Admiral Nelsen

I'm happy enough to say that I'm pleasantly surprised by some of the early performances. First impressions can obviously be misleading (in both directions, as anyone seeing Andre Ooijer's debut would testify!). But Alebiosu has impressed me more than a lad with his pedigree had any right too. Gudjohnsen and Morishita appear to have something about them. McLoughlin looks better than you'd expect for Hull City's fourth choice centre back, and even Tavares has had his moments which suggests he could have a pretty high ceiling. But stronger than last year? I seriously doubt it, and we can only really say one way or another when we see the sorts of performances they're capable of in February after they've had some exposure to a Championship winter and regular three game weeks.

It would be a disaster, but a shoe in for relegation is a bit much. There's some absolute dross in this league. You don't need much talent to finish above the three worst teams. Having said that, I'd obviously be much happier if we had another proven midfielder coming in before the deadline.

I don't think you are. I think there's a *lot* of nervousness about letting Travis, Brittain and Batth go, in particular. I think there's some excitement over the last day or two now we're at the 'getting new players through the door' stage, but if you were to ask most of us if we could send some of our new signings back, and get back the core of the squad that finished 7th on longer contracts, I suspect most wouldn't think twice.

I don't think he does get that much ire though. He probably got more in the early 2000s in fairness, but I think most fans always recognised he was doing his best. Doesn't alter the fact that it was a catastrophe of a transfer. Huge money and a big contributing factor to getting relegated. Agree that there are lots of examples where we've had players where the shoe has been on the other foot. Danny Graham at Sunderland is one that comes to mind.

In the same season as £7.5 mil (including future international, Rovers fan James Beattie) for Kevin Davies!

When you think about the fees that were paid too. Absolute megabucks by the standards of the time.

He did indeed, forgot that he was a January signing. So Woy just takes credit for Davies, Dailly, Peacock and Perez. Ugly stuff.

It would have to go some to be as bad as the Murphy/Etuhu window! Or Hodgson's spending spree in 98/99 for that matter (at least we got Matty Jansen alongside the rest of the dross). But yes, whilst I get there's an optimistic way of looking at this summer's dealings, I'd say there's only McLoughlin that you can hang your hat on as a reliable Championship level player (and even he could end up being a downgrade on what what we had last year). I don't say that as a criticism of any of the players or of Gestede even, but we've clearly gambled and it could easily backfire.

I think that underplays his pace a bit. He's not lightning, but he's sharp and clever enough to get into scoring positions. Thinking back to the Boro cup game last year, he missed a couple of sitters but the thing I took away was that he was getting in the right areas. In fact over the course of his time here the ball seems to find him in good areas, and plenty of strikers with decent careers obviously never develop that knack. I'm in two minds about letting him go. He's not that young anymore, so a million quid for an unproven player with a shocking injury record isn't bad business. At the same time, once he's given a run I can see him banging them in at that level (*if* he stays fit). All of a sudden a seven figure sum doesn't seem that great for his position and age. I agree that his all round game is unlikely to ever be that impressive. He's a poacher or nothing, off what I've seen. But then again teams pay the big money for goal scorers.

Indeed - although not in year 1! Massive deflection and a dodgy pen in the last ten minutes making a draw out of what seemed like an easy win.

Personally, I thought at the time we were massively thin skinned when it came to that. He's obviously quite an emotional guy in a high-scrutiny job, and he ended up saying a handful of slightly ill-advised things when a microphone was shoved under his face after a loss. Agree that some of his errors were shockers. Bradley Johnson as a 10 sticks in the mind!

I suspect you're right, but to be honest it's far too early to be making a call on that. It's undoubtedly a gamble, and not one I'm at all comfortable with. I would have kept Batth and Weimann, but being hard headed I can see the logic of standing your ground with contracts for players of their age. VI clearly wants an athletic, energetic team, so you shouldn't be held to ransom for players who don't even fit in with that (assuming that was the reason behind them leaving) Different kettle of fish with Brittain, Travis and if rumours are to be believed, Hyam. Gambling on their replacements and getting it wrong could easily be the difference between a comfortable season and one where we end up going down.

I really wanted him to succeed here (and rate his talent) but Buckley needed to go for his own sake. Getting a handful of minutes here and there didn't suit either party, he needs to get a run of games somewhere to get his career back on track. Agree it's a shame, but he turns 26 in a couple of months. As much as he might've been unlucky with the odd manager, he's had his chance unfortunately.

If you offered me 8th, then I'd say that exceeds my expectations by a fair distance. I wouldn't call it a success. Success for us in this division is either promotion or a big step forward from the previous year.

