I thought he was wrong last night in not facing the press. Its ok to be good with the media when you win, but its how you act when things go against you that counts, and at the moment he is not going very well.

I presume you know the reason why Chelsea are complaing to UEFA then if you think, unreservedly that he should have faced the media.

I await the confirmation of what the clubs issue is before I shall judge him and his team. Not making an announcement and laving it to the clubs MEdia man to make a v v short and curt statement.

CUP TICKET SCHEME!!!!

We get the idea now. But some of us cannot

a ) commit to the expense of every cup game

b ) commit to be able to go to eevrycup game

c) want to go to every cup game.

For those of us in groups a and b your incessant banging on about this is getting annoying.

It is not just up to the fans. The club should be able to handle high demand for tickets. Yes, it may be a one off (ish) If we had drawn Man U or chelsea and had a replay we would still have quite high demand for tickets in a v short period of sales time.

Yes, we could have made our lives easier, but the responsibilty does not soley rest on the fans. The club does have some obligation to be able to sell tickets in an orderly and expected manor (the key word being expected). In that respect the club should be giving me warning to the fans about delays etc in the press and on the web.

Unfortunatly due to our normally low ticket demand, we the fans, expect not to have to queue and wait, unlike Manu or Chelsea fans who treat that as the norm.

What's the atmosphere like in this stand?

Is there one?

I was in the queue at 43 and it took just over 40 mins, so around 1 minute per customer.

so that 60 an hour, office open for 8 1/2 hours so thats 510 a day, 3 days season tickets have to claim their seats so, being generous, 1500-2000 season ticket holder could claim theire seats IF they were the only ones who could call on the first three days.

Guess you will be lucky if half that number are actually season ticket holder. When you look at the figure like that I think the phones are understaffed.

Edit. Forgot multiple buys, say 2-2.5 tickets each. 2-3k Season ticket seats sold by phone max.

.....and they do NOT expect to shift 7,000 tickets.

Apparently Rovers ensured that we allocated Burnley more tickets than they could sell so that there would be no chance of Dingles trying to buy tickets in the other 3 stands.

postal application then if you cannot get to the ground or phone up.

I understand people not having time to do it, but if you do have the time i think the best way is to visit the ticket office.

With my history of posting season ticket applications form to rovers and the post in general I would not trust postal applications for a match such as this with such short timescales.

The main issue here is that the club cannot handle the extra ticket applications with current staff and temp staff are never any good at this.

the only way the club could solve this is if they did not actually do the phone slaes themselves, or asmentioned, allowed seaon ticket holder automated purchases (this could work for away matches as well so would not just be used as a one off).

Well not being an away fan at Ewood I wouldnt know this would I !!!!

This letter had been discussed on many rovers forums as the debate about standing rages on, I presume that is how most here have heard about it. I also think the club actually mentioned earlier in the season about it.

What do you expect when hundreds of people are ringing up at the same time.

Easy solution if you dont want to ring, go to the ground.

How do you go to the ground when you are stuck at work? And how when at work are we supposed to have a free hour to be on the phone to get tickets.

The club has made a big mistake by having open sale from day 1, Should not be on open until Friday.

They also should have more people on the phone and at the ticket office windows.

Jus hope its quieter on the phone this afternoon or tomorrow.

Didn't M. Andresen play for Blackburn on a loan last year???

He did , I also thought he was supposed to be the orginal Norwegian David Beckham

Yes, and look how easy we glided past them.

Cardiff - replay,

Colchester, not much opposition after their keeper screwed up, may have been different otheriwse.

Burnley - Replay, yet to go through.

Good job we have had an easy draw, any premiership side looking at that would think we were easy pickings.

I think some may just be getting a bit carried away.

Lets just concentrate on getting a few more points in the premiership and get to safety.

If we need an incentive like Lesicester at home to spur us to beating Burnley then we are doomed.

Beating burnley and resching the next round should be enough incentive. If it isnt then none of the players deserve to wear the blue and white.

Just out of curiosity, why should we be putting up Leicester as an example to strive towards? Do you want to see us (heck, what's that word you guys use instead of bankrupt?)?

He was using Leicester rugby Union Club (not football). they are arguably Englands biggest and most succesfully Rugby club and I believ are on a very sound finacial footing with a considerable fan base for a rugby club.

But it has become all to predictable from certain members.

But it should be. If a fan is nor happy with the board/finn/williams as some here are (and for arguably good reasons, even if I do not share them all) then they should be predictably criticising a regime that they do not support.

But ... religion is intertwined with geographical location and club allegiance (if what you're saying is right).

So ... isn't the choice of what club you support down to religion, at least in a transitive sense?

Yes, but my point is that its not purely religous, that the gegraphic locations of fans play as big/if not bigger part than the religous beliefs of the fans.

I think I should have spent more time and worded my original post in the way I meant it to read.

Ah, so it's gone from half to 90% in the space of a few minutes!

Religion has a huge part to play in the rivalry and the two clubs support is not restricted to just Celtic or Rangers areas. For example, half of Ireland support one of the two clubs.

Religon pays in part more historically than currently. Religon governed immigration patterns into this coutry from Ireland. Therfore people in ireland tend to support clubs who are based in the areas to which theire relative emigrated to.

yes, religon pays a part. But I think it is partly geograhical in nature now. I think people consistenly overdo the religous aspect. Rangers and Celtic fans hate each other for the same reason as we hate Dingles. It is football, Not religon(although some wld say football is a religon). It is just the religous and sociogeographic factors play a bigger part up there.

