JHRover

Down to the last 2000 now which when you factor in a few hundred will be restricted view seats in the Riverside they really need to be getting it open this week. Knowing this lot though they'll leave it to 3 days before the game and then do it.

Apparently the staff Xmas party this afternoon. Would have been nice to tell people the shop was closing before they spent the afternoon driving there/back.

Sounds like Gary Rowett first choice for Oxford. I think sensible for a team wanting to stabilise and survive, though won't win any awards for being good to watch.

Next 6 games are: Millwall, Sunderland, Hull, Leeds, Dingles, Middlesbrough (Cup). Presumably those who would be happy with a point at Millwall would also be happy with draws against Sunderland, Leeds, Dingles (all above us) and at Middlesbrough in the cup. If that happens and even if we draw all those and celebrate the points it is 1 win in 6 games, assuming we beat lowly Hull who are under new management. 0 wins in 6 if we don't. Happy then?

Does this apply to Coventry fans too? If so good news for them, they'll sell loads at that price. Rovers will do well to shift 500. Midweek, TV, loads of other games in the run up to then, and of course the usual strings attached to purchase.

Need a bank loan to get the train from Preston, £115 return for a standard ticket last I checked, scandalous

Well Millwall, QPR, PNE, Swansea, Watford all examples of clubs that are able to compete in this league, spend money on players, not sell £40 million of talent and still do so with capacities of around 20,000 without a need to provide vast allocations to away teams. I'm sure the repugnant Venkys would boastfully claim to be richer than their owners too, with no impediment on their funding according to their spokesman/snake oil salesman. Personally I hate the reputation we have as being a grand day out for all and sundry and I think a huge allocation being issued is basically setting away clubs a challenge to fill it and have a good day. What I would like to see is tiered pricing. The Riverside is the least popular stand (usually a maximum of 1500 in a capacity of 4500). It is the worst stand for facilities - uncovered seats for the front 10 rows, obstructed view seats for all rows higher than 15, uncovered walkway, no concourse, limited bar and catering outlets. With all this in mind it should be cheaper than the rest of the ground. It annoys me no end that a long standing Rovers fan who decides to go to the dingle game elects to sit in the Riverside (at this point other than very limited numbers in the JW wings this is the main availability) are going to be paying £33 (the same as a dingle) to enjoy inferior facilities and views to a dingle. That stand should be priced according to its facilities and then when we play the likes of Leeds, dingles, Sunderland we can still charge away fans £30+ and Waggott can get his figures up but there is still a route for Rovers fans to go and pay substantially less.

Yeah they had the same brainwave last year when they sacked off Gary Rowett (the bloke who had them in play-off contention every year) and appointed Lampard's mate who was going to play pretty football. They plummeted down the division and would have got relegated had Harris not returned and dragged them out of it. Could maybe understand making that mistake once but twice in a year? Foolish.

I think the owners' input into January will be zilch. They won't know, or care, about how we are performing on the pitch or in the table, they are employing two shysters to run it day to day and give them minimal hassle or expense. So there's no decisions for them to make. They've set the budget for the year and given their instructions to their henchmen. That's that. I still think people give them too much credit by suggesting they are following results or are wanting us to get promoted and will respond to results accordingly. There's no evidence of this from recent seasons at both ends of the table. Inertia whether relegation is staring us in the face or promotion within reach. It seems the only one with any way of even contacting the Indians is their man in the shadows, so I doubt there's any prospect of Eustace somehow getting in touch with them and persuading them to support him as Mowbray and Bowyer once did. So in the end it will be juggling around with what can be generated from club resources. Getting shut of Sigurdsson ought to free up some cash on the wage bill to bring one or two in, but then we've the problem of paying for people so probably looking at a loan or two.

Currently looking at a gate of about 20,800 based on tickets sold with about 5200 maximum remaining available were they to open the BBE upper. Would be good to sell most of those and get up past 25k but still think it is a poor do that we always seem to fall a long, long, long way short of Ewood's capacity.

Well I suspect there is zero intention from India or the boardroom to offer any of these players more money or longer terms, so it will either be sales in the summer or run down the contracts and get nothing.

