JHRover

A manager out of ideas and ambition offers Bell a new deal. By direct extension that means a club out of ideas and ambition because Blackburn Rovers in 2021 is Tony Mowbray and vice versa. Cheap, easy, safe is the mantra here. Far better just sticking with mediocrity that costs little than striving for better. Apply that to the dugout as well as the pitch and boardroom. A club with an ounce of ambition would jettison the manager, coaching staff and mediocre players and aim for better. Not here though. Tony is the best we can hope for, he is the oracle on all things football and cannot be questioned with his 5 star CV. Mind you I'm sure what comes next transfer wise will make Bell and Bennett seem good and justify new deals. Hope they are alright in a relegation scrap because that's where we are headed.

The other theory is that Pickering isn't a Mowbray signing, and he has no desire nor intention to use him next season, so his solution to that problem is to give Bell another year and play him instead.

Predictable and depressing.

Yes, but preceded by the usual talk about how the owners have made money available and how we are targeting/bidding for decent players but are refusing to be ripped off by greedy unreasonable players/agents. Like Bauer and the ridiculous suggestion he was demanding £40k a week, or demanding a guarantee to play every week. So this will all earn positive publicity but in the end yeah, it will be whoever City, Liverpool and Everton have who they want regular game time for and whoever Neil Warnock wants rid of at Boro. Exciting times.

We aren't even in a position to offer new contracts to senior or even junior squad members, or get season tickets on sale to bring in much needed income. The chances of us doing anything to bring in players from other clubs, especially when they would require a transfer fee and the club in question is gearing up for the play-offs, is virtually non-existent.

Oh good. Another Mowbray directed appointment to the coaching staff of a close friend of his. Should make him even more indispensable. Good news for the car share back to Teesside though. Why would Billy Barr retire? How old is he? I do find it remarkably convenient how all these people out of contract we are deciding not to renew the contracts of. Of course the reality is that the likes of Holtby, Evans and Bennett could be brilliant and essential to our futures and we wouldn't have sorted out new contracts for them. Only have to look at the Armstrong, Nyambe, JRC and Rothwell situations to see that. Lets not pretend they are following a plan here. They aren't. These people are out of contract and we can't offer them new terms. Convenient that most of them are replaceable but that's a secondary issue.

I think the reason we failed FFP and got placed under the embargo, along with numerous other clubs, is because the club hasn't yet submitted its accounts. So it is an administrative issue, rather than the EFL assessing our books and adjudging us to be in breach of spending limits (which won't happen due to Covid otherwise everyone would be in breach). But I think Waggott will use this to justify player sales and limited spending. Try to convince people that we simply have to sell people and spend little to get ourselves compliant with the rules. Suits the 'never refuse a cheque' owners down to the ground. Never shy to take advantage of a situation to direct blame elsewhere this lot.

Oh yes, I expect a ban on interviews would hurt the Telegraph more than it would Rovers But, by the same token, Rovers are not in a position of strength here, a ban on the Telegraph would impact negatively on them too. There's a reason Rovers use the Telegraph to advertise and for interviews - they know full well it is just about the only way they can reach a large portion of their fanbase on a regular basis. Lose that link and they could lose even more fans (if they care).

This thing works both ways though. The local media-club relationship is not a one way street. Not at our level. A PL club like Newcastle could get away with ostracizing a local paper if they didn't toe the line, but Rovers couldn't. Rovers depend on the Telegraph as its mouthpiece, particularly to the older generations of fans not hooked onto Facebook and Twitter. So they would have to be very careful about cutting off that particular avenue. Rovers burn their bridges with the Telegraph and they lose their biggest outlet in the local area.

Yeah but Ben Brereton said we are on a good run and were looking to take that into next season. I can only assume Mowbray has been telling the players that and he is happy with results. Even more worrying is that some people seem to believe we are on a good run and that a corner has been turned.

