Last 8 home games for Bristol City they've lost 4, drawn 2 and won 2. They've scored 3 goals in those 8 games. Their only other home win since September was a 1-0 against lowly Derby. Soft touch Rovers roll into town and it is like Christmas has come early for struggling sides. Its been the case for years and I'm sick of it.

The big question on my mind this morning is how the hell did we manage to lose at Bristol City? They're awful at the moment, and everyone else is going there and winning. Sums us up to be honest.

It really boils down to me to whether you are happy or content with being 12th in this division and sat above Barnsley on GD and below Luton. Bear in mind of course the financial disparity between us and those clubs, the losses we incur in comparison to those clubs and the fact that those two just avoided League One (by each beating us). Barnsley have also had to endure a managerial change this season. As far as I'm concerned that represents underachievement here. It makes an absolute mockery of Mowbray's slow build when Jones can turn Luton from relegation to being above us most of the season so far in a few short months and Barnsley can lose managers yet still cobble together as many points. That's before we look at personnel and expenditure. Those who celebrate our 'style' of play perhaps need to watch DVDs of West Brom in 2009 when they finished bottom whilst receiving plaudits for their style. I dont want to be that sort of club getting pats on the back from neutrals and opposition fans whilst not upsetting or troubling anyone. Mowbray had 3 years at Boro and 3 years here with everything stacked in his favour. Good clubs, autonomy, little pressure, healthy backing and has failed to smash the ceiling of 6th. My view is that it is because he isn't pragmatic nor ruthless enough to do what is needed to get there. The x number of points off the top 6 is just meaningless. We've had this now for 3 years. We are just as near or far off being in 19th place. Its mid table. I want promotion. I'm already very disappointed in Mowbray declaring his ambition to be 'around' the top 6 in May. I think that is pathetic and nothing more than covering his own back for the inevitable mid table finish (which will be 'around' the top 6 until the final few games). Even if he doesn't think we are capable of promotion he should be saying we are. I think he is just communicating with India and trying to buy himself more time at it now. Compare to others who set their ambitions for the top - promotion - and don't tolerate weakness or lowering of expectations.

Walton is out with a really bad injury.

Yes. It seems they get one batch delivered at the start of the season and once that's gone they don't get any more. Usually means they've plenty of left over small sized stuff at the end of the season but quickly run out of large. As you say its poor. If we can't order more stock I'd question what sort of merchandise deal we have here because 10 days before Xmas we shouldn't be running out of things and if we do we should get more in.

It doesn't really work like that though. If it did then the only time managers would ever get sacked would be between May and August. Sometimes you have to see the bigger picture. At most clubs you have owners or a board constantly reviewing performances and results and forming educated views. Here we are in a vacuum where the owners haven't any interest and the board seem to think Tony Mowbray is the greatest manager in our history to the extent that they commission huge flags of him. Can't imagine he's under any level of scrutiny from anyone other than a portion of the fanbase.

I think the squad is capable of more than is being delivered. Mowbray of course deserves credit for assembling that but also criticism for not making more of it. The flip side is that if the squad isn't good enough again that falls back on Mowbray. He's had more than enough time and money to get it to being good enough so if it isn't there now will it ever? I know that having 4 years in the job, not being forced to sell any key players and a net spend of £20 million is a luxury very few others get at this level. Injuries are par for the course. People mention Dack not being back yet but we've had 2 transfer windows to deal with his absence and despite it we are still top scorers so I dont accept his absence has caused us too much of a problem. Travis unfortunate and a big miss but we've a raft of midfielders signed by this manager to step into his shoes. If Lenihan isn't up to it, making mistakes or playing poorly it is the job of the manager to drop or replace him. Yet he's straight back in after suspension suggesting the manager is happy with him.

I'll put money on it now that at least one, probably two, of those clubs will finish in the top 6 of this league before we do.

I'm not suggesting that we should be run by an agent as we were in the dark days. I don't see any particular issue with taking advice or help from a well connected agent to identify the best people for jobs. I'd prefer that to Waggott, Cheston and Venkys leading a search.