£3 million is only a bargain price to those with massive budgets - i.e. parachute clubs, and aberrations like Wrexham. To the rest of us, it's sadly a significant fee, especially if you're talking about a non-attacker and a player of an age where you're not going to see a profit further down the line. Those Championship clubs who want to do their Guardiola tribute act wouldn't be that keen. Other than that, I'd take some convincing that he doesn't start for every club who finished below us last year, and he walks into their XI in plenty of cases.

The sky won't fall in! We've sold better players in the past. Equally we shouldn't do what it is always tempting to do and pretend that they were never that great to begin with. I seem to remember one or two doing the same about Cairney who left to a similarly middling club for a similar fee. (Not that I'm saying that Trav is as good as Cairney! But most clubs in the league would love to have him, and hardly any non-parachute clubs will spend more this summer than what Derby are offering for a central midfielder).

I think that's a feature of how we set up to be honest. He's shown that he can drive forward with the ball well enough over his time here, if we played 442 (which I appreciate nobody does anymore) or even 433 then we'd see him do that much more I think. To be clear, I'm not arguing that Travis gets into every team in the division. Teams going for the automatics will have better options, as will a couple of others. But there are some absolute plodders who play his position in this league - we've had our fair share at Ewood! - so I think saying he's average is seriously underplaying his ability and how easy it should be to replace him. I hope I'm wrong, obviously, and that Tavares and Baradji are a class above! But I'll believe it when I see it.

I expect these to improve as the season goes on (as Manning's Bristol City seemed to do last year) so this is probably a good time to play them. It seems like they're (another!) team that plays out from the back with defenders who aren't up to it, so hopefully we can take advantage of that.

Agree that they're well suited. I expect him to be a big hit there to be honest, but I'd also have expected him to be a big hit at Coventry. Or at Millwall if they managed to sign him last year. Or others if they had the money to spend. I think because he's a bit of a wind-up merchant and can be a pantomime villain, we can be in danger of overdoing what he brings/doesn't bring as an 'enforcer', and missing how good (at this level) his all-round game is. We saw it when he first came into the side and could immediately do what Evans and Smallwood could do as well as plenty more besides on the ball. We've had countless central midfielders in the last decade or so since we've been relegated, and Trav is one of at most two or three that don't have glaring weaknesses in his game.

Game of opinions, but I think this is selling him well short. If you were a team managed by a Russell Martin type (or even a JDT type, even though they're very different) then I can see how Travis isn't the sort you want. He's technically decent - much better than people give him credit for - but asking him to play one/two touch football isn't playing to his strengths. But if you want a classic box-to-box type, how many are better than Travis? I'd say he'd be a key player for at least half of the teams in this league (much in the same way he is for us).

Pears is absolutely fine as a Championship back up keeper. Definitely far too accident prone as a #1, but adequate as a stand in. We were happy to have him a few years back once Kaminski was injured. Unfortunately we then made the wrong call to let Pears keep the jersey and sell Kaminski, but that's hardly Pears fault! If we get offered genuinely decent money for him (seems unlikely) then you take it, but I certainly wouldn't want to be chasing him out of the club. Not least because it's not as though Toth has really proven himself either just yet, so it's not even just injury we need to be wary of.

I think an issue we have is you could probably take at least two from Good Enough (Toth, Alebiosu) and to be fair a couple from Not Good Enough too (Kargbo, Montgomery, maybe De Neve) and move them into the Unknown category. Which now constitutes a majority of the squad! We've well and truly rolled the dice this window. The law of averages suggests we'll probably get both successes and failures from this current crop, but we'd better hope there's at least four or five more in your good enough section come the spring or we'll be bang in trouble.

I'm pretty confident that, barring a very bad injury run, that there will be three worse teams than that squad. Beyond that, I don't think we can say it's competitive one way or another because we're heavily dependent on the new signings being up to it. They could be - and one or two are showing good early signs - but the Championship is such a relentless league. It worries me that so much of the squad could be physically struggling once we get past Christmas, and that's before making judgements about their quality.

I think a really big problem with Buckley is that he takes a while to get his rhythm. I've always been one that rated his ability and wanted him to kick on, but I don't think I can ever remember him coming on and changing a game. Similarly when he's had a spell out of the team and he gets his chance, his first game tended to be pretty underwhelming, where we see his under-hit passes and getting caught in possession. He has tended to get better when he is given a run of starts, but he's not going to get that here so it's best for all parties that he tries to get his career back on track. I really hope he manages it.

Rovers have posted pictures of him training with the group. No idea if he's fit enough to play at the weekend, but he's not on the treatment table.