Now now. There's a 'massive summer' and a 'rebuild' needed at this football club. Exciting times for the local media as transfer gossip and rumours should fill weeks of headlines and articles. It seems there is some sort of acceptance that Mowbray is or should be the man to lead this rebuild. It is nauseating. The question the Telegraph and others should be running with is "Why do we need such a rebuild?" and "Why the hell do you Tony deserve the chance to lead it?" It seems neither of those questions have or will be put to anyone in any position of authority at the club. It seems the two wins over dire Derby and horrific Huddersfield at home have re-written the narrative and it is now full steam ahead, certainly in the public comments. Personally I don't think Mowbray's position has ever been in any doubt as they have exactly what they have always craved here. A stooge running the show however they want with little or no need for them to waste any of their time on it. This is how Mowbray has been able to set the whole show up as he wants and how Waggott got the job, and how the training ground sham took off. The only way this would even possibly change is if mystery man Pasha went back to them and put forward a strong business case to get rid - e.g. that Championship status was under immediate threat - and that won't have happened. The question I, and many others, will be asking themselves is whether I can support, finance and invest in a club where there is no accountability for results, no pressure on the manager and no consequences to poor results. This means we are not a club that is trying to be the best it can be. A fundamental element of being a professional football club is not in place here. Does that deserve my support?

The real sickener won't be losing Armstrong. I think we all appreciate that if a PL club comes in then it is probably fair for all parties to let him progress his career elsewhere away from muddled Mowbray. The real sickener, won't even be that Mowbray will still be here to oversee his sale and replacement. The real sickener will be when in our increasing desperation to get him sold this summer that we end up taking knock down bids from garbage like the relegated PL sides looking for immediate goals - someone like Fulham or Sheff Utd. Then having got a drastically reduced fee for him on what we could have had we will then get Waggott playing the victim about how hard up we are and how we need to screw our remaining fans some more to make up for it.

I often hear about how replacing Mowbray is a huge risk and Venkys are likely to get someone worse. Then I look at his last club, Coventry, who after getting rid of him have gone from strength to strength despite still being lumbered with the same owners. Why couldn't we have a post Mowbray upturn?

Yes, and he's using the oldest trick in the book at the moment by pretending to be cracking on with a plan and a budget. Of course there isn't one but it shifts attention away when directing focus onto transfers and plants it into minds that he needs to be here to deliver the plan.

I don't know what is worse. That Mowbray is planning on being here in the summer and next season. That Crewe players are the extent of our capabilities/ambitions Or that we probably won't even be able to get them as Venkys won't have even considered a budget yet.

Its the perfect storm. Poor manager and coaches means promising player(s) doesn't realise his potential. Promising players then run down their contracts and look to leave, ending up at rival Championship club with better coaches where they prosper. We get nothing or very little to show for it, other clubs can pick up our academy produce on the cheap and polish them up into gems under proper contracts worth Big money. We stick with the same old coaches and wait for the next batch to come and go. Due to crap management/coaching people think the players aren't very good, until they go elsewhere and perform. Having to sell your assets is a fact of life where we are but not even coining it in when we get good players coming through in our financial position is simply inexcusable.

Ben Brereton wants to keep this 'run' going into next season. Stop the world. I want to get off. This run that has seen us overcome two horrendous teams at home in Derby and Huddersfield and get beat at 2nd bottom Sheffield Wednesday. If the players think we are on a run they need help. No doubt this is being fed to them by Mowbray and co. and back to the owners. All in good time for a wipe clean of the slate and off for the summer to go through his tortuous recruitment again.

Today's reason why we should keep St Mowbray as manager is that we managed, supposedly against all the odds, to get Harvey Elliott in on loan for the season.

https://tickets.bristol-sport.co.uk/screenloader.aspx?type=include&page=custom/documents/html/genre/bristol-city.html Bristol City got theirs on sale. Today they announced a permanent deal with Pearson. Adults from £355. Benefits: £10 credit for merchandise, 10% discount on concourses, discounts on away travel and discount on hospitality. Can't wait to see what we have planned. Only 6 weeks to wait. Shame about that pandemic causing havoc with plans.

