On the defensive side there was one particular passage of play where he battled Burn for the ball over 20 yards, it was obviously a duel he was destine to lose but he stuck at it, delayed him and did his job for the team. Something we've not seen before. To be fair he wasn't the only one, they all seemed much more willing to engage in duels last night rather than closing down and pressing without initiating contact

Getting to and from Ewood last night was a total mare but couldn’t spoil a Fantastic night, had a lot of the good bits of JDT with some defensive steel mixed in. Every player to a man deserves credit for tonight. I though when the subs were made we’d fold like a deckchair but they performed admirably, even Billy, who for 5 minutes looked like he was plucked from Sunday League before calming himself down and making a few valuable contributions. Shame to end with not going through but a fantastic evening and great to see Ewood bouncing

Markanday was very direct last night, every time he got the ball down he looked to run at them in straight lines and commit them. It was a joy to see, if he can carry that through he’d be a handful.

The point I was making is that win % is usually used a comparison with other managers, of which I am comparing our most recent. To show a small but undeniable improvement, also I’d say points per game over the period would be a better context to judge JE. We were equally unsuited to playing Cruyff style positional football too. We are where we are with the squad, rank rotten management at senior level has tied both managers hands behind their back

It's an improvement on JDT's 5 game win rate of 0% and for Rovers to stay in the division is what counts right now.

I‘m not saying anyone has broken any rules, it’s just a system that leaves Chair eligible to play. Which is odd in comparison to the system here, it would be likely Chair having erm found guilty be remanded while an appeal took place. So had he not appealed he would now be banged up and obviously ineligible to play

Ilyas Chair Sentenced to 2 years in Belgium for whacking a bloke with a rock and fracturing his skull. Remains available for selection while the appeal takes place. Seems mental you can be found guilty and sentenced yet not be remanded awaiting the appeal. Imagine he keeps them up, loses the appeal and goes down. You'd think the clubs that are relegated at the cost of QPR would have something to say about it!

sorry, 3 months, typo

I think JE will try and overload midfield too, especially with Bucko having only played 30 Mins in 30 months and extra body in there to free him up could be a sensible option.

I fancy us to get something out of this, it's going to be ugly as hell with 10 behind the ball for most the game but playing against one of the better sides in the league makes sticking to the task of defending deep and compact easier in a way. Against lesser teams gaps appear and it's more likely that you get drawn out and picked off, look at us under JDT and post Jan under Mowbray. Teams let us have the ball, poor decision making and execution meant we created problems of our own overloading areas of the pitch to get picked off week after week. If we can be disciplined and compact I think we may nick point, fingers crossed for more!

For sure, it’s still unclear to me who Broughton and co have actually signed from their A list other than Tronstad and Leo. Where the results are neutral, 1 good, 1 bad (so far). Other than those 2 and maybe Ennis/Telalovic none of the signings whether they be loan or otherwise seem signings that are done out of anything other than necessity to pad the squad out, filling bodies on the training ground. As everything Rovers we’ve got a system that isn’t fit for purpose in that we have a DoF who can’t sign the players he identifies in the main. You look at the loan players and they look to be more ‘the club’ drawing on its pre-existing relationships with Brighton and Liverpool rather than signings we wanted to make, barring Moran maybe who they talked up as first choice in September (I’m still not sure). I feel for the recruitment team in a sense as they’re operating with arms behind their backs and taking the flack for a lot of duds. Whereas I think a number to the duds are Waggot/club signings from friendly clubs. That said the ones that look like their signings have been a very mixed bag so far

To be honest if the bonus trigger were the case I think it would have been more likely that JDT would pick him to spite Waggot and the owners. In fact I could imagine JDT starting Travis just to hook him after 5 mins to piss them off!

I agree with Neil that the football has been dross, I’m not sure how JE is planning to bring winning football to the team but at the moment I suppose I’m just glad we’ve stopped conceding goals at the rate we were so we at least have a chance to win without needing to score 5.

How's Weston doing? Always thought he looked a really tidy and composed player.

I agree with what you're saying but I disagree a little as whilst JDT didn't have Hedges, Dolan and Gally, JE doesn't have Wharton, Pickering, Carter or Travis and he's only had JRC for 1/4 game if we use the 3 game yard stick. As said, I am certainly not in the JE is the saviour camp (if that even exists) or the JDT out camp but I think we can recognise that he has managed to stem the tide at least initially, which at the time JDT seemed incapable of doing, whether that was due to stubbornness, ability or the broken relationship with the SLT we'll never know.

Form table since JE has taken over puts us 15th with a +1 GD. 4 (league) games prior to that we were rock bottom with 10 conceded and 3 scored. Including tuppings from Huddersfield and WBA. As I’ve said many times I was a huge fan of the way JDT wanted to play, but less of a fan of his lack of pragmatism and ability to identify and/or enact a plan B. That said if you take JE’s first 4 games and compare them to JDT’s last 4 league games he is performing better both in points gained and goal difference. Looking at the opposition they’ve been fairly similar too with WBA and PNE being the only teams either has faced that are threatening the upper reaches of the league. Even if you look at from an injury/availability point of view you’d have an argument to say SG coming in is cancelled out by AW leaving and the rest are fairly neutral in terms of quality or whether JDT was even selecting them. All in all I am very much undecided on JE however I think it would be unfair to say he’s not stopped the rot short term and at least stemmed the tide for a period. It’s not pretty at the moment but it’s grinding out points, getting whalloped away for 0 points at Huddersfield playing suicide football was even less attractive.

Sorry, yes, one of the lesser autocorrect messes my phone has made recently

There definitely feels a likeness to the beginning of the Hughes era in our first 4 games under JE. Hopefully once the mild threat of being sucked into the bottom 3 subsides we will start to see a similar shift as we did with MH and the reigns being loosened a little.

He’s not being helped with the Tuesday - Saturday rotation of games at the moment. Meaning he’s getting very little time to work on patterns, etc. Coming off the back of the worst transfer window in memory, general calamity at every level of the club and a threadbare squad that looks bereft of confidence I think 5 points is a decent return regardless of who the opposition is.

Grinding out points after the December and January disaster will hopefully start to instil a bit of confidence in the players. I’m a fan of JDT but it’s seeming more and more apparent it wasn’t a happy camp with some payers appearing devoid of any confidence. It’s going to take time and I’m not saying JE is the answer but grinding out points and stopping the rot/losing should go some way to helping us turn a corner.

All important clean sheet, gives us a bit of something to build on and gets the monkey off our back to some extent.

I’m not sure Dolan has been good lately either, he played well against Stoke was starved of service but ineffective against Brum and bloody terrible on Saturday. So fairly true to form in that he’s consistently inconsistent

Dolan comes inside because he doesn’t have the pace to go by someone on the outside rather than tactical imo

Not one to say I told you so but at 5’6 and 10 1/2 stone you’ve got to be a hell of player to cut it in the champ, Ayari is not a hell of a player

I think he’s 10x the player Garrett is with the ball, that said Garrett does put himself about and is a physical presence. At 5’6 and not much over 10 1/2 stone I don’t think Ayari has the same defensive abilities. Happy to be proved wrong mind