Let's see what the future holds, but I'm hopeful for the back end of the season. Sufficient proportion of the population will be vaccinated by April that football may return to something like normal. At the very least I hope they'll let us in to Wembley in May.

I'd argue that missing both our starting number 8s for the Forest game was quite bad, but that's splitting hairs a bit I guess. We should've played better in those games, even if a points return of 1 point was a little less than we deserved. Even so, we're not in December yet & we've played multiple games with a third-choice out of position left back, our back up keeper, our fourth choice centre half and without arguably our four first choice centre midfielders in Dack/Travis/Holtby & Rothwell. We'll all have it bad at some point this season, but so far I'd say we've had it a bit worse than most & hopefully it'll have evened out by the end of the season. Anyway, all in all I think we're slightly unfortunate not to have a few more points than we do, and I think we've definitely played well enough to not be scared of anyone in this league. In previous years we might be looking at a Brentford/Bristol City/Norwich week as damage limitation. This season I hope we're looking at it as a chance to make a statement.

We're still looking at a small-ish sample of results. At this point last season Brentford were only just getting going, but their quality showed as the season went on. All teams have been influenced by injuries and covid, but I'm not sure how many teams have had as many first teamers out for individual games as we had before the international break. Even yesterday we finished the game with a fifth choice centre back, and we're in miles better health than we were a few weeks ago. I'm not saying that we do have a better squad than those teams by the way! But if we're judging our league position, selection issues alongside some reasonably unfortunate results earlier in the season could easily have us a bit higher up.

Agree, I was impressed with his debut but the way we play doesn't offer too much in the way of protection for the centre halves. Not fair to ask him to play too much before he's ready to do so consistently. He's got the perfect example to follow in Scott Wharton. The years he's spent getting nearly 100 appearances in men's football has obviously done them the world of good.

Only following it on twitter, but as far as I can tell they're both still on the bench.

Chorley had a penalty saved which would have made it 3-1! Really hope they hang on.

Width of a post away from losing at the death to Wycome today. Start of the season they had plenty of injuries up front, but they've had close to a full team for weeks now. Inexplicable.

Three points is the main thing, but he deserved the clean sheet today. Actually I thought Lenihan and Wharton did too for their defending, even if it wasn't ideal that they saw so much of the ball. Compared to what we've had, Kaminski is different gravy.

Not difficult to see how Barnsley are beating plenty of teams this year. Very well drilled team who are making their talent go a long way. All credit to them. We were way off our best today, but we won. Winning tight games is the thing we needed to improve on, so I'm not going to bag our performance now that we've gone and won one. Big credit to the keeper and both centre backs, who were under a lot of pressure. Today shows how important Nyambe is to our season too.

Elliott in for Gally. Otherwise same team

Was thinking the same earlier, genuinely don't know what we do if Nyambe gets injured whilst JRC/Bennett are out. Pike from the Ressies? On Arma, suspect that there might be 2 + 2 = 5 going on after they've looked in the Championship recently for Bowen and Benrahma. Having said that, if we take those two as a yardstick, we have to be looking at £20million plus to even start he conversation, and even then only if he's desperate to go and won't sign a new deal.

Two games against Wycombe and Cov coming up for them next. Far too early to be saying that they'll decide their season, but lose them both and they'll be in panic stations.

Sure it has already been mentioned on here, but having Douglas at left back should really help get the most out of him in that role. In fact our change in approach generally has made the team a bit more 'Gallagher friendly' this year, even if he hasn't played enough to really show it. Think we need to be reconciled to him never fixing his heavy first touch, but a fit and confident Gallagher can be a real asset if we use him properly.

Think that's right - I'd expect him to play some point tomorrow but probably from the bench. On Gallagher, there's a very good chance that we'll never see value for money for him, but if we are then we have to be playing him when he's on form. He's played a very big part in the points we've picked up over the last week, so keeping him there makes perfect sense for now.

The one change I'd be tempted to make would be Johnson for Trybull, just because of his influence in the earlier games of the season. On the fence with that one, but Gally, Wharton should keep their places. Going off Barsnley's most recent games, looking like we'll have most of the ball once again. Whether it will turn out to be another dominant display or a stodgy draw/ loss by the odd goal remains to be seen.

Wonderful

I've always been an optimist when it came to Rovers. Only wanted Ince potted after the third went in at Wigan. Even expected Murphy to show his ability once he got used to the Championship. Even so, I never in a million years thought it was possible for Ben to improve so much so quickly. A full season like this and nobody will be mentioning his price tag, which is amazing where we were at the start of the season.

Dolan getting the third! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA *breathes* HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

MoM alongside Rothwell for me.

They haven't got a striker in the starting 11! Watch it rain goals now

On the Rovers home page you should see a stopclock counting down to kick off and button underneath saying Live Match Centre. Click on that from around an hour before kick off & you should see the live stream on there.

Feeling reasonably confident about this one. Whilst our performances have been feast and famine this season, we've got the better individuals and we should be fresh after a week off. 1-3 Rovers

Entirely possible that I've just not picked up a shift during the pandemic. It's true that I've seen the odd post on social media which have used words like welcome & forgiveness, but then again these platforms are well known for amplifying minority voices. I'll take some convincing that the large majority of match-going fans aren't Venkys-sceptics in some form or another, albeit with a large an increasing number with a bit of a pragmatic response. As you say though, I could be wrong.

I can't speak for others, but I don't think there's much in the way of a significant number of 'pro-Venkys' Rovers fans. The divide as far as I see it is the group who believe (rightly or wrongly) that Venkys are necessary/inevitable/manageable in the short term and those who see getting rid of them as the main priority for the football club. I agree that many more fans would now fit in the first category rather than the second compared to when Coyle was in charge, but I don't think it's fair to characterise this as a sea change in how they are perceived in any meaningful way. Take a straw poll of Rovers fans of all persuasions and I'm certain the vast majority will say that Venkys have been a disaster - how could they not? We almost all agree that the decisions that were made under their stewardship have wrecked the club. Where lots of us differ is how we can best move forward from where are now, but I don't think you'll find too many fans in the more pragmatic camp using words like 'welcome' or 'forgiveness'. Completely misses the point, and arguing about that sort of language serves to exaggerate the percentage of fans who are actively pro-Venkys, of whom I'm convinced there are a pretty derisory number.

Great signings for the Magpies. Won't pretend to know too much about Tomlinson but I always felt a bit sorry for Henley. Got a bit too much too soon after a couple of stellar performances as a 17 year old. Maybe had he come through at a different period in our history things could have been better for him here.