Both Corberan at West Brom and Rohl at Sheff Wed have built up as good if not better reputations than Eustace. Corberan took Huddersfield to the play-off final with no money and at West Brom has had them in contention despite a takeover and cutbacks. Rohl worked absolute miracles in keeping Wednesday up last season and has them top half this season. Difference is both those clubs will recognise this and try their hardest to keep their managers. Will Venkys lift a finger here? Highly unlikely, and as for Waggott he's probably salivating at the potential for a compensation lump sum to boost his figures.

Eustace doing a fine job, team in a good position, fans happy, players seem to be happy. He has 18 months left on his deal signed when he joined. So not only is a large chunk of our squad out of contract in the next 6-18 months but also the manager who is holding it all together. Now what you would expect to happen, and pronto, is for the club to sort out a new, extended, improved contract for Eustace. But that doesn't happen here. Contract extensions just don't get sorted under slippery Steve and the shadow man. Improved terms? Ha. Makes me chuckle to myself when I keep hearing fans talk about whether Dolan is going to sign 'his new deal' or not, as though it is just assumed that there is a new improved deal sat there waiting to be signed by him and we are being strung along. I'd say based on the antics of this club and total lack of senior contract extensions over a number of years that there is little to no intention among the hierarchy to plan longer term or ensure key personnel are tied down. Not if it saves a few quid in the meantime.

Waggott already has a job for life as does anyone else down there as long as they are happy to keep their heads down, do what they need to do, keep quiet and don't rock the boat or offend Venkys. So I doubt promotion would make his job any more secure than it already is. The only way he's leaving is if he retires or if he suddenly decides to go rogue and turn the spotlight on the owners, which as we know from Allardyce, Williams, Lambert, JDT very very quickly sees your time come to an end here. I'd hoped by now that approaching 71 he'd have retired but obviously this job is too lucrative and cushy for him to give up voluntarily even at that age. So he can keep his head down, keep things ticking over, do the bare minimum to hit his targets, collect his wage and count down the days to retirement. Or he can apply pressure to the owners to go further, harder, back the manager. With that comes all sorts of extra pressure, risk, attention that he clearly doesn't want here. Personally I doubt he could even contact the owners even if he suddenly wanted to. His decision making over the last 7(!) years now shows us that pushing for promotion just isn't in his vocabulary. JDT was desperate to do that and Waggott quickly put that to bed by talking about survival. I imagine right now he's happy that 50 points is getting nearer and nearer but also concerned that Eustace will (quite rightly) be expecting some level of support in January when there is zero intention of providing that. He will be worried about last season repeating itself and the manager giving up or walking elsewhere when he is failed by the club in January. He might get lucky and avoid that with Eustace probably a calmer and more patient character than JDT but it won't last long.

It would be nice just to get north of 25,000 and not be close to absolutely full. We've had quite a few low 20,000s usually fuelled by a 6,000+ away following from PNE or Leeds but don't seem to ever get above 25,000. The buffoons at Rovers consider anything north of 18k to be a 'bumper gate' and get themselves into a right old panic about traffic, parking, congestion, queues so it would be nice for them to experience an actual proper crowd that this club was accustomed to right up to their bosses destroying it. Having restricted the dingles to 4,000 (still too many IMO) there is additional pressure then on Rovers fans to make up the numbers and have limited the attendance to an absolute maximum of 25-26k even if we managed to sell the whole lot. So far it looks good, I'll be honest I feared a pretty low turnout with the expensive tickets and early kick off, so to be at circa 20k with 3 weeks to go hopefully we can shift a few thousand more as it gets nearer.

One way to remove any prospect of a bumper gate is to simply stop selling tickets, which is what it looks like they have done today....

