Buckley is class - and has the potential to be a good premier league player - but he's some way behind the level Dack was pre-injury. It's a good thing that we can actually include others in the conversation though. Dack was so much better than anyone else that we had on our books a couple of years ago, it's easy to forget.

It's working out which forwards play (& where) which is the difficult bit. I like the look of the defence & midfield though.

I like the idea of three at the back, especially now we have a proper right wing back and Edun might be improving. No idea if we'll actually go down this route or not but something like: TK Sepp Ayala/New Wharton Brittain Pickering/Edun Travis Buckley Hedges Gallagher Brereton Although then you're struggling to accommodate our more attacking players - Szmodics, Markanday, Dack, Dolan and Vale all on the bench or not in the squad - so maybe not.

5 in 18 last season, which is better without being brilliant. He was Forest's best player at Ewood though - absolutely dominated Van Hecke, which didn't happen so often.

I remember seeing an interview of Pochettino when he was still in England. He was talking about being manged by Bielsa as a young boy at Newell's Old Boys, and how he used to get the youngsters to do scouting reports for their next opponents and deliver them to the first team. He remembers the whole thing being unbelievably nerve wracking as a teenager, but that it was great for squad integration, and obviously helped no end with players' confidence, tactical awareness, diligence and the like. He even put it down to him eventually becoming a manager. Great to hear that we seem to be doing the same.

I'm looking forward to seeing whether this is right or not. In his first few appearances for Rovers he looked a bit clumsy and accident prone, but not a bad passer per se. This was when he was playing in a two but also when Mowbray wanted us to play like Barcelona, so far from ideal circumstances for a young centre back. I admit that since then I'm going off what others have said rather than actually having seen him play, but Pompey fans don't seem to think that he's particularly limited on the ball. Time will tell I suppose.

Looks like Callum Robinson will be their only recognised forward for Sunday, and even he is more of a wide player. Starting to get a bit more confident about this one.

Seems like you've already got your fill of young-but-talented centre backs. Think you could do with someone a bit more established to fill that last slot ideally, but then again that might be tricky if you want to find someone who can pass it well enough in your system. Is there any sign that Kompany would like to play three at the back? Otherwise, another centre half would but the new lad from City (not THB) as fourth choice? Interesting career move for a lad his age who is meant to be highly rated.

Wigan have had some nightmarish pitches at the new ground - typically blamed on the rugby when Sky pundits would talk about it - but I believe the issue there was the drainage that they had from the pitch, and that in wetter spells there was basically nowhere for the water to go. Don't think it's an issue anymore, but I could be wrong.

I suspect that the earlier post (that Mowbray will be judged more favourably after a few years) is right. Hopefully the success of JDT will tell a story of why we needed to move on from Mowbray, but also that he left us some decent materials to work with too. Unless it was the collapse that ushered in the new era! It was a completely unacceptable run of form, and his tendency to go on these spells every year was easily the most important reason why he had to go. The thing that gets me though is that he was here for so long - responsible for some massive calls both good and bad - and yet things like his demeanour in interviews or on the touch line regularly get brought up as a reason why fans are happy that he's gone. Each to their own I suppose, but I can't think of anything less important.

I basically agree, although Barnes is an extremely unknown quantity even for next season after his injury. The one caveat is that we will need another option if JDT wants to play 3 at the back for any length of time. We can assume that Ayala's going to be missing at one point or another, which means that we can only play that way with either Carter or Phillips coming in. That's fine, but it also means that we have the other unproven youngster as the only back up for three positions. If the idea is that we stick to a back four though, I agree that VDB along with what we have is enough for this season.

Wharton's the only left footed one, so that counts in his favour. Also, to be honest, he's developing into a class footballer. I can't see him dropping out of the team under any circumstances now bar injury or a unforeseen drop in form.

Covers right back too, so would be a top signing.

Just looked up the game, apparently it was the first time a British team kept a clean sheet at their new stadium. Not a bad effort. At one point we had Samba, Nelsen, Zurab, Todd and the Axe all on the same pitch! Not straightforward to break that team down. Todd was only brought on in stoppage time and still picked up a booking! Miss that team.

As impressive as Dack and the young lads were yesterday, the XI shouldn't change from a 3-0 away win. This will be a big test. WBA have recruited Swift and Jed Wallace in the summer, who are both incredibly productive players at this level. Having said that, they're missing their main striker, Daryl Dike, who hasn't been able to get going since his move. Any first teamer who plays in the cup tonight will have played twice since we played Swansea too, so there's a chance that one or two won't be at their sharpest. I think we'll get something from the game, but I've a feeling it'll be a score draw rather than a win.

And had one of the best chants going. "His name is Ludo Miklosko, he comes from near Moscow..." Mikloško of course came from the Czech Republic, and was born closer to Upton Park than Moscow.

Not now, but it was a real disappointment at the time. Treacy was getting big plaudits in the youth team (the new Duff!?) and Sparky seemed to do no wrong in picking up quality strikers for next to nothing, so there were some hope that Rigters would be the next in line.

We've had a poor run against Cov over the years, but that sticks out as such an awful game. Treacy and Rigters in particular were absolutely appalling.

Along with Dack, this is the main think I'm looking out for tonight. I don't think Tomasson had much of an option but to leave him out of the squad vs Swansea, but I'd really like him to kick start his career here seeing as he didn't get the chance last season. If he looks like he has something to offer, all of a sudden we seem to have a really decent amount of depth at that area of the pitch.

We came as close as it comes to beating them at their place too! Towards the end of the game, either Dunn or Derbyshire, I forget which, hit the bar with a long rage speculator. Probably only fair to mention the two miracle saves that Friedel made before then though! Pretty sure we were playing Bruno Berner as a left winger that day, so fair to say we were happy enough with the 0-0.

Plenty of Championship clubs out already to lower league clubs. In fact the only ones who have made it through so far have done so by knocking out other second-tier sides. This will be a big banana skin with all the changes that we'll be making. Hopefully the incoming Dack, Markanday, Dolan and Vale will be hungry to take their chance and that will see us through. 0-2 Rovers.

FA cup too. Wigan away last year was most of the same team that beat Bournemouth a couple of weeks earlier.

Up there with the worst keeper's performance I've ever seen from a Rovers player. Woeful. If we're not willing to play him in a game like this though, we might as well not have him at all though. It doesn't look like we're after another one, so I think he'll probably play. At least it can't be as bad as last time!

Butterworth's been extremely unlucky with the timing and severity of his injures. Even so, he's turning 23 in September and is yet to do anything beyond a couple of promising cameos (and an equal number of pretty poor ones). If he's behind Vale now, I think his time is up. As with Davenport, I hope he has far more luck at his next club, because there is some talent there that can be nurtured.

Pretty abysmal that - especially because we had so many good moments in the cup under Bowyer.