Probably the equivalent of brining in snake oil salesman Senior in January 2017 to lead us to survival rather than just sacking the inept manager.

https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/sport/19266195.mowbray-reveals-question-marks-defensive-recruitment/ I don't think I can endure another summer of Mowbray's transfer musings. It's bad enough watching his teams and having terrible results but another 3 months of this? We know what he will do with the defence. Ayala will return to fitness in time for the warm weather and pre season. He will impress and will be lauded as 'like a new signing' and his presence will resolve any defensive issues. He will pin other hopes on the return of Scott Wharton, who hopefully gets fit ASAP, but it is a huge gamble with an injury of that nature. He will 'have a look' at Carter and Magloire in the pre season games. But when the serious stuff comes round they won't feature as he won't trust them, saying that this is man's position and we need experience. We then wait until deadline day or beyond and bring in a couple of cheap loans of teenagers from other clubs. Ayala gets injured by September and doesn't feature. So so predictable yet there are many people who will go through it all again and wipe the slate clean ahead of the new season. I just hope and pray this guy is going through this for PR purposes and doesn't genuinely have any go ahead from the owners for next season. presumably his next one will be to show everyone what great players he has lined up and how much work he has done on recruitment, so we can't possibly sack him now.

Unless they trigger it then immediately try to sell him for whatever they can get, which i think is probably the most likely outcome from this.

To be honest even if Macron are inferior quality to Umbro (I'm not sure they are) it would just be nice to have a kit supplier who can provide a good range of stuff at an affordable price and not run out of stock every year. I used to make a habit of buying a t-shirt, tracksuit top and coat from the shop every year. The way it has ended up under Umbro that just cannot be justified any more. The designs are very similar each year, the pricing has just got ridiculous and the range of products abysmal. If we were to get ourselves a similar range to what Forest have, and charge similar prices, then there's all sorts - hoodies, tops, polo shirts, t shirts - and they are all at what i would describe as a reasonable price - £20-30. Not £50 like Umbro charge for tracksuit bottoms. This merchandise is out of date after less than a year, so I'm not too bothered about it being something that lasts forever. I'd be willing to sacrifice on quality if the range and price was good.

I do wonder sometimes how much, if anything, actually gets sent back to the owners. For people seemingly content to chuck £20 million a year into this black hole you do have to wonder why they would baulk at a much needed pitch replacement, or a lick of paint around Ewood, the costs of which would be insignificant in the scheme of things. There's a theory that Waggott is here because it reduces the hassle to the owners and they can leave things be year to year without needing to bother themselves with the mundane requirements of running a football club. Waggott has presumably sold himself and his salary to them on the basis he can handle it all and will save them money, so I imagine running to them cap in hand with a request for another couple of million cash to rip the pitch up might not be something he wants to do or bring attention on himself for, even if the owners might well approve it if asked. Then again it is equally plausible that the owners, clueless as they are, don't understand the importance of having a decent playing surface or the risks of neglecting this, and so don't see it as essential expenditure. I've said for a while we have two levels to this club. The operation down at Ewood, which includes the facilities and pitch, and the first team which includes Mowbray and his spending. It's an insane way to do business but on it goes. I do wonder what else gets put forward or suggested at the Blackburn end but then doesn't end up ever seeing the light of day in India, or maybe vice versa. Where there is such a void and such various interests and agendas it makes me very suspicious.

Think Sharpe should go and try to find out who from Rovers went running to Sky Sports before the Middlesbrough match in January and told them we had arranged for a £2 million pitch replacement. A lesson for anyone who listens to those at the club - don't - they couldn't lie straight in bed. They'll tell people anything to keep them quiet, promises of x, y and z at a future date, it won't materialise. Especially important lesson in view of the training ground con.