Look at Reading. For the last 3-4 years they've been something of a basket case club. They had Jaap Stam who did a good job in getting them to the play-off final where they lost on penalties and then never really recovered from it (a reminder for all those who consider 6th to be the holy grail that it means very little if you lose in the final at Wembley). When they were beaten in the play-off final we had been relegated to League One. Since then we've supposedly done things the right way whilst by Mowbray's manual they've done it the wrong way with a high turnover in staff and players and dodging FFP rules, yet here they are looking down on us. After Stam went they've worked their way through Paul Clement, Jose Gomes, Mark Bowen and now Veljko Paunovic in the space of only a few years and have spent most of that time in the bottom half looking over their shoulders at relegation. Mark Bowen did a steady job last season results wise, collecting enough to steer them comfortably away from trouble to a mid-table finish. But that wasn't enough. It would have been very easy for their owners and directors to applaud Bowen and give him the time he had earned to see how he got on in the job. But they had other ideas and set about taking a different route and harshly/ruthlessly got rid of Bowen and immediately appointed Paunovic. This was a risky strategy, carried out whilst results under Bowen were reasonable and in the midst of the pandemic with the new season rapidly approaching. But they did their homework, found someone out there in the big wide world who they liked and thought would fit. A few short months later they have been in the top 6 all season and are fighting for a top 2 spot. Now maybe it won't last and maybe they will fall away and maybe we will end up finishing above them. But at the time of writing they've been above us all season and have spent more time in the top 6 this season than we have under Mowbray in nearly 3 seasons. No 4 year projects, no emotional decisions, no slow build. Just make a ruthless decision for the good of the club, get shut of one bloke and before you do scour the globe for the right man for what you are looking for. So what if his agent is mates with their owner. It hasn't done Wolves much harm. Infact most decisions these days have agent links in them. Just because we were handed on a silver platter to dodgy people by our owners doesn't mean that all transactions involving agents are bad or to be avoided. That sort of mentality will see us end up like Oyston's Blackpool only dealing with personal friends of the manager.

I'm not against the idea of a club promoting from within - plenty of clubs have done it - most of which don't work out but some do. Off the top of my head Parker has done a decent job at Fulham, Holden is doing ok at Bristol City, Monk did quite well at Swansea, and Gary Bowyer here - but in the main they don't work out. See Southgate at Boro, Woodgate at Boro, Carver at Newcastle, Wassall at Derby, It can be a good route to go down if there is someone obviously deserving of a crack at it. Sadly I don't have the confidence that we would be following such a plan here. If we gave it to Johnson it would simply be to avoid the aggravation and expense of bringing in a new coaching team, which we know from experience these goons are reluctant to do. Kean inherited the rump of Allardyce's staff, Berg had to work with them left over, Bowyer worked with existing staff already at the club promoted up, Lambert was able to bring his own team in, Coyle was expected to work with Lambert's team before they jumped ship elsewhere and Mowbray has had to work with Lowe and Benson since his arrival. Who behind the scenes is qualified to judge whether Johnson is ready or not? Nobody from what i can see. The remit here is to keep a happy camp, avoid unnecessary expense and ideally get a manager willing to toe the party line. These aren't reasons to give it to Johnson but will be the reasons he inevitably gets a shot at it. Cut corners - get nowhere in this game.

We will win this one, but it won't be easy or comfortable. I expect another single goal victory, probably 1-0. Pressure will be mounting on Mowbray after 3 games and 1 point so he will recover the situation here followed by a tame defeat at Stoke on Saturday to keep us muddling along. Rotherham are a handful but their away record is abysmal. If it was at their place I'd be backing them but we should have enough.

Surprised Barrow can afford to fire him. I keep hearing about how due to closed grounds and the pandemic that paying off a manager isn't possible. In all seriousness I expect that will be the end of his managerial career. Distinctly poor record at both Oldham and Barrow. To be honest I was very surprised they gave him the job in the first place. They're still outside the drop zone so must not have much confidence in him turning it around.

