I asked Waggott at the Shareholders meeting in September about what, if any, attempts were being made to circumvent the rules by bringing in sponsorship from some of the owners many companies or the hundreds of large businesses that they must have dealings with in Asia. QPR, Cardiff, Fulham have all done deals e.g. with Visit Florida or Visit Malaysia or airlines linked to their owners. Alternatively sponsor the training ground like Birmingham owners. I didn't get a coherent answer from him, except to say that it was something that they were 'looking into'. It's what, 5 years since Ffp was introduced? They simply don't want to. Don't fall for it. They haven't the interest to try and beat the system or find ways of improving our prospects. No wonder then why the place is in such a state.

We need a goalkeeper. The current one isn't good enough and isn't ours (thankfully, though it wouldnt surprise me if there was some sort of agreement to make it permanent). Either in January or the summer we are going to need to sign at least one keeper. Why not do it now? Why wait 6 months? It sums up what a mess our recruitment has been that we don't have our own competent keeper yet there appears to be no budget nor rush to get one. Where has the Raya money gone?

If it was so important to grow income and revenues I would expect to see the club go out and headhunt a proven successful individual from elsewhere in the industry. The fact we are advertising for the role suggests we will react to those who apply rather than proactively go out and recruit a leading figure and pay him/her top dollar to deliver results. Let's be realistic. At no stage during Venky ownership have we had an executive structure worthy of a club of this size and stature. Why did the last commercial manager leave? Why have we not had a commercial director since Dave Biggar went off to America having landed the lucrative sponsorship deal with Dafabet? Even when we've had people like Waggott and Shaw they have ended up in the job through being mates with the right people and havent really had any power. What freedom will the new commercial person have to revitalise that department of the club? Very little would be my prediction. The owners have shown no desire nor interest to employ the right calibre of people to run the club on the lines required to make a big difference. Shame but that's their decision. A bit like they've never invested sufficiently in the playing or coaching staff to propel us into serious contention. Up to them.

How many times have we seen this. For some reason we start most games brightly for the first 10-15 minutes and often catch the opposition out. Bristol, Swansea, Huddersfield, Preston, West Brom, Stoke, Reading away - we go ahead in the first 10-15 minutes. At Ewood we usually have a bright first 10-15 minutes but rapidly regress into insipid dreadful football for the next 30. On the occasions we do get ahead we often immediately sit back and change our approach to the game. This gives the opposition time and opportunity to fire back quickly - WBA, Swansea, Huddersfield we concede soon after going ahead. QPR away concede soon after scoring. Home games v Birmingham and Forest almost immediately conspire to allow them straight back in. Despite Bristol being a good win they had numerous good chances after we had scored to get back level. We can't cope when we have a lead to protect. Heads go. It's a very serious problem that goes back to last season which Mowbray has been unable to address. It isnt down to personnel. It is mindset, fitness, game management. I'm bored of watching it. Very predictable.

Mowbray will go and try to get a draw and will be delighted if we do get that. That actually wouldnt bother me if he could set the team up to go away from home, defend as a unit and absorb pressure but I can count on one hand the number of times we have managed to do that. We are playing the mighty juggernaut Forest and should be excited to be able to play them and 'test ourselves' against such a great side - that will be the attitude. Expect minimum 4 changes, probably more. Can't be bothered trying to guess what he will do next. Dack's injury and other unavailability looks to have sent Mowbray into a tailspin of chopping and changing. Try to second guess him at your peril.

Interesting. His record at Sunderland was almost identical to that of his successor Chris Coleman, yet I recall you suggesting him as an option not long ago.

Every club in this League has FFP on the horizon to contend with. This season Cardiff, Swansea, Reading, Millwall, QPR, West Brom, Birmingham, Barnsley, Hull, Middlesbrough, Sheffield Wednesday and Stoke have all made managerial changes. Other than Middlesbrough all have either stayed consistent with last season or improved following their change. Middlesbrough are climbing rapidly and aren't far behind us. Prior to inexplicably appointing Coyle we had Lambert and Irvine coming down from the Premier League and Neil Warnock wanting the job. The decision to give the job to Coyle wasnt because nobody decent wanted to come here. We are an attractive club in a very popular league. Only recently world known managers like Bilic and Bielsa have moved to Championship clubs. There are many options open to ambitious clubs.

I'm bored with all this stuff. We had similar last season with a player (can't remember who it was just now) being 'punished' or 'taught a lesson' by Mowbray for off the pitch actions. I fear Mowbray puts way too much time and energy into thinking about off the pitch stuff and into maintaining his happy campers regime rather than just focusing on who is doing the business during games and on the training ground. I've seen Chapman for the u23s numerous times this season and can safely say his performances havent warranted a place in the first team. Having said that with Dack out and seemingly no more money to spend Mowbray is going to have to get more from HIS signings like Chapman, Brereton, Gallagher, Holtby. I have to say I've been disappointed with Holtby's contributions to games so far. Expected more and don't see where the hype is justified.

