Four year contract. Very happy with this, goes a long way from solving our chronic shortage of pace & numbers in attack.

Still think we're a little short on both to be 100% happy, but all of a sudden we look a lot more capable of doing well in this division. 

I thought Gally had some fairly serious weaknesses last time around. His first touch, especially, sticks in my memory as being a real flaw.

BUT, he managed to get 11 goals with dire service and no manager. Some of his goals were all of his own work. In the set up we have now he could be twice the player, and a real asset.

Just now, Scotland1 said:

We’ve had all summer to get this sorted, we’ve now lost a key player for the first 3 point battle.

Great signing but disappointing timing. Any news on his fitness ala Palmer?

He's been involved in some games, so should be in front of Palmer in that respect.

2 hours ago, JacknOry said:

Sign on the dotted line AA - we have a fondness for Geordie strikers.

Always liked Graham Fenton

21 minutes ago, JayDee said:

If you could choose either Armstrong or Maddison who would you pick. I'm pretty sure we couldn't afford both and I'm a little torn. Think I'd try get Maddison on a permanent and try loan a striker in the mould of Graham. Not a clue who that would be mind 

I'd be happy with either to be honest.

Really liked what I saw of Armstrong last year & think Mowbray is far more likely to get a tune out of him than was the case at Bolton. That said, I'd probably just go for Maddison because he looks like he can handle himself physically. 

Peterborough are pretty well known for getting top dollar for their players. If it is us that's in for him, then expect it to be done late.

Optimistic about the season, but less so about this fixture.

We never do well at Ipswich, and we've been slow starters for years.

Fully expect us to finish above them come May, but a point here is acceptable. 

14 minutes ago, chaddyrovers said:

Zach Clough getting mention as this player who the tweet refer too..how true I have no idea

Definitely appears to be on his way out of Forest.

Interestingly, Bolton fans don't seem enormously keen on bring him back either. Can't have impressed much on loan if he's gone from their only real asset to not worth his place for relegation favourites in a couple of years.

Having said that, he strikes me as a player similar to Armstrong, in that he's clearly not going to get a kick for a Parkinson side, doesn't make him a bad player. Would be pretty happy if we could get him on the cheap. 

12 minutes ago, islander200 said:

Rich Sharpe tweeting that a story on Armstrong coming shortly.

Davenport likely to be out with injury for Ipswich 

Davenport thing is disappointing, but the indications are that he would be starting on the bench anyway I guess. Most likely Smallwood & Evans, with Travis an outside bet. 

Hopefully it's minor, and he'll get his chance to start against Carlisle, see what he can do from there. 

3 minutes ago, OJRovers said:

Its an impossible league to predict.

I see that they have Norwich on there predicted as 14th, when they have been throwing a bit of cash about this summer (signed Marshall and Rhodes).

Rovers will need to use our promotion momentum to over-achieve vs some of the massive budgets (Stoke, Boro) but there's not much between the teams outside the top 3/4 contenders.

100% agree. It'll be too much for this squad to compete at the top of the table, but there's no reason at all why we can't be successful with momentum and the culture of the squad.

We'll be clear of relegation as a minimum, for me. A couple of clever signings and a fair crack with injuries and who knows.

1 minute ago, JHRover said:

The likelihood of Lenihan, Mulgrew, Graham or Evans making it through a 46 game Championship season without getting injured is remote.

Remove any of them for any length of time and we have no depth. We're relying on Downing or the unknown new CB to step in at the back, unproven Travis or Davenport in CM or Whittingham, and nobody up front at this stage other than Samuel.

Lots of work to do so whilst satisfied with the Palmer addition there are another 3 required as a minimum, and they have to be good enough to play every week.

Evans I'm not so sure about. There are question marks about all of them, I accept, but it's equally likely that a Davenport or a Travis will get in the team in front of Evans on merit rather than injury. Given where we've been in the last 5 years, we're alright in the middle of the park imo.

Agree about depth elsewhere, but you can probably say that about a few teams. The one which is really frightening at the minute is back up to Graham, but I don't think that'll still be the case in a few weeks.

Just now, islander200 said:

Sun article from Nixon saying Kent going to Rangers 

Expect to see him in a Rovers shirt come the weekend!

Could be completely wrong about this, but I'm not all that sorry. Going off the totality of what other fans have said, clearly there's some talent there, but a lack of an end product & footballing intellegence comes up again and again.

If a loan player has to do too much 'learning on the job' then it's probably means that the loaning club is getting the rough end of the deal. Hopefully this means we can get better.

