JHRover

Going off experience. We let Cairney, Duffy, Raya all leave for less than their worth when keeping them for another couple of years would have seen us land much much more. We should be offering him a bumper deal to keep him here, protect our asset and ensure we are protected. Yet he's still on the same terms as when we came from League One and only 18 months left to go. Not a good position to be in really. These sort should always have at least a couple of years on their deals so the club is safe from poachers. I agree that on current form and market value Armstrong is worth a lot more than £10 million. He's going at over a goal a game for a midtable side and has been doing for the last 6 months. He's 23 and English and has pace. Name your price territory if a Premier League club takes an interest (apart from Burnley who we don't sell to even if it costs us). My pessimism comes from the fact that we've got the top scorer in the league in Armstrong, the highest scoring team in the league and the best or joint best goal difference and yet here we are in familiar mid-table territory rather than up there challenging. It tells me that we are wasting a glorious opportunity here due to poor management. These runs like Armstrong's don't last forever - he'll either lose form or end up moving on - and then we are back to square one. Now is the time to make the most of it.

i enjoyed that Times article. Covered most things quite well. Personally I couldn't really care less if Venkys came to Ewood or not. I wouldn't boo or jeer them if they did, but wouldn't be particularly impressed either. I do think that it would demonstrate some level of interest and commitment if they did. The problem for me is that I still feel that we are still some distance from being a well functioning properly structured club. I completely accept that the current stability and operation is much much better than it was in the early days and we appear to be operating as a proper club should. I am still worried however that the whole thing is built on sand. We still have this bizarre system where the manager of the club is running the show, just like Kean did back in the early days. The difference is of course that Mowbray is trustworthy and has honest intentions and also that he's a competent manager but this is all incredibly short sighted. It all hinges on Mowbray being here and performing to a reasonable level to avoid difficulties. Touch wood it won't happen, but I'm one who envisages difficulties when Mowbray goes - he appears to be secure in the job for as long as he wants it because they like him, he's got his mate in the boardroom backing him up, pretty much everything we've had since 2017 - transfer policy, appointments, investments, scouting - has been on Mowbray's say-so because he has had a word with the owners and they trust him to roll with it. In this day and age you need a setup where performance comes before personality. There needs to be someone reviewing things on a regular basis to see if targets are being met. I still think we have a vacuum where the manager is here regardless of results and this will hold us back. I also think Waggott is completely out of his depth and is now causing damage in the longer term by diminishing our season ticket base at a time when it needs to be growing. I find it astonishing that our season ticket base has declined on his watch despite promotion and recent positivity. An opportunity wasted to boost numbers all in the name of short term balance sheets.

Very strange and quite unprofessional for a Chief Executive to be speculating publicly about the sort of bids he could attract and naming potential clubs who might be interested. I get the impression that a sale of Armstrong would actually be welcomed by Waggott and Mowbray. A massive profit and windfall for the owners right now would vindicate Mowbray's management and recruitment and bolster his position whilst Waggott will want to use the funds to improve the balance sheet. I'm not stupid and know that if a huge bid comes in from the division above it might suit all concerned for us to take it. I would hope however that this is secondary to trying to get promotion and only happens if a huge bid comes in - compare to Watkins when Brentford got £30 million- that is what I'm talking about - not £8-9 million to a rival club.

Quite a terrifying interview. Predictably season ticket sales are abysmal. No surprise when combining a pandemic with price rises, uncertainty and a 2 week sales window. Just don't compare our decline to those elsewhere as that will really bring things into sharp perspective. Waggott should be taken to task for those figures, as CEO commercial and financial performance should be his responsibility and a decline of that magnitude should set major alarm bells ringing. Doubt it though. Excuses at the ready and carry on boys. Waggott references poor commercial performance - how about employ a commercial director? Or is that too difficult? He's going to have to find a way to triple or quadruple sales post pandemic to just get back to where we were. That's going to be nigh on impossible before factoring in Waggott's ineptitude and short termism and another year of Mowbray going nowhere. Year on year declining sales on his watch. Any accountability or responsibility for that? None at all. Just another pat on the back for our great owners and blame the fans

I'm just cracking open a bottle to toast our marvellous owners after the news that we've sold 2500 season tickets but they are topping up the difference to keep us in business. Fantastic.

Its beyond a joke now.