So we can't change manager because Mowbray signed the players and they like him? Whatever happened to the club comes first? These are meant to be professionals who play for whichever manager the club appoints. Seems a very amateurish setup to me. Players here because of their mates and Mowbray has been afforded far too much power and influence over the entire club way beyond what a manager in 2020 should have and that then protects his position further. The 'Mowbray out crew' aren't the same as the 'Big Sam out' crew. I'm a member of the Mowbray out crew whereas I loved Big Sam and would have him here now, 10 years after his departure.

We are sandwiched between Luton Town and Barnsley neither of whom have spent remotely near what Mowbray has here, so lets drop the funding excuse. I'm also pretty sure that we've had a bigger net spend than the likes of Swansea, Reading, Middlesbrough and Cardiff over the last couple of years.

Bang on. The manager is now publicly stating that his aim for the season is to be 'around' the top 6. Not necessarily to be in it, or to win the play-offs, but to be around it. What does that even mean? I can guarantee now that with 5-10 games remaining this season there will be at least 10 clubs either in the play off positions or 'around' them. Anyone within 5-6 points will be able to claim that. It is the whole point behind the play off system to ensure that most teams in the division have something to play for going into the later stages of the season. It isn't an achievement because only 4 of those 10+ will actually get in there and only 1 of them will get promoted. This is the sort of blurring of lines between success and failure that Mowbray is getting good at achieving. Already downgrading success for the season from promotion to now being happy to be around the top 6. He needs asking how many years he thinks it is going to take to get to being a promotion ready side and if he believes we will ever be that because if not he might as well pack his bags now. I've no doubt that if he leads us to 60 odd points and can arm himself with the usual statistics on possession and goals he can then jet off to India in May and prove his progress. He'll get even more plaudits when Klopp gratefully takes Elliott back a year more experienced and he can mention how Ivic, Tindall and Farke all rated us in the newspapers.

All the delight and elation of those narrow wins against Barnsley and Millwall has dispersed with a meagre 1 point from 9 since. As predicted by so many experienced Rovers observers we have been unable to collect points from the more difficult opposition, contriving to lose games we shouldn't and as is so common are able to hide behind narrow defeats, refereeing decisions and deflections to provide a comfort blanket. End result is the same though whichever way you want to dress it up. Mowbray sees a need to remind people that Norwich are top of the league. Of course he is correct. But the same Norwich were well beaten at Luton, drew at home to Coventry and scraped past Forest in their last few games so it was hardly Bayern Munich we were up against. There's always an excuse though. So on we go. Where to who knows. My prediction is that we follow the established routine of win a few, lose a few for the remainder of the season and end up somewhere between 8th and 14th. No doubt there will be a number of stats to suggest progress. A few more points than last year, a position or two higher, more goals scored or more possession. A 'better' style of play. The cycle then continues on again because half the squad are out of contract, and we can bet Armstrong will be off elsewhere. Then it all starts again. Many people seem happy with that which is fair enough if you pay your money and are happy to spend years floating around making the same errors and not changing but I'll never accept it as enough. I can't help but keep remembering Mowbray's grand plan when we got promoted, where he admitted that he had gone to India and put the handbrakes on the owners spending to go to the Premier League and had persuaded them to go with his 'slow build'. It says a lot about the man's confidence in his abilities that he would do such a thing because I can guarantee Neil Warnock wouldn't have done the same at Cardiff or Middlesbrough. I do wonder how much Mowbray really wants this. Is he prepared to do whatever it takes to haul us to the promised land including playing dirty or nasty when needed? I don't believe so. This is why he will win a lot of respect from opposition fans, managers and the likes of Jurgen Klopp. He's great for diplomacy and as a flag carrier for your club, great for keeping a happy camp and working on meaningless stats that impress certain people but a ruthless winner he is not.

Cowley's win record at Huddersfield was 32.5%. He picked up 50 points from 120 available meaning 1.25 points per game Mowbray's win record here in the Championship is 36.29%. He's picked up 1.37 points per game. I'll leave it up to individuals to decide if that difference is worth 4 years of slow build, tens of millions in losses and being deemed a success or failure. In my opinion it is pretty similar really. Mid table/bottom half stuff.