Pleased for Wharton. Convinced that there's a long term future for him here, even if this season is at least 12 months too soon for him to be playing a consistent first team role.

If we're determined to play 3 at the back this year, then it might be worth keeping him around the squad, but hopefully he can get 1st team football at a good league 1 club next year. 

Just now, ChrisPriceBaldSpot said:

I see the bookies odds have shortened overnight on Maddison coming to Rovers. Gone from 10/1 to 4/1. May be something in that. 

Hopefully, wouldn't have taken much betting to shift those odds though I wouldn't have thought.

Just now, AAK said:

I am so sure we are in for Maddison. Peterborough chairman literally replies to all fans, but has avoided answering every single question from Rovers fans. Maybe Rovers asked to keep it quiet, that's how Mowbray usually likes doing business?

Really don't know what to think about this one. On the one hand, it doesn't seem like we have £2 million or whatever it would take to sign him when we'll need another 3 or so additional players. Also seems totally implausible that you can keep something like that secret these days.

Having said that, if you take him it face value then there simply aren't many clubs it could be! Really hope it's us anyway, first team looks okay apart from a massive Maddison-type-player hole in it.

Just now, ChrisPriceBaldSpot said:

I would be happy with Gallagher on loan. He played in a poor Birmingham side that scored very few goals due to a lack of service. He still finished the season as their top goalscorer with only 6 goals. 

He knows the club, he knows the manager, I think as a loan signing he would be ideal. Armstrong, Chapman, Maddison and Bauer as well and I think it would be a happy summer. 

Pretty much exactly how I feel about it.

There's no getting away from that in certain areas, we're badly short. Fortunately though, we look fairly well off in others.

Defensively, we're fine. We were fine last time as soon as Coyle was potted. Numbers wise we're okay in the middle of the park too, albeit with an element of players stepping up to a new level. Already better than last time we were in this division, if Davenport can be as good as he seems, potentially miles better.

Issue as everyone has recognised is up top and out wide. No idea if Gallagher has improved since we had him, but he would be useful even if he simply hasn't got worse. Got goals in a team with no service and basically no manager. No reason why he can't get more now that we've got a proper set up.

Don't see anything in Mowbray's comments which look like panic stations just yet, but clearly the next few weeks are massive in terms of what we can hope for this season.

Given that we'll be looking for 3-4 attacking players by the end of the window, don' think there's any problem at all with 1-2 of them being loans. So long as they're all of the right calibre, think that's an entirely healthy ratio for a team looking to do well in the Championship.

If we get Gallagher & Armstrong on loan, Chapman on a permanent & ideally another attack minded player in (Middison if the budget stretches), then I'd be happy with that.

Like winning the league vs winning the FA cup.

One is a slog. Your bread & butter. Something that you invest all your time & emotional energy in. The other is a great few days out and some amazing memories, but you'd never take a good cup run vs league success.

It would've been brilliant if England won the world cup, the entire country would need a week off work. Ultimately though, Rovers doing well is something I've thought about for not far off every day of my life since I was in short trousers! No contest.

19 minutes ago, LeftWinger said:

When we were linked with Valeri Domovchiyski years ago, I edited his wikipedia page before the media reported the story, to suggest he had run the 100m in under 10 seconds. This was then reported by numerous news outlets as being true.

Was that a fact as it was more than 3 news sources reporting it?

 

That was amazing! Forgot about that episode. 

Pretty sure it was even described on Sky Sports News as "Blackburn are interested in signing Bulgarian speedster Domovcheski". Top work. 

Pleased with this. Think he'll prove his worth this year when you'd expect that we'll have a bit more defending to do!

23 minutes ago, Ewood Ace said:

I wouldn't have Neymar in the top 30 Brazilian players that I have seen. I just don't see what the hype is all about with him, so overrated. 

Definitely! Clearly a very good player, but you could make an argument that in 2002, he wouldn't even get in the team in front of Ronaldinho, Rivaldo & Fat Ronaldo. 

Was the big superstar in 2014 because it was the worst Brazilian team in memory. Simple as that for me. 

Just now, tomphil said:

Building a team to play that way would be a real treat i'm sick of the sit off and let the other side play approach that has been often the norm at Ewood since relegation.

Ok you have to at times but if you can mix it up and have the pressing as your core style then even better. 2 holding mids which manager after manager here has seemed to prefer is fine if they are good enough to break play deep and if you have two sharp wingers to get the ball to and counter.

TM mixed it up a bit last season to be fair but not enough for my liking although the people available often dictated it I think, i'e strikers on the wings etc. Time for a proper change.