Again they are taking the easy route though Chaddy. Here's a radical idea - why not try to INCREASE footfall? The problem is the word TRY - there's no chance of that happening with this lazy regime. They said that having a town centre shop wasn't justified so they got rid of that. They said that having home fans in the Darwen End and Blackburn Upper wasn't justified and shut those. They said having a matchday programme wasn't justified and got rid of that. Rovervision and Radio Rovers went too. They said having 2 separate sites at Brockhall wasn't justified and tried their best to bulldoze one of those only not that easy when dealing with major planning requirements. Each and every time it is downsize, downscale, cut, reduce, hollow out, devalue, diminish. Easy option. But each and every time the outcome is a further degradation of Blackburn Rovers as a proud institution that once represented excellence and ambition. Each time it becomes harder and less attractive for people to engage with the club. Harder to buy tickets, harder to go to games, less incentive to do so, worse atmosphere at games. I've pointed out before that we can continue on this never ending cycle of downgrading until there is nothing left. We can shut half of Ewood, Riverside will be the next one, because it saves on cost. We can mothball other facilities and congratulate ourselves on a minimal saving whilst still somehow losing £15 million a year. What you will eventually end up with, and we aren't that far off it now in my view, is a husk and shell of a football club that is failing on delivering for its fans, instead just existing in a zombie like state every year. As I've explained above, from what I understand we are still employing staff to work in the club shop and in the Blues kitchen on Mondays, doing other jobs like sorting online orders and tickets, we've just got the doors locked so the public can't wander in and buy things off the street. So I'm not sure what saving we are actually making there. It will be minimal I suspect and that's assuming that we aren't losing money by turning people away from the shop. It assumes all those people will happily head home and buy online instead, I suspect some can't or won't do this and sales will be lost.

From what I gather even though the shop is closed on a Monday we are still employing people to work in the shop, where they sort out stock and online orders, but the doors are locked and people cannot walk in and buy anything. Likewise I've been told that the Blues Bar is no longer open to the paying public, but continues to operate for the benefit of staff to get their lunch. Plenty of people, family members of mine included, have made a decision on a weekend, maybe after watching us win on the Saturday and making a decision to go to the next game off the back of a good performance or a few drinks with mates on the Saturday night and making a decision to go on a Tuesday / Wednesday. So they pop down to the shop on a Monday to grab some tickets and whilst there might see something in the shop that takes their fancy or might be a good option for someone as a Christmas present. Whilst there they might notice the Blues Bar open and want to grab something to eat or a coffee. Last I heard we needed every penny we can get and yet we are essentially telling people turning up at the shop to get lost and take their cash with them, even though we've still got people inside the shop being paid. Blackburn Rovers 2024 - almost unbelievable until you remember who owns it and who is labelled CEO. It's hard not to believe that they just want the whole operation shutting down to a part time enterprise. Odd when the first think slippery Steve spoke about when he arrived was making Ewood a place for people to go all year round. Funny way of going about it.

So will the club shop also be shut on Monday 23rd December (traditionally the busiest day of the year for shops).

According to the online planner there are roughly 3700 or so remaining tickets in the home areas. On that basis I suspect we are somewhere just short of 20,000 sold in total, bearing in mind the 7000 unavailable for sale in the Blackburn and Darwen Ends and probably the end block of the Riverside and JW lower being netted off. I would like to think that if we get down to the last couple of thousand this side of Xmas they will have to open up the top tier but I wouldn't put it past them to leave it closed and be happy with the 22,000 'bumper gate' and leave it at that.

Blackburn End lower virtually sold out now, not a great deal left in the Jack Walker, couple of thousand left in the Riverside. Time for common sense and get the BBE upper opened, and have the ground even looking remotely full. Trouble is in its mothballed state probably nobody has been up there for 12 months

We shouldn't be treating a draw here as a good result just because we've managed to do very well and exceed expectations in our last few games. We need to take this in isolation, forget about the last few games and go all out to beat this lot at home. We certainly owe them one - don't think we've beat them since they came up from League One a few years ago and must have had 5-6 attempts at it now. Their away form is horrific, as is their goals against column, so we need to be looking to exploit that. Anything other than a win here will be a big opportunity missed going into Xmas. Of course going into the last batch of games we'd all be happy but we need to keep it going in games where we should be really confident.

I'm not even convinced that the Club - that's Waggott and co - want Dolan to sign a new deal. Of course they will say they do when asked by fans and the media, but its free and easy to say something. They've done a lot of that over the years with little to show for it. He's probably licking his lips at the prospect of getting another wage off the books and perhaps some compensation off his next club. Sadly as we all know footballing considerations are irrelevant at Blackburn Rovers, it's all about what suits the Indians and the charlatans they employ.

Still 3000+ empty in the BBE last time I checked unless they've opened and sold the upper tier.

In theory we should be in the better part of the country to avoid the worst of the storm. Still don't fancy heading over the M62 if its very windy.