Dack can forget about a higher club coming in now until summer 2021. January 2021 will be too early. Rovers have a decision to make. Do we try and get him tied down to a new deal now despite everything being up in the air with his injury? Or do we leave things as they are until he is back in training knowing by then he will be free to talk to other clubs? Are we comfortable going through the lengthy rehab process for another 12-18 months and then waving him off on a free transfer at the end of it? Difficult position all round. But one that was always a possibility in football.

I remember Huddersfield setting a League record for unbeaten games in League One not long ago with 40 odd unbeaten. They failed to get promoted. I'm all for taking positives and not losing games but we'd have been better beating Wigan and losing yesterday than drawing both and remaining unbeaten.

3 wins at home all season and 6 defeats. Another good opportunity if we get ourselves sorted. I expect a defeat. Two very poor displays at home, players celebrating not losing and a manager back to his usual style of needless chopping and changing.

I don't know. Perhaps. Maybe he is genuinely injured but i do find the frequency of our injuries to be bizarre.

If our transfer policy is built upon selling our best player in January (and primary goal threat) presumably to a divisional rival (not good enough to attract serious Premier League interest) then we are in trouble. To begin with very few clubs at this level have the means or freedom under FFP rules to pay what we should demand for a player of Dack's importance. Secondly if we were to sell him to bring in reinforcements the damage done to the team through selling him would create more problems than it solved. I'm afraid I don't buy the FFP excuse. Last January we were in good form and on the cusp of the play-offs. We refused to add any depth to a weak defence and paid the penalty, going on an atrocious run of form that almost saw us dragged into a relegation battle. If there was one lesson to take from last season it was that we needed more depth in defence to weather injuries and suspensions. Mowbray appeared to have accepted that in March/April when he spoke to the fans meeting. Then he went and spent £5 million on Gallagher whilst not investing in defensive signings. He failed in the summer by signing Cunningham and Tosin on loan whilst allowing several defenders to go out. We've just about managed through to now despite losing Cunningham for the season although Lenihan, Tosin and Williams have all spent several weeks out with numerous injuries already. With Tosin mysteriously injured again and Williams not great an injury now could derail the entire season. Despite the disappointment of the last couple of games we are still in a good position and perhaps a couple of good additions away from kicking on in the 2nd half of the season, whilst adding nobody and ending up with injuries to defenders could completely derail us again. If January isn't a time to invest and add depth with us on a decent unbeaten run and within a few points of 3rd and 4th then there will never be a good time.

Do we? I'm not sure that is correct when you compare to other sides. The difference is that we have 5 or so u23 players who are also classed as 1st team players. I'm talking Chapman, JRC, Samuel, Butterworth. Take them out the equation and I dont think we have a big squad. We are threadbare in key areas and well stocked in others. Manager to blame for that. Talk of having a squad too big is just a cover story for there being no cash available from the owners.

Yet in his latest interview Mowbray appears unconvinced about the need for January reinforcements. After what happened last season after the January window closed he needs firing if he can't see a need for more depth in defence.

You could copy and paste that for every home game this season and last. When do we ever see a first 45 minutes with urgency and quality? It is two points dropped. I expect you'll be celebrating draws at Huddersfield and Forest and then before we know it the gap to the top 6 will be there again.

Absolute garbage to build on the back of a disappointing yet at least relatively entertaining 'contest' against Wigan. No doubt there will be pats on the back all around about how we're another game unbeaten, how unlucky we've been with injuries and how decent Birmingham are but the reality of the situation is that we've allowed two very attractive fixtures against two mediocre sides to pass us by with 2 out of 6 points to show for it and have allowed the momentum following the Swansea and Bristol week to dissipate. Ah but we are only 'x' points off the top 6 - meaningless data that will continue all season without us ever actually being in the top 6. Now we've two tougher looking games at Huddersfield and Forest to prepare for and I think we can all expect the talk to be about how tough those games are going to be and how well we will do to avoid defeat in them both. Achieve that and it is 4 points from 12. Not good. You can forgive one of these two games to be a disappointment. A come down, a battle against side tough to break down but as far as I am concerned we have allowed two poor sides to come and take points away from Ewood and from our own point of view we haven't done remotely near enough as the home side supposedly aiming for the play-offs to beat these sides. Urgency? Very little. Usual non-event of the first 45 minutes. I don't know what is said pre-match but our performances at Ewood between 10 and 45 minutes are frankly a disgrace and it happens almost every match. The game just passes us by as we aimlessly play the ball around in circles in our own half. We almost got out of jail today - having been atrocious for 55 minutes we are handed an opportunity via the penalty. We get our noses infront. Yet from the second the goal goes in our mentality shifts away from chasing a goal and towards protecting the lead - not good - we sit back, let them start playing and then comes the inevitable basket case suicidal defending which has plagued us so many times. I can't even begin to analyse the team today but once again Mowbray has shown he has no intention nor desire to end his constant chopping and changing. Those hoping or believing that the settled side of a couple of weeks ago are going to be disappointed. This manager loves to make numerous changes even when he doesn't have to. The decision to start Bell once again a poor one. How many chances he is going to get I don't know but each time it is shown to be a poor decision. Buckley starting? No thanks. Extreme disappointment as the same old flaws come to the surface each time.