We lost at Bristol City. We shouldn't have done but in typical Rovers/Mowbray fashion we didn't hold on and didn't get the result our efforts should have brought. This isn't unusual. It's already happened at least 3 times this season including Bournemouth away and Watford away. Brentford is another one. Whilst I was jubilant with the late equaliser and in the circumstances happy with a point there remains a frustration that we didn't win it. Blame the referee or blame Lenihan but these things always seem to go against us. Why? Because we aren't ever in control and defensively solid. This is why we couldn't cope against Brentford after going 1-0 up and why Bristol were able to get past us and why Bournemouth took the lead 3 times despite being pegged back. It needs dealing with but we are now into season 3 of it so I can't see it. I'm yet to experience a defeat that doesn't leave me disappointed and downbeat. I'm yet to experience a win where I don't wake up the following day with a spring in my step. The fact we played nice stuff or caused the opposition problems doesn't come into it. Infact it irritates me even more. I can just about tolerate losing if we deserve it and are outdone by the opposition being better but when we are worthy of a result and don't get it then it gnaws at me inside.

How is he nearer the top? His ceiling so far has been 8th in the Championship. We got that high soon after promotion in 2018. Barring a couple of short spells we haven't got any higher. You seem accepting of the typical lackadaisical attitude around the place. We lose a game we shouldn't = oh well it happens and we move on. No. It doesn't just happen. It happens because our discipline slips. Time and time again. It doesn't happen to sides who get promoted.

You don't feel downbeat after 1 point from 6? Do you ever feel downbeat?

I'm in the same camp. I just feel that we are going to waste a glorious opportunity this season and we won't get a better one for some time. The likes of Armstrong and Elliott won't be here long especially if we can't get higher than 8th. Its the same old story every time we get anywhere near threatening in the division. We've already lost too many games for a side that wants promotion. We are too easy to beat. Last night should have at the worst case been a 0-0 but we are the masters at allowing the fine margins to go against us. At 60 minutes last night I was quite pleased with the potential for a 0-0 draw at a tricky place following on from a draw at Brentford. But their goal and our defeat highlights where we are at. No way should we be losing like that in those sort of games and so we are now facing another gap to the top 6 with top of the league coming on Saturday.

We didn't lose because our shooting boots weren't on. The opposition don't score because we miss chances. At 70 minutes it was 0-0 and level pegging was a fair outcome. We'd had some chances, they'd had arguably better ones. Certainly in the second half they had gone nearer. But it was an even affair. What frustrates me is that 0-0 doesn't seem to enter into Mowbray's vocabulary. At 70 minutes, away from home, mid week, with a point in our hands, there never seems to be an attitude of protecting that and coming away with it. A draw would have been a reasonable outcome and quite satisfactory. But we don't seem to ever accept that and strive to protect it. The glass ceiling has been reached again folks, as many predicted. A muddled manager who is no nearer the top since than this time 2 years ago. Never mind, we're top of all the tables that don't matter and get loads of accolades from other clubs and the media so hooray.

So what you are saying is that if we were sat bottom of the table now on 0 points and getting beat 5-0 every week we wouldn't be able to change manager like any other club does? Because sacking Mowbray would cost more than thousands of pounds and would result in a points deduction? Not having that for one minute.

As I say, I don't doubt that finances are affected. It hasn't stopped us spending significantly over the summer. It hasn't stopped half the league sorting out new contracts, paying transfer fees, sacking off managers etc. The football world keeps going. It won't stop us needing to spend to bring in replacements in the summer for Holtby, Nyambe, Rothwell etc. if they walk out the door. The cost of those replacements in the short term is likely to be greater than the expense of increasing their wages on new contracts. FFP won't even apply anyway, but again how can the likes of Derby, Forest, Wednesday, Bristol City, Reading all afford to fire off management teams and employ new ones within FFP restraints and the pandemic yet we can't get moving with negotiations on 3-4 key players worth millions to the club. You've only got to look at the half arsed, slow, lazy approach to ticketing, merchandise, sponsorship and maintenance of our stadium to work out what is going on here Owners who couldn't give a stuff and a manager and CEO under little pressure or expectation to do anything about it.