What I can't really stand is 'celebrities' or ex-players/staff members telling the general support base what we should and shouldn't think about Venkys. For example Dunn - the reality, however you want to spin it, is that he was on the club payroll for a large part of the Venky era, first as a senior player, then as a coach and u23 assistant, and there's no doubt at all that his status will ensure he is at the front of the queue in future if he needs a job here. So he might be a 'legend' or respected former player, but the reality remains that he has had a living out of Rovers for much of the last decade of destruction, and i'd even suggest that has in part been enabled by the destruction wreaked - if we had remained a top flight club or properly run I doubt he would have been able to carry on playing as long as he did and further doubt he'd have ended up as first team coach. I've got no personal gripe with him but his position as a paid up staff member is infinitely different to that of working fans who have had to cough up their dosh for the last decade to support it all and watch the misery unfold. Perhaps before rolling out the red carpet and speaking on behalf of thousands of fans who have been put through it he should think about that.

I accept that it doesn't achieve anything to dredge up the memories of 2010 onwards but it is difficult not to and I don't think we should ever forget it. At best it was criminal mismanagement and negligence that could and may yet still be the end of Blackburn Rovers. Whilst it didn't result in a Portsmouth style bankruptcy and owners skipping off into the sunset leaving us in strife the fact remains that we are up to our eyeballs in massive losses and dependency on these owners, the very people responsible for this mess. I don't think these owners feel guilty or responsible for the mess they created, or are serious about making amends. I think they are stubborn and see an exit as weakness or admission of failure - two things that are intolerable to people of their position and the costs of keeping the club on a drip each year in the faint hope something changes for the better is preferable to writing off their losses and disappearing with tails between legs. It feels like yesterday when this sorry saga began to unfold. I remember hearing of Allardyce's sacking so clearly and remember thinking that it was a bold and potentially reckless move but respected that new owners often want their own man in and I maintain to this day that in isolation the sacking of Allardyce didn't have to be a catastrophe. For a club in our position Allardyce was the ideal man for us and we'd have always survived under him. He didn't deserve the sack. But at the same time new owners and investors have the right to appoint their own team and had a competent replacement been lined up there's no reason why the club couldn't have progressed under different management. It wasn't Allardyce or bust, but Allardyce was ideal and his replacement would have needed to be a big name and expensive to better him. I still hope one day that we find out the real truth of how it came about. I just want the answers as it will help in my mind as to culpability. For example, was the Kean manager appointment wrapped up and agreed with the Indians prior to takeover, or was it something that Kean wormed his way into quickly after he and his mate realised how clueless they were and Kean set about smooth talking Mrs Desai? Anderson - another strange one - why would he put his professional reputation in danger by wrecking Rovers? He had everything set up to his advantage - contract to run the club, ability to spend the owners funds - why set the club on a trajectory to ruin by installing his mate as manager and keeping him in place? Longer term surely his interests were better served by making recruitment and management of the club as strong as possible, enhancing his reputation, rather than the stigma and problems he had at Rovers. I never cease to be amazed by those who stick resolutely to this belief that it is Venkys or bust. Of course if they turned their investment off overnight the club would be in a mess. Welcome to the real world. Every club is in the same boat. Since we entered the Championship in 2012 there have been takeovers at Leeds x2, Huddersfield, Barnsley, Sheff Wed, Derby, Forest x 2, Leicester, West Brom, Wolves, Birmingham, Villa, Wigan, Bolton, Watford, Reading. Was the Walker Trust model sustainable? Possibly not. There's only so far you can get with disinterested owners as we are seeing here today. Under Allardyce and even the later days of Hughes we were in a zombie like state of just ensuring enough was done to avoid relegation. Now we are in a similar rudderless era just a division below with horrific annual losses to go with it. We're probably doing quite well in some respects as we are now at about 15 years in a row of having either unwilling owners looking to get shut and stop spending or clueless perhaps dodgy owners with absolutely no interest or understanding of what they are dealing with. I doubt there are many other clubs at this sort of level that can 'boast' such a prolonged spell of disinterest, reluctance or cluelessness and have anything to show for it. Maybe one day we will have someone in control who has passion for the club and genuinely wants it to grow, prosper, improve - see Andy Holt at Accy - rather than just plod along all the while the club decays and fanbase dwindles. There's no room in football for corner cutters or reluctant owners - only those who want to be here and want to be successful will get anywhere. Venkys might think that signing off the cheques every month and meeting Tony at their place a couple of times a year represents interest. I do recognise that Venkys financial input at present does put us into a position where we can recruit and retain at a level the club couldn't on its own steam or with corner shop owners like other local clubs have. But the most frustrating part is that for their level of investment we should be the envy of clubs at this level with a quality squad, top management team, lovely stadium, yet so much is missing through neglect and corner cutting that their investment doesn't get them where they and we need to be.

With Pulis i think it comes down to his style of play. I still reckon he would do a job at any level, including the Premier League, if the remit was to organise a side and to keep them up. The trouble is that there aren't many clubs who are keen on that sort of thing, and those willing to do it quickly get bored with it. Stoke loved him because the accomplishments outweighed the dire football. Palace only had it for half a season and it kept them up. West Brom put up with it for a couple of years as it kept them up but their fans were fed up of it. I don't think he's a busted flush, his methods will get results and keep struggling sides clear of trouble. The issue grows where the expectations or higher or people want nice football.

Doesn't really matter if the players there suit him or not. The good managers can work with whatever players they inherit and get results. Pulis will organise Wednesday, make them fit, disciplined and tough to beat. It will keep them up. Its a sensible and pragmatic appointment. They won't be top of the possession tables, top of 'xG' charts and all the other pointless nonsense, they won't get plaudits from other clubs for being a nice good side whilst getting beat. They'll be horrible to play against. Can't imagine who Derby will appoint now. In their position someone like Cook would be sensible to get them out of trouble. If they give it to Rooney they deserve relegation. I doubt their new owners would be so foolish.

We've got less for our money out of Davenport than we have Evans. He's been here over 2 years and has barely featured.

They've got permission to start on their new ground but as yet no work done. It's actually going to be slap bang in the town centre next to the railway station so should be a decent new ground maybe like Rotherham rather than on an industrial estate in the middle of nowhere. Kenilworth Road is horrendous. Easy to see why visiting sides don't like it and don't feel comfortable there.

I have a bit of sympathy for the lad. Unlike many of his 'knocks' or 'tweaks' or 'bruises' picked up in his time here there can be no doubt that his latest setback was a genuine one and he'll be gutted to be missing a huge play off game for his country. Having said that if they get through to the tournament then he'll have plenty of time to get himself ready for that. Where do we go from here with him? Tough one for me. Only last year him and Travis had struck up a great partnership in midfield and he was playing well, arguably to the best level he had ever done in his time here. The seemingly endless succession of injuries since this time last year have almost become comical. The one against PNE was a freak and potentially career ending event. He did well to come back from that quite quickly all things considered but then the bizarre ones since then just make you wonder. Is he just soft and looking for these sort of things? Is his body just very fragile and susceptible to knocks more than most? Given the number of players we have out of contract and loan come the summer we've a hell of a rebuild on our hands coming up. I'm just a little reluctant to add to that exodus bearing in mind what the alternatives may be, but clearly if he is only going to be available for half a season the club may need to form a view on that. The annoying thing for me is I think there is a decent player in there that someone else will get a tune out of.

Amazing how quickly things turn. Not a year since they were sitting pretty near the top and Neil was being pursued by West Brom. Now the nobbers want him out. I won't be crowing much because they are neck and neck with us and are revving up to play us at Deepdale searching for their first home win. We've seen the script for this already with Mowbray's soft lads turning up and rolling over.

Pleased and relieved to secure a desperately needed win. All things considered with changes and the personnel available it was a good and deserved win. An early setback with Evans, a weak looking bench and then the setback with their penalty yet we recovered well. I remain extremely concerned about the injuries we are picking up and struggle to accept that these are just down to bad luck or misfortune. The way it is going they are going to derail the season and I think there needs to be a review. It is frustrating that despite the obvious quality in the squad and goalscoring ability that we are sat here in such a lowly position. Many rivals would love the abilities of Armstrong and co. in their ranks. Time after the break to get some payback on Luton and PNE but we need to show a nasty side in these games. The opposition will.

It goes without saying that there will be harm to attendances across the board and clubs are really going to have their work cut out to try and address it. What I am interested in is how our decline compares to those elsewhere at rival clubs. I am expecting us to be one of the worst affected, and I don't believe that this will be down to 'demographics' or the local population, but will be down to a shoddy poorly thought out strategy from those running the club. Lets assume that fans will be allowed back without restrictions for the 2021-22 season. Lets assume we are still on the road to nowhere with Mowbray in the summer. Then Waggott is going to have to work his socks off over the summer to get people back. It isn't going to be easy, or quick, but serious, sustained and innovative ideas need to be rolled out to do it and re-engage supporters and get people back in the habit. Groundhog day just won't sell. I'm afraid sticking an extra £50 on the price and attempting to emotionally blackmail supporters into signing up will just alienate even more. 'As you were folks' and 'we're committed, are you?' attitude to it will not bring people back. This is going to be the stage when a £300,000 a year CEO needs to earn his salary. Sadly I don't think Waggott has the capability, innovation or interest never mind the freedom to spearhead such a thing. All he will do is propose a pricing structure and await approval from the money men in India. Scary really whilst Accy Stanley are this week distributing free kits to Hyndburn primary school children. Keep them interested, keep them hooked.

As far as I'm concerned every home game should be viewed as must win if there is any ambition of achieving promotion. To get promotion you will need to win the majority of your home fixtures, and you will only do that by going into them desperate to win them, not taking pressure off and seeing a draw as decent. We've dropped far too many points at Ewood already this season. If we want to get back on track we need to win. On what planet 2 points or even 1 from 6 this week in home games against Middlesbrough and QPR is acceptable im not sure. All the excuses at the ready but once again its more delaying and stalling. Promising milk and honey later on in the season when we arrive at having no players missing which won't ever be the case.

Well, prior to the Swansea game I came on here and said he needed 2 wins from these 3 games to justify remaining in place through the international break. We've picked up 1 from 6 and haven't scored. Arguably fortunate to get that point. The Armstrong injury may justify a slight reduction in target but not much given other options available. But anything less than a win v QPR and it is time to go. Rather than this being a bad or difficult time to make a change I'd argue that it is ideal. International break, time left to salvage the season and new man to re-jig things in January.

I'd be surprised if Derby were so foolish to take such a gamble at this point. I think Cocu will be gone soon but I'd be amazed if their owner gambled on Rooney who has never struck me as manager material. I think it is more likely they'll end up bringing McClaren back for another spell to save them, or look abroad. They seem to be a bit of a mess and with a big money takeover lined up can't afford to be hanging around the bottom 3.

I'm one of those people that wasn't sucked in by an admittedly very impressive couple of wins against dreadful sides early doors. The 'brilliant start' lasted about 4-5 games and saw us peak at about 5th place for a week, since when our trajectory has been a downward one over the last 5-6 games with the exception of the Coventry win. We could easily end up in trouble this season. I thought Sheff Wed would be a nailed on bottom 3 bet but their survival chances have rocketed after a good win and deduction reduction today. Wycombe have turned a corner with impressive results vs Watford, Wednesday and Birmingham, hitting some momentum and consistency that we are still waiting to achieve. Sides who many look down their noses at including our manager are outperforming us. This includes Luton, Millwall and Preston. Sides who many on here said we had no right to expect results against e.g. Bournemouth and Watford, now dropping points against sides below us in the table. Of course Mowbray is now armed with his raft of excuses for anyone who dares question performances and results and is able to point to the Covid issues and injuries. Ok. He has some sympathy on that front because a lot are missing. But lets not make out that we were running rampant before those players went missing or that we have ever or will ever have a situation where all these players are fit and available together or that this manager would know what to do with them all if they ever were all available. We were inconsistent to say the least when most of them were here. Douglas, Johnson, Armstrong, Kaminski could be argued to be unfortunate absences, however Mowbray has a £12 million strike force waiting in the wings along with 2 goalkeepers just signed this summer so I'm not sure he can plead poverty on that front. The rest are injury prone or long term injuries that he has had chance to recruit replacements for. Folk predicting promotion or even play offs need to revise their expectations because it ain't happening under this setup. 12th to 18th was my pre-season estimate but I'm not as confident of that right now with the state of things. Shame because we've ended up with a squad of players capable of much more and it likely won't be here beyond this season.

Its just not going to happen is it. In the event Mowbray goes it will all be about preserving the status quo with Johnson, Lowe and Benson part of the furniture. Any new manager would be expected to work with them. I don't necessarily think that is a cost based decision just that there's a reluctance to bin off nice guys who have been here for years Unfortunately the best managers take their own coaching staff with them so those willing to work with whoever they inherit tend to be those just grateful to be getting a job. Remember Coyle was supposedly meant to be working with Irvine and Kelly, which was presumably one of the reasons he got the job rather than Warnock who insisted on bringing Blackwell and Jepson along. Once he was in Coyle then managed to bring his cronies in later.

I'm not sure on Hughes. First off I don't see him as the type desperate to return to management to the extent he'd embrace a Championship job with aggravation and restrictions to it. I think he'd prefer to enjoy life and only take a job if it ticks every box e.g. in the Championship but with a big budget and a proper ownership and management structure. I don't think his time at Rovers stirs up sentimentality that it would lure him back here unless we had a proper setup and offered him big bucks to come and do it exactly how he wanted. Even then I don't think he'd fancy a Championship job after 15 years in the Premier League. If he was willing to manage at this level i'd want him to reunite with his old team Bowen and Neidszwicki. Bowen still working at Reading I think. I'm really not sure any more. Missed a trick with McCarthy off to Cyprus and Hughton in at struggling Forest. I'm sure both would have sniffed a good opportunity here with a promising and talented squad that needs shoring up and organising.

I've no strong view either way on this. I'm certainly not opposed to bringing Downing back as I think he did well for us last year and the stats show that. Vast experience and versatility could be useful. In terms of him not being fit I very much doubt he's spent the last 4 months out on the sunbed drinking cocktails. I would hope he's looked after himself and maintained a good degree of fitness. The timing is strange. If this was a deal Mowbray really wanted to do it should have been done way back at the beginning. Even 3 weeks ago the media were saying it was happening so I cannot fathom what has taken so long. Unless it is another case of waiting for the Indians to approve it.

Yeah, i just think the names I suggested were the obvious sensible options that would have given us a real chance this season. The others I'm not so sure. Pulis would be acceptable as a means to escape relegation and then maybe see what he can do but I worry that his ethos is so far away from Mowbray's that it would take a long time and a lot of work to whip this lot into the fit and organised structure Pulis would demand. I also think that he and Pearson would be unwilling to put up with the rubbish from India. McCarthy is apparently joining APOEL Nicosia - surprise move but a big opportunity missed for clubs at our level. The hidden gems like Reading and Barnsley have unearthed really require a lot of homework and planning. We simply don't have that here. Waggott is too busy deciding what hours to open the club shop for and how to milk another £10 or £20 out of supporters The search for our last 3 managers appears to have been done by someone going on an internet search engine and typing in "unemployed and won promotion to the Premier League within the last decade" then picking one. I suppose it is better than just handing it to the bibs and cones man or someone's mate.

Personally I'd have sacked Mowbray some time ago. I can understand a reluctance elsewhere to replace him but my only interest is us getting promoted as soon as possible, and if that means being 'unattractive' or unpopular then so be it. Nice guys get nowhere. I'd have pulled the trigger quite a while ago once i had identified and lined up his replacement, but again can understand the argument for keeping him through last season. I'd have replaced him at the end of last season when there were a raft of unemployed yet quality managers ready to be getting back to work. Hughton, Warnock, Karanka, McCarthy - just a few obvious obtainable names that roll off the tongue and require very little research or reading up on, You know who they are and what they do and as time has shown with Forest, Middlesbrough and Birmingham all were willing to manage under constraints in the 2nd division, despite baseless suggestions from some that they were all unaffordable or unwilling to work at this level any more. To be totally honest I am less eager to make a change right now than I was a couple of months ago. Back in the summer we could have got shut of Mowbray and appointed one of the above, giving them time to bed in and implement their methods and a summer window (and admittedly decent scope in the budget) to address things. Since then we've allowed another window of opportunity to pass by. Another pre-season gone, another sloppy poor start to a season meaning we are aleady playing catch up, another summer transfer window and precious cash entrusted to Mowbray, and meanwhile the decent managers above are now in work at rivals and are out of our reach. Now even if we did get shut of Mowbray we would have less obvious decent options available to us. Not because nobody decent would come but because they've all been snapped up by rivals. We'd have to take a bigger gamble or really do our homework and unearth less well known quality, neither of which I think the morons running the club are capable of. 3-4 months ago I'd have been on the phone to McCarthy, Hughton or Warnock and giving them what they needed to get here and down to work. Now I'm short on suggestions that would genuinely make me believe. It would probably have to be a foreign option in the hope they could quickly transition. None of this is going to happen any time soon of course, but I genuinely believe that unless Mowbray quickly changes his approach we are going to become embroiled in a prolonged spell of looking over our shoulders at the bottom 3 and relegation. We should have enough to avoid that fate but sooner or later the question needs to be asked whether a bottom half or bottom third finish is remotely acceptable and what the solution is to that. For 150 years across the world the solution has been to change coaching staff. Here it will be to once again overhaul the squad at great expense and then rinse and repeat.