So there's the evidence. Cheap tickets and an extra 6000 on the home crowd. 'We've done all we can' whilst 12,000 turn up. So good to see the lower BBE full, Riverside quite well populated and JW almost full. Felt almost like a Premier League atmosphere again.

A very disappointing evening. Once again Rovers are presented with a golden opportunity to make serious progress in the table and come up short. A predictable performance - all too common at Ewood - a positive first 5-10 minutes, then 35 minutes of dross, before an improvement but too little too late in the 2nd half. How many times do we witness that. Virtually every game follows the same pattern. Lets not exaggerate what Wigan are. I've seen claims on twitter tonight that they are better than their position suggests and they are hard to beat. They are a poor side, like Luton and Barnsley, yet we appear to have little to no answer to these sides coming to Ewood and being organised and the onus being on us to take the game. To fail even to score against them and in the first hour have 0 or 1 attempt on target is extremely disappointing. Alarming also that in the last 5-10 minutes plus lengthy injury time that only one side looked like winning it and we struggled even to touch the ball. This a Wigan side whose dreadful track record away from home late on in games is there for all to see - regularly conceding and relinquishing points in the last 10 minutes of games yet we failed to create very much at all and were actually close to conceding a couple of times. They appeared to be fitter than us, finishing strongly whilst we seemed knackered and out of ideas. A real shame that we've had a bumper crowd on yet not many of those present will have gone home with much of an impression. In terms of the season - yes we are in a decent position - yes we are still unbeaten - yes we are 'only' a few points off the top 6 - but you have to be capitalising on these sort of fixtures at home against the weaker sides. Our fixtures at home later on in the season are mainly against the better sides.

Normally, at 20-30 quid a ticket, we see maybe 3000 if we are lucky, pushing us from 8500 season ticket holders to about 11500 home fans. Tonight, at 10 quid a ticket and some proper pushing from the club, it looks like we have at least doubled those 3000 to 6000 individual sales, and will probably be looking at 15000 home fans. This despite it being on TV and a night game. I believe if it had been repeated for a non televised game at 3pm on a Saturday or better still Boxing Day the take up would have been higher still. What is better? 3000 paying up to 25-30 quid or 6000 paying 10 quid? From a purely financial perspective the former. Obviously we aren't factoring in longer term benefits - more chance of shifting season tickets to the extra people, more money spent on food, drink, merchandise. More kids enjoying the experience. Better atmosphere for all.

Looking like a good crowd tomorrow on the ticket website. Amazing what can be done with good prices and a good run of form. Just hope we deliver on the pitch.

The sales for Birmingham online dont look much more than usual to me. Perhaps an extra couple of hundred. If you really want thousands more turning up then making a relatively non descript fixture Category A at nearly £30 a time isnt the way to do it.

I worry about this. In theory this should be a win all day long. Wigan are atrocious away from home and have that losing mentality that can see them surrender winning positions late on, even in comical fashion. The evidence is there for all to see with their results. 2 wins since promotion in 2018 and one of those was a complete fluke with 10 men when Leeds bottled it. However, we've seen many a time with Mowbray's Rovers that we struggle against the poorer sides who come and sit deep and our record against the poorer sides isnt great. We inexplicably lost home games v Luton and Charlton and just about got over the line against Barnsley when really you should be getting 7-9 points from those. In fact it is those struggles against the poorer sides that are the reason we aren't sat in 3rd or 4th now. Keep it simple, don't fall behind and there is a great chance to win the game and go into Xmas looking good.

An excellent days work and result to build on the solid point at Swansea and put us into a good position heading into the hectic Xmas period. I hope we use the next week to recover, refresh and get ready to hit the 4 games with confidence. Without wanting to get carried away the way we have been playing recently gives me confidence against anyone, and having done such a good job yesterday at nullifying Bristol none of these games fill me with trepidation. If we can maintain our efforts of recent weeks there are plenty of points to be won. What we don't want is complacency. Wigan first up will be coming to battle and Cook will have them cheating and using all sorts of tricks to try and stop their losing run away from home. We will be expected to win the game and these tend to be the ones we struggle in. Yes Bristol had a few decent chances, particularly in the first half, but not many sides will go there and keep a clean sheet. We restricted them to one attempt on target. I expected a long, painful second half with us clinging on to our lead and eventually conceding, but I was very impressed with how we managed to neuter Bristol to ensure they had very little by way of attempts and couldn't get any momentum going. All the more pleasing given it was done with several players we would consider to be 'second string' e.g. Johnson, Holtby, Brereton and Gallagher - people who haven't been starting games during this good run whilst the big players in that good run - Dack, Graham, Evans, Armstrong - missing or rested. Table is still too tight to draw any conclusions from at this stage - a couple of wins and it could be 3rd or a bad week and bottom half. Just about continuing to pick up wins and get through to February in the right area. Even more sweet to see Lee 'Poison Dwarf' Johnson losing his rag, you know we've done a job on him and his team when the cocky facade slips and the nasty side shines through. Whatever has changed behind the scenes long may it continue. Mowbray has stopped a slide and turned the season around in the space of a month. Probably where his experience comes in as a younger manager might have crumbled when it wasn't working.

Agree