Angry_Pirate

1996: Shearer - Newcastle (£15m) 2003: Duff - Chelsea (£17m) 2008: Santa Cruz - Man City (£18m) 2011: Jones - Man Utd (£17m) 2021: Armstrong - Southampton (£15m) 2024: Wharton - Crystal Palace (£22m) I could stomach it when it was United, City and Chelsea (even Newcastle) taking our world class players and wonderkids... now it's Southampton and fucking Crystal Palace grabbing our stars?!?! Thanks a fucking lot Venky's! Take your £22m, sell up, and fuck off! You've killed this historic Football Club!

When Gregg tells Swag to "Roll out the Red Carpet" for a signing.

Let's imagine that Rovers do finish this window and these next 8 hours in a positive fashion we don't anticipate - Maguire signs, other (good) money signings too, sensible loans (in and out). That does not excuse the fact that - YET AGAIN - Rovers have had their reputation dragged through the mud due to obvious incompetence from the very top. Laughing stock, unreliable, unprofessional, incompetent from top to bottom, clown owners and senior management. Signing some players will not erase that. How much for 5,000 tennis balls?

To be fair (only thing to be fair about), Orlando is 5hrs behind, so it was only probably 9:30am EST time things got resolved... so stressing about talks resuming all morning was redundant as they would have been asleep/not working until 90 minutes ago.

The thought of "Asking" to loan Wharton back to us - when we currently already own him - and being told "no" and then ACCEPTING IT anyway, makes me so fucking angry. We own the wonderkid, Palace knows that his price will go up in July. How hard is it. A competant management would say that Adam is only for sale (today) if we keep him on loan till the Summer... if you can't accept that. Fuck off. Rovers need to fucking grow a pair and add £5m to the fee - as that is what relegation would cost for losing him. This transfer stinks. "Hello, Swag here... Hi (Palace)... oh I see, £18m, rising to £22m you say?... Well, Adam is only available if you loan him back to us till the summer, John needs him as we already loaned out our captain....... oh, I see... you don't want to do that.... ah okay then, we'll do it your way, always a pleasure, take care.... oh wait, got any 18yr olds that need game time?" THEY play by our rules, it's our fucking player. Imbeciles.

Pretty sure (with zero research) that the "shirt retiring" joke is directly linked to the fact that Birmingham City actually did/have retired Jude Bellingham's.

He was certainly the "golden child" of his year (2018-2020). It was obvious from within, that he was the hope of that (average?) crop. For record, his class was Luke Brennan, Dan Pike, Jalil Saadi, Jordan Eastham, Enzo Boyomo (who is doing well over in Spain), James Connolly, Chanka Zimba, Sam Burns and Sam Durrant. Not exactly the class of '92.

I'll remain seated for that one! 🤣

I'll be the first to say it... shame on any "fan" who boos Sam Gallagher if/when he comes back as an Ipswich Town player on March 29th. (Say what you will, but there will be boos!). The lad gave (gives!) everything for this club - on and off the pitch - 100% effort since day 1, and that is all that counts. Fact is, Gallagher isn't far off having a 1 goal every 4 game ratio. 43 goals in 200 league games. Not bad for a guy utilised 75% of the time on RW. (214 appearances with 46 goals total). Save the boos for the Bradley Orr's, Shane Duffy's and Danny Murphy's. Not only does Sam Gallagher deserve applause, I'll personally be standing when I do it.

Some thoughts on today. Rovers were lucky to draw, got away with THREE 2vs1 or 1vs1 counter attacks. 1-4 was a real possibility. Shout out to the officials who I wouldn't trust to referee an U8's football match. He's the guy that "lost the plot" for the final 20 mins vs Bristol City last month. That's a clear penalty (and by law - maybe a red card). VAR can't come quick enough in this league - 12 hopeless idiots every weekend. Always harsh and rash to judge a player on debut (Rudy Gestede - who was there today - being one!), but Chrisene was pure garbage in all facets. Szmodics was poor. Garrett (after MOTM last week) was ineffective and lasted far too long. The "tactics" after the final subs were BEGGING for a Huddersfield winner. Why? Sorba Thomas (those booing him was nonsense - glad the applause took over) was the best player on the pitch. I remember him drilling every cross low when at us, and I couldn't understand why, showed today he knows how to play. The irony of going to back 5, and then having two of them gain serious injuries. Final shout out to Huddersfield "Football in a library" Town, who came to Ewood and sang that chant (at least) 7 times. Though our home fans mainly only sing about Burnley, so who am I to comment. Can't wait for the next 3. 😳

Arrived in England, comes on as a sub days later at the Millennium Stadium in a cup final, gets a Worthington Cup Winners medal, played about 300 minutes of football, scored two tap ