution' card as it is tried, tested and most importantly free. The problem they have is that this is the third time they are playing this in the space of 4 years and the first two times around their approach has cost us two good and popular managers. Even if, and this is highly unlikely, Ismael is as good as JDT and Eustace, they'll act to undermine him come January 2026 in any event. People are seeing through it now but the stooges don't have many other cards left to play. They didn't have many to start with, and are running out of options with many now recognising where the problem is and deciding they've had enough. Personally the thought of handing over my hard earned money again to support the stooges' wage and pension increases after they've destroyed our squad and promotion prospects makes precious little sense whichever way you look at it.

The 'rebuild' line is only going to be spouted more and more and more over the coming 3-4 months as form hits disastrous levels and we slide down the Championship table. The stooges are going to need to come up with something somehow to try and stop a calamitous drop off in already poor season ticket sales. They have done everything they can to ensure sales are poor over the course of the last few years but will now try a few minor things to try and arrest that decline. We saw one yesterday with the 'safe standing' story. The cost of fitting a few hundred safe standing rails across the back corner of the BBE dressed up as investment in Ewood and listening to fans/trying to improve the atmosphere. It is pathetic. Most Championship clubs have had safe standing for years, in far larger numbers than our few hundred spaces. But it is a cheap gimmick to try to distract people from what is going on. We know that Rovers have deliberately run down the contracts of all senior players over the last few years. Deliberate. No attempt made to renew any contracts. This wanton reckless policy has left us in a position where it is inevitable that most of our senior players will either be out of contract/loan, coming into the last 12-24 months, looking elsewhere and wanting to move on. Therefore a huge turnover in personnel is necessary. They will dress this up as a good thing, desirable, exciting. Unfortunately with Nixon in overdrive every Sunday morning and the Football Manager laptop brigade speculating about who we are going to sign, people will delude themselves into thinking this rebuild is going to lead to a brighter future and a revolution in our approach/playing style. Been there, done that. It is a cost cutting measure, designed to trim the wage bill further and inevitably means we end up with youngsters, kids, and short term deals. Basically a modern version of the old Accy Stanley or Oyston's Blackpool, having to throw together a squad at the last minute every year. Ismael will probably have been told that the club is serious, has plans, will invest, will allow him to build something. It won't. They lie.

A ruse to distract the masses. And as usual a half-hearted low cost attempt of just an initial few hundred seats and then 'we'll see' about more later on.

He ended up here by accident due to the external intervention of Broughton, and very quickly both realised that what the club appears to be from the outside, what you are told when coming in, and what you find when you are through the door, are very different things, and it is unworkable under these owners. An opportunity dropped into our lap with JDT to become something and get somewhere, and our great wonderful leaders did their level best to destroy it, and did so in a little over a year. He was never the problem, he was an asset with the capabilities of taking this club up a level. Never forgive, never forget. They'll put on a performance via their stooges over the next 3-4 months as they gear up to earn their bonuses by hitting ST targets, they'll wheel Gestede out for some interviews, make promises on signings, the usual lot will be fooled by Nixon's Sunday rumours every week. It means nothing. The poison remains.

Maybe despite being a Rovers fan his girlfriend wanted to live within walking distance of Spotland so decided he was moving there?

Many of the players will have knowingly or subconsciously downed tools. For the first 2/3 of this season they worked their socks off, overcame the odds, turned what most expected to be a relegation battle this season into a play-off push, and clearly loved playing under Eustace who had crafted a well coached and well organised unit out of them. Whilst they - manager, staff, players - have gone about this season in terrific fashion, showing commitment, dedication, hard work to overcome the odds (odds that these owners have stacked against us to start with) the opposite can be said of the owners and board, who have taken every opportunity available to them this season to prevent a play-off push being sustained: An outright refusal to offer new terms to players who have given so much this season, who deserve new deals and to know where their futures lie. The end result is that circa 50% of our squad is due to leave in the next 10 weeks The remaining 50% 'lucky' enough to be under contract to 2026 or beyond will know from their agents and mates just what is going on and will be wanting to avoid a similar fate themselves, so will be looking towards the exit door asap The ownership and board have created the conditions for Eustace and his team to actively look to get out of our play-off push in February, preferring instead to gamble their careers and reputations on trying to keep Derby County out of League One. I cannot overstate just what an unprecedented and alarming move that was Despite all clearly not being well with Eustace for some time, no steps taken by the board to alleviate those issues, improve his deal, extend his terms or at least allow some reasonable funding into January to support him, this equates to active sabotage in my book - they were aware of issues and had multiple opportunities to head off trouble and instead did nothing, allowing it to unfold In one swoop demolishing the tight team spirit and bonds built up over the preceding 12 months at a critical time of the season A terribly bad transfer window, failing in every conceivable way to strengthen the team. The players will have seen those turning up at Brockhall and would know what was going on. Then appointing Ismael to come in with 10 games to go, upsetting the apple cart further. THEY have created this untenable situation. I don't blame the players. Would it be any different at any other club where the ownership and board knowingly and deliberately scupper and waste the team's efforts? The players probably naively believed that if they hauled us into contention in December then the owners would reward them with new deals and make an attempt at promotion. They were seriously mistaken. An easy mistake to make because at 99.9% of other professional organisations those in charge would want to be successful and improve/grow/get promoted/retain assets. Now that it is there for the avoidance of any doubt (it's actually happened 4 times now going back to Mowbray's days) the question is what next. A mass exodus of players dressed up under the banner of 'Ismael's revolution' in the summer is my guess. Aim of this not being to rebuild or strengthen but to slash costs further whilst deluding the paying people into thinking it is with progress in mind. Less and less people are falling for this I have noticed.

All part of the plan. Anyone capable of getting a move elsewhere will be on to their agents pushing for it. Then Rovers can pretend they've offered them all new terms but the players are angling for moves elsewhere leaving poor old Rovers powerless to do anything other than sell the lot of them and replace with frees, all under the banner of giving Ismael the players he wants to get his plans off the ground. Unfortunately within a couple of weeks of this season ending there will be plenty in the fanbase subscribing to this scheme and going along with it.

True, That's kind of the whole point and idea behind the play-off system. Most teams in the top half and even the upper bottom half will continue to be within 'striking distance' of the play-offs right up to the last few games of the season. It's what makes it so exciting for the neutral and keeps so many teams interested up to the end of the season. We've seen enough to say we are out of it. Players have, understandably, downed tools. If you are told no new contract offers by the club when sat in the top 6 it must be hard to continue to motivate yourself to fight for the cause. Of course the probability is this is deliberate from the hierarchy to demotivate and derail our campaign now that survival is secured and another round of cuts and sales is on the horizon. Pay increases are there to be earned.

Anyone need upsetting even more than they are already just think about how Waggott will be chuckling away to himself in his car on the way back down to Kent, job done for another year, no relegation, another round of cost cutting coming this summer, pissed off most of the players to the point where anyone with sense will push to leave, managed to successfully steer us away from top 6 contention again after deliberately derailing us (again) in January. Never mind, another year on the gravy train and potentially another pay hike to come!

When the club forces the popular and overperforming manager out in February to bottom of the league Derby, once again sabotages our promotion hopes with a dismal January window, deliberately runs down the contracts of the players who put us in the top 6 and then appoints a strange and unimpressive character as manager Is it any wonder the players are downing tools? I'm not saying they should as they are paid professionals but apply the above to any other club and you'd probably get the same reaction as we have seen here since January. It is an inevitable result of the owners/boards actions (inactions).

Only one step on from the grotesque half-hearted efforts under our lot to 'sponsor' the Riverside by plastering their logo along the ad boards at the top, now covered by grime and filth after 5 years without being cleaned or replaced so barely visible in parts.

You make out like these were achievements. WBA were fresh out of the PL and armed with cash and a strong squad. Being in the top 6 for such a side is not particularly impressive, and they were on the slide having been top after the first few months. Watford is more difficult to judge given their turnover in managers and it is correct to point out that others like Wilder and Bilic have struggled there in recent seasons but again, I don't consider 9th for their squad to be anything to congratulate.

Almost as big a basket case. Despite all the hullabaloo about him he at least turns up from time to time and acknowledges he owns a football club. Hell he even got Rohl to sign a new improved deal in the summer which our lot have forgotten the meaning of.

Eustace will keep Derby up I'm sure, some of the Rovers lot are going to end up with egg all over their faces. If anything Cardiff and Derby winning only makes tomorrow that much more difficult. Stoke simply have to beat us looking at that table. We know how that usually goes.

Out of interest when is it early enough to judge him? 10 games? End of the season? Next season? Xmas? I think it is unlikely that he will be here by March 2026. Why? Well our record on managers outside of Mowbray and Bowyer (who got an audience in India) is very short. Berg/Appleton/Lambert/Coyle/JDT/Eustace - averaged what, well under a year each? Berg and Appleton about a month each, Lambert 6-7 months, Coyle 7 months, JDT 19 months but he was offering to leave after 12 and Eustace 12 months and he was offering to leave after earlier than that if reports of him applying for other jobs is true. So that's 6 managers going back now 13 years under Venky ownership none of whom last very long. The only exceptions those who got to go to India. Add into that mix that Ismael himself has an extremely short lifespan at clubs. 8 different teams managed in 10 years, never lasting more than 1 season at a club and an average of 26 games in charge. That would cause me concern if he was coming into a normal club, which we are certainly not. Combine all the above and I'd say it would be a miracle if he sees out a year or the 2025/26 season. When do you judge him during that time? Is he allowed to lose the next 10 because it isn't his squad or at some point in that time do you criticise?

A momentous occasion tarnished by Venky occupation and their stooges who should be nowhere near the club. What should be an occasion to celebrate and savour undermined by the poisonous regime. I think people expecting the club to have planned very much at all are optimistic. I suspect at best we will get twitter videos from Dunny, Morten, Faz, Garner, Friedel, Bennett and a few others and then perhaps an overpriced 'dinner' event in the Premier Suite. That's the most they will do because it will be relatively easy to arrange and won't cost them anything. Anything else they will be hoping/expecting the fans themselves to come up with and arrange. A bit like when they expected crowdfunding to raise the cash to instal safe standing rails, they'll sit back and wait for fan groups to suggest ideas and then poo poo those that are going to cost anything or require any bold action. They'll dress this up as involving fan groups in important decisions but really it is just shifting the work away from those paid to do it.

We don't do 'early bird' because we don't get them released early enough. If they are on sale before the end of this season I'll be very surprised and that leaves insufficient time in May/June/July to run a proper early bird process. The time for that is February to May. Your pricing would require a substantial reduction across the board. Have you seen or heard anything at Rovers in the last 10 years to think that they are going to slash prices? I haven't. What we will get is the old Waggott favourite of strings attached to an offer whereby if you commit 'early' e.g. within a few weeks of them being on sale and hand over your money in June then you'll get a £25 discount. The idea here is to force the regulars worried about losing their seats to buy early and then they are committed before the summer firesales and negligent recruitment gets underway and they can't then back out,

Why? How could they be worse than the current lot? I feel a need to remind you of a few facts as it seems that you are now reverting to the old 'but who would buy us' routine, of course potential buyers are not going to waste their time and play their hands going public about their ability/willingness to buy Rovers when they are up against a stubborn refusal to even speak about a sale. Would you go around putting offers on houses that weren't for sale or would you move when the 'For Sale' signs went up? Here's a quick list of clubs in England that have changed ownership/control in the last 10-15 years of Venky destruction of Rovers: Everton, Man Utd, Aston Villa (twice), Wolves, Newcastle, Leicester, Southampton (twice), Forest (twice), Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Bournemouth, Fulham Non-PL clubs: Burnley, Blackpool, Bolton (twice), Wigan (twice), Stockport, Salford, Wrexham, Port Vale, Burton, Chesterfield, Mansfield, Notts County, Sheffield Utd (twice), Sheffield Wednesday, Barnsley, Huddersfield (twice), Leeds (twice), Hull, Sunderland (twice), Norwich, Ipswich, MK Dons, Coventry, Birmingham (twice), West Brom, Swansea, Newport, Bristol Rovers, Swindon, Reading (soon to be twice), Wycombe (twice), QPR, Portsmouth, Gillingham, Carlisle, Morecambe, Accrington, Charlton (twice), Leyton Orient, Lincoln, Cambridge, Oxford (twice) I'm sure there are others I can't think of. Why do you, and others, think that new owners would avoid a Championship Blackburn Rovers, one promotion away from the PL, yet would get involved with all those other clubs?

I agree. I think things will pan out that way. I think we needed a wise old head who would be able to come in and put his arm around the players and get them 100% focused on the rest of the season and galvanise us. I think there will have been a lot of deeply unhappy and angry players in that dressing room after the unprecedented occurrence of a top 6 manager joining a club at the bottom mid-season (it isn't normal, despite what the club and media attempt to portray). Whilst Ismael has a reasonable CV and reasons for some optimism with his track record he just doesn't strike me as the sort who will do the above. I've read and heard things that he's probably the opposite of what Eustace was. I find it totally crackers that a bloke who has managed 8 clubs in his short career, never lasted more than a season and averaged about 20-odd games in charge is then handed a 3+ year deal to come here. The only logic I can imagine with it is that whatever else we were offering - pay, budgets, guarantees - were not forthcoming so we had to offer him a long deal to persuade him to accept it. I suspect that a large number of our players will have been looking elsewhere anyway due to the club's decision to run their contracts down, but with the events of the last 5-6 weeks and then if Ismael is very different to Eustace I think a few will have had enough. I'm at the point where I suspect that is precisely what they wanted when they appointed him - makes it easier to deliver their plans if there are players actively wanting out.

Have we ever beat a Mark Robins managed team? Certainly didn't in all the time he was at Coventry. Don't expect that to change.

