JHRover

Southampton were taken over and within a couple of years had back to back promotions to the Premier League. Who is suggesting rebooting and clearing out? If results aren't good enough the manager goes. His job is to coach and get results and if they aren't up to scratch it's his head on the block. It's only because we persist with this mental archaic all powerful manager system that Mowbray is presiding over scouting. Normally that would be an independent department working in conjunction with the manager, not dependent on him.

Years to get a competent scouting network up and running? Try months. Most managers especially the experienced ones have their own contacts and lists anyway. How long does Mowbray expect to be afforded to be able to take years to develop scouting? A quick look at Watford, Norwich etc. Who put excellent scouting networks together in no time at all and reaped the rewards. Never today, always tomorrow. The Venky motto and it seems Mowbray's too.

So the fee for Nuttall was £500,000. I'd say that was good business considering. Of course that ensures we are probably even for the summer and haven't spent anything net. Sounds like we are waiting to see if anyone departs and if so if anyone drops into our laps on the cheap. Very poor.

No suggestion at all that theres any intention of addressing LB. Mowbray likes Bell, he's got William's to try out again yet plus Hart who played quite well against Barrow and Mansfield....gulp.

The party line from Sharpe and co is they 'wouldn't rule out' a move for another CB before the window shuts. What's that all about? Either we want one, which we surely do, in which case we try to get one and are disappointed if we don't, or we don't feel we need one (ludicrous) but then we don't pursue anyone. 'Wouldnt rule out' just another one of those ambiguous ones trotted out. Suggests we aren't really that bothered but if something comes up we might get someone in but might not. So don't expect or demand anything but it might happen. Either way we can say we are happy with the window after it shuts.

I don't enjoy it because I've no hope or expectation of anything positive happening for us.

New ground syndrome for many. The League have already bent several rules to help them out but it will get really interesting this week if it isnt done soon. How on earth they will be able to host games with no tickets and presumably no safety certificate or stewarding will be interesting to see.

Time to forget about Ffp. We've spent net £15 million since last summer and not sold anyone and havent broken the rules. Plenty of space in there to sign a couple of decent defenders. This isnt a Ffp issue, it isnt a wages or cash issue. It is a policy issue. Either the owners will not allow cash to be spent on defenders (go and look at the list of defenders we've signed under their ownership) or the manager has chosen to not address the defence. It's one or the other or both. Excuses like Ffp, missing our targets, sob stories about the tough transfer market - all cover stories to shield the owners and manager from a failure to deal with the big issue. They've made their choice between them and unless we do something unexpected in the next 3 days then we're going to have to live with the consequences and Mowbray will be in the crosshairs.

But I'm confused because after Gallagher was signed Mowbray claimed we hadn't touched the Raya cash.

Take it the Raya money has disappeared then.

Venus has previous for dabbling in non-assistant manager territory. At Coventry he was elevated to board member status and oversaw recruitment and even property matters, allegedly. To me his role should be on the training pitch not on the end of a phone. Bizarre. At best ridiculously old fashioned at worst completely incompatible with modern day transfers.

No points or prizes for trying. Doing it is the way to success. We could try to sign Ronaldo if we cant or wont do what is needed then we are no further on.

Agree, but for me you need a settled defence with minutes together under the belt in pre-season. That way work can be done on at least trying to forge them into a coherent unit. Not only was the standard of pre-season poor but there was too much experimenting and messing about with players Mowbray has no intention of using rather than working on making the defence better,

Over the pre-season games Elliott Bennett played 45 minutes against Barrow, 90 minutes v Rangers and 75 minutes v Blackpool. Mulgrew played 75 minutes at Rangers, 45 minutes against Bury and 90 minutes v Blackpool Bell played 60 minutes at Rangers, 45 at Bury and 15 minutes at Blackpool. I don't think that is sufficient.

What Mowbray says and what Mowbray does/what actually happens are two very different things. So his comments in the Telegraph I tend to ignore these days. Very little of what he promised has actually materialised. Be it new defenders, new style of play etc. I was looking at his comments the day after selling Raya that he wanted an 'experienced' keeper in to replace him. The inference being that Raya wasn't experienced and that was the problem. He then goes and signs Christian Walton on loan from Brighton, who has 30 odd games at this level with Wigan under his belt and less than 100 career appearances on loan at various lower league clubs. So a similar number of career appearances to Raya but less at Championship level. Now maybe we will go and get this experienced keeper Mowbray said he wanted but my money is on nobody else arriving before Thursday as things have gone very quiet and we don't tend to be very good at doing late urgent business. Our deals take weeks to get over the line. These sort of comments are what is costing Mowbray big time in my view. He seems to 'get it' when talking to the fans and press but then what he actually does is completely different and he tries to cover for that afterwards.

This isnt a money issue and I'll be annoyed if Mowbray or the media try to make it out to be as that will deflect blame away from where it lies. He's had 5 million this summer plus hefty wages for Gallagher, Downing and Johnson. He had millions last summer. He hasn't had to sell to raise money. So he's had all the opportunity he needs to address defence which could have been addressed for comparitively less money than other positions. I suspect we will get more talk about the budget not stretching to defenders or being priced out of the deals we wanted to do but that is nonsense. We've chosen not to address it despite having a good budget. That's either the owners or the managers fault, but either way it is very concerning

Barnsley, like Brentford, are on another level to us in terms of management, strategy and scouting. Limited resources but clued up.

We havent won an opening day fixture since this lot bought the.club and started 'running' it from annual Indian board meetings. It's not rocket science. Waiting for their approval in late May is too late. Need a comprehensive and testing pre season schedule arranging early. Even Mowbray has suggested he wasnt happy with our pre season games this year.

Micky mouse pre seasons playing Barrow and Bury trialists whilst rivals are off in Europe playing top division clubs.

Price hikes across the board on food and drink dressed up as better quality/portions.

Well we had almost 13000 home fans on today looking at the figures. Not brilliant but moving in the right direction. Shame about the performance and result. A good start and some optimism might have seen us build on those figures but a lot will have gone home disappointed.

Football is a simple game. The solution to our defensive woes is either new coaches or new players. It seems Mowbray isnt doing either so the ultimate solution will be a simple one - new manager. His naivety and ability to make simple things complicated staggers me.

I just hope and pray a situation arises this season or quite soon where it is in a sides interest not to play and they test the league. Almost certainly won't happen but it's the sort of thing i'd be looking to do to humiliate them in public.

If you want a crash course in how to make the fanbase rapidly lose faith with you then follow what Mowbray is doing. The performance and lineup just groundhog day stuff again. Only minor surprise was not having Graham in the team from the start. Usual positive first 10 minutes before regression for the remainder of the first half. Usual 0 goals at half time. Usual routine of the opposition countering to score with their first attempt after a silly mistake. Usual 'brave' fightback. Usual bucket-loads of possession with little to show for it. Usual sucker punch at the other end from a corner. Boring. Tiring. Frustrating. Nothing has changed. Despite promising to do so much we're no further on than this time last year. As expected the new lad nowhere to be seen. Nyambe making up the numbers. Sick and fed up with it already. Another opening day failure to win. Is that now 10 years in a row? All by chance or a result of woeful pre-seasons and poor preparation? Charlton a very limited side but did the job on us. More idea and more of a plan than our lot. I can see the fanbase turning quickly on Mowbray without big changes soon. He's made a rod for his own back and he's had ample time and money to address it. That was appalling and horrendous to watch. After Charlton's second went in it was game up for us. Heads dropped and that was that. Last ten minutes, 2-1 down at home and we've Gallagher on the wing. He should be in the box at that point winning headers. I haven't seen it again since but couldn't see where the corner came from for their 2nd goal? We won't go anywhere gifting goals away.

"The EFL granted permission for Preston North End’s Josh Earl to complete a loan deal until January, and for Harry Brockbank and James Weir to sign permanent contracts on the morning of the game" There we have it then. Rules being bent to help them out.