Agree, but to be fair I'm all for a pragmatically direct/defensive approach, just so long as it's coherent, planned and part of a blueprint of 'this is how we play'.

I mentioned Brentford, but there are so many clubs that have succeeded way beyond their 'natural level' for parts of the last decade or so. Huddersfield, Bournemouth, Hull, Reading, Swansea, Brighton, B*rnley, Blackpool, Wigan, Cardiff, probably others that I've missed all with spells in the bigtime. There might be the odd cash injection here and there, but it shows what you can do with proper recruitment fitting into a specific culture and way of playing which gets the most out of what you have. As much as I loved Bowyer, I never got the sense that we had an 'identity' beyond being hard working & organised. The less said about anyone else who graced the managerial hot-seat in the meantime the better.

If our days of being big spenders behind us for now, then it's encouraging that we at least are looking as though we're trying to be a bit cleverer in recruitment. If we can do that whilst playing attacking football, then so much the better!

2 minutes ago, S8 & Blue said:

A significant amount of the fee that will be realised for Marriott is potentially down to Maddison - his assist stats are excellent.

Still reckon he'll end up elsewhere.

Probably, I'm still trying to treat it as a long shot rumour at this point, albeit the detective work a few pages back is getting me a bit excited.

If true, and along with signing Rothwell and especially Davenport, it looks like Tony is trying to put together a team which really goes out to play on the front foot. Maybe not too dissimilar to how Brentford set up when they were first promoted. Remains to be seen if it actually turns out like that, but I like how it appears that there is some attention being played to how we play, which hasn't seemed to be the case since Sam.

The better & quicker our wingers, the more space we'd expect Dack to get, so hopefully this is sort of player we're looking at, even if it doesn't come off.

15 minutes ago, Blueandwhitemike said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uN1uBGnIOK4&frags=pl%2Cwn

I don't know if this has been posted elsewhere but it's Maddison's best of video from the 17-18  season.   Obviously, you don't want to judge a player just from a highlights reel but it's all recent and there is quite some talent there.  Some of the through balls are fantastic, some good crosses and set-piece deliveries.  He's a real footballer and although it's league one he, like Dack, obviously has the ability to play at a higher level, whether he has the application and desire I don't know but I can't help but be a tiny bit excited by the thought of signing him. 

Somebody is always going to question information no matter how much a poster does or doesn't say, that's just the nature of a message board, it's nice for the majority to get a little more information than Callumrovers put out but it's up to him and we will see if he's right.

Was about to post this, so thanks for saving me the trouble!

Usual caveats for a highlights package, but the fact that they can put together a 6 minute video for one season is encouraging! Could you get 6 minutes from Feeney's entire career?

Obviously has great quality of delivery, but seems to like to run with the ball given the chance too. Couldn't tell if he had absolutely blistering pace or not, but definitely quicker than anyone else we have there at present.

34 minutes ago, HIBBY said:

You aren't seriously judging Hibs or the Scottish league on that are you?  It was a kick about in the sun against a Hibs team shorn of arguably its two best midfield players in Dylan McGeouch ( away to Sunderland ) and Scott Allan ( back to Celtic ) ….. our right back was playing his 2nd pre season match after being injured for 6 months and our forward Oli Shaw has played about 10 first team games, around 3 as a starter.  Our first choice keeper is out injured as well.

Compared to our normal performances that was utterly insipid from Hibs, have a look at Hibs.Net fans forum to judge what we thought of it ….. as for another poster saying we were well into our pre season … so far we have played the mighty Linlithgow Rose and Berwick Rangers lol.

Hibs average crowd last season was just over 18,000 a high not seen in 40 years, to the point where we cut Rangers usual allocation to fit all our fans in … we didn't get that because of displays like Sunday.

Besides that, how much did your squad cost compared to ours … money talks lads, Blackburn fans should know that better than anybody or did I miss the Jack Walker era?

Anyway, good luck for the rest of the season.

To be fair, you've probably picked the worst time in the last 30 years to ask that! Of those who played yesterday, I think 8 were academy graduates, and most of the rest were frees, with the odd 6 figure fee there too. Having said that there's probably still a fair gap in wages though.

In any case, glad to see optimism about the state of the game North of the border. A healthy game in Scotland is good for football in the rest of Britain & I'd say we've tended to get a pretty downbeat picture of things down here in the last few years, to the point in which I had no idea anyone outside the Old Firm were getting near 20k crowds. 

Best of luck in Europe.