Trust me streaky, it "got" Bryan's sarcasm (if that's what it was).  It just annoyed me that, for the first time in ages, we get a decent thread on here that's raising some good points and issues and someone comes along with a throwaway line to have a dig.

Just like you did.

Whereas accusing me of "towing the company line" was not a dig? Because even if you did not mean it, that was how I took it.

I feel a good forum has to have a balancce between well structured debate, humour/sarcasm and fun.

In my eyes, the club approximately meet my expectations. yes they have things to work and improve on. But overall they do a lot better job than any of us and probably better than people we could find to replace them. So as unhappy as you may be with them, we just have to get on with them and work with them to ensure a bright furure or rovers.,

It was just a throwaway line from me on a sh1tty day in East Kent, I doubt it will alter the standard of the "debate" in any way.

Some people fail to get sarcasm etc and take it all to heart

it just a case of people airing and justifying their opinions.

No offence mate but that's just @#/?.

Yet another well formed argument to prove that I am wrong.

Yes, 90% of it its derby rivalry, but some is the fact they they are pushing for the title.

I think that, in the main, the points people have raised are worth raising and are far from moaning and groaning. And all streakyb seems to be doing is towing the company line without really thinking too deeply about the problems.

People have a right to criticise the club if they feel the need. They may be wrong to do so in some cases, but to just dismiss all criticism as moaning and groaning just lowers the standard of the debate.

Firsty, I am happy with everyone having their own views as long as they jusify them.

I am not towing the company line, just saying what I feel. If that means I am relativelt happy with the sitaution, then so be it. And I am not the only one who think the ay I do. Just because I disagree with you does not mean I am wrong (or right)

So why am I not thinking hard enough then? What problems am I simplyfying?

Yes, we need to getmore fans in, but I feel on pitch improvement is the main way to achieve it. Yes Souness should have gone earlier, but the club did as must clubs (and hence chief exec do) and gave him time. Else we cld be like Southampton.

And I am sorry if i feel that Finn and Williams deserve to be earning clsoe to what people in their posistions in other comapnies earn. Perhaps we shoudl install monkeys in their places witha salary of bananas as a lot would feel they would do a better job.

I think you overestimate the ability of chief executives and managers in general. Most do not have any special ability but have got where they are either through bullshitting/brownnosing their way to the top, or luck.

Why is it me overestimating and not youunderestimating.

And as far as leicester. How many rugby clubs did they have competing with them for the market share. Not saying free tickets for under 12's isnt a bad idea, just that leicester had an esier target.

Streakyb, I think you are making the mistake of being logical, coherent and reasonable with people who want to moan and groan - it's makes them happy.

Sorry, I just though I would give it a go.

The important thing in all this is the passion we all show for the club.

Just out of curiosity, how many Protestant members of your family are Celtic supporters and how many Catholic members are Rangers supporters?

I think that religion had a part in the early days but now its not the main factot. Firstly, If there is still a religous divide between the clubs this is down to the areas they draw their support from. Not a case of I am Catholic so will support one not the other. You support Celtic because you live in a celtic area not due to you religon.

I also feel half of the rivalry now between these clubs is not derby rivalry. It is the same that exists between ManU and Arsenal. the are the only real challengers for the title so this is also a big part of the derby atmosphere.

I was referring to it's contribution during the financial year, not over it's life.

Did any players break through into the team last year?

...........And in this they failed.

Douglas broke through to play. And you cannot judge the succes of an academy on a yearly basis, it has to be done over a period of years. We do have one of the better acadamies if not the best, for a club of our size and status.

The better the club status and bigger its size, the easier it is to tempt youngsters there. Our acadamy has a good enough reputation to lure players to us instead of Man u etc.

As for Souness. They did a very good job in getting him to begin with. We have to remember from where he took us from and to the heights we achieved. But do agree that in hindsight we would have been better off to have replaced him about 10mnths earlier.

Attendances may be only a small percentage of income but it the one source of income that Williams and Finn have the power to influence through their skills (or lack of them) as managers.

Williams has said over the past year that he does not know how to reverse the decline in attendances, which is a remarkable admission of failure that would have led to his departure/sacking in other industries.

I am not sure whether attendances have been done to death of this forum but it has been done on most.

Blackburn Rovers have a small catchment area. Therefore we are already have a higher percentage of "locals" who follow the club. this means that it will be a very hard challenge to increase this.

We also suffer the problem of other large and succesfull clubs who to the young may look more glamourous to support. This is the only market they can target.

The adult market is predominatly performance based. Therfore this is ot fully in therir control. Second to performance is cost. This is a carefull balancing act, ower prices, more fans, yet lmay not be more income.

The youthof the town is the future of the club. Since I dont not live in Blackburn and do not have kids, I cannot comment on this but I feel that this is an area where even the best marketeers wiil find hard.

But it sounds like some here what to remove the chief executive and replace him with a marketing executive. I think we may be underestimating the task of running a multi million pound business.

........which in the case of the Rovers would not appear to have been done.

All depends on what our targets are. What we think they should be and what they realistically should be.

I think that in hindsight the only and biggest mistake they have done recently was to keep Souness for as long as they did and let him spend as he did (too many players bough without knowing enough about them, but you have to trust who you select as your manager).

Apart from that they have done a good job, they have managed our finances, in my opinion, quite well, and have made some other good decisions.

The pay rise may not be deserved, but then again, it isn't not deserved. We should, like Jan pointed out, keep them at least at the bottom end of the pay scale for people doing their jobs.