I doubt Waggott or the curtain twitcher in the shadows know between them what is going to be happening in the summer or next season as I doubt the wretches in India have decided or communicated that to them. They are probably working on the basis it will be business as usual - that being find another few players to sell, release a few, cut the wage bill down and then cobble together a squad that has enough to hit 50 points next season from a combination of the academy, loans and free agents. Exciting times. But the belief or suggestion that Gestede and Ismael have some sort of plan, project, strategy, and that Ismael should not be judged until that has settled into place, I can't accept. He won't be given the opportunity to assemble his own squad just as JDT and Eustace weren't. He won't be given the resources to recruit or develop a quality squad. He's walked into a club in a good place on the pitch, almost 3/4 of the way through a season and on track for the play-offs. Whether you have confidence in our ability to sustain that or not, that is the position he has inherited and he certainly cannot receive a free pass from February to May. His average tenure as a manager has been 26 games across his 8 senior teams. How long does he want/need here and why are we going to suddenly buck that trend with our 3 year inexplicable contract? Of course he isn't the problem or the issue here. But February to May was never a write off or settling in period. It was our best and probably last shot at play-offs and promotion and we are once again letting it slip before the talk then shifts to the good old 'projects' and squad overhauls which we all know is just an excuse to be on the road to nowhere and cut costs further.

We'd have been in the Premier League or would have gone very close to it if they had backed JDT in January 2023 or January 2024. If the owners had shown any interest, confidence, faith in the man they appointed to coach the team they'd have backed him to finish the job. Teams serious about getting promotion don't look to sell their best players in January. Instead he got Sorba Thomas on loan and then they actively sabotaged the rest by deliberately pulling the plug on the O'Brien and McGuire deals and then actively looking to sell Adam Wharton to raise some money.

I saw some photos from the Millwall v Bristol City game the other night. The ground was ridiculously empty. I'd be surprised if there were more than 4-5000 actually there, but of course the official attendance is printed as 12,300. Not a chance. QPR similar - loads of empty seats when we were there a few weeks ago This is happening all across the league. There aren't many that keep getting the numbers on for these daft games.. I'm not sure what their logic is when picking games - tonight it is Norwich v Oxford - surely they aren't suggesting that is anything more than a run of the mill fixture? Rovers gladly accepted a significant financial bonus for these Sky changes. That of course hasn't made its way into the stadium, ticket prices, transfer kitty, player contracts, but it might well have found its way into Slippery Steve's wage packet. Club costs haven't risen significantly by having to play on a Friday night or Sunday morning rather than a Saturday afternoon. Rather the opposite, costs are probably lower due to less people turning up. So what is that increased Sky money for if not to cover higher costs? Answer - it is to use to address the inevitable impact on gates. Some have realised this by reducing prices, but that's never going to happen here with this CEO and setup, not when his wages depend on it.

I don't believe Dolan has been offered a new deal, or if he has it is insultingly bad for someone at his age/experience/ability. There's one example. Of course they claim he has, and technically they could be right with that. But I won't be blaming Dolan - I will be blaming Rovers - when he departs for not sorting this out with an appropriate offer. I'm glad you've finally accepted that FFP is not the issue here. I've been saying it for 5+ years. Enough on Rothwell, we will go around in circles on that. I will hold Rovers accountable by using every platform I can to hold them responsible and take them to task for it. I will ask questions, scrutinise, criticise and blame. Not much more I can do that that other than totally disengage which is the final step I haven't quite reached yet. I think accepting their version of events and believing their fiction is simply falling into the Venky/Waggott trap and doing the job for them. Slippery Steve would love nothing more than everyone to believe that Rovers have done their very best and are blameless for what happens. Of course you can ask - yes I am a current season ticket holder - and will have a decision to make when they get around to renewals as I have the last few years. Each year it gets harder and harder to justify....there is a limit to my patience and it is rapidly approaching.

Updated list: 3pm Saturday home 'traditional' games: Watford, Millwall (Good Friday), Cardiff, Plymouth, Hull (Xmas), Sunderland (Boxing Day), Luton, Swansea, Bristol City, Oxford Home games moved for TV or other nonsense: Middlesbrough, Norwich, Wolves (FA Cup), PNE, Dingles, Leeds, Sheff Utd, QPR, Derby Midweek home games: Sheff Wed, Coventry, Portsmouth (postponed), Stoke, WBA, Away games at 'traditional' 3pm Saturday: Sheff Utd (guaranteed to be moved for TV as final day of the season), Sunderland (Easter Monday), Luton, Portsmouth, Derby, Swansea, Bristol City, Oxford, Millwall, Leeds (New Years Day), Hull, Plymouth, Norwich Away games moved for TV / other nonsense: Middlesbrough (FA Cup), Cardiff, Watford, PNE, Dingles Away games midweek: WBA, QPR, Sheff Wed, Middlesbrough, Coventry, Stoke As it stands 10 of our 23 home league games at 3pm kick off, including Xmas and Easter fixtures 8 moved for tv or other excuses 5 in the midweek slots, one of which was the Portsmouth postponement The penny doesn't seem to have yet dropped at Ewood that this diminishes the value of the product and a season ticket, evidenced by lower numbers turning up for those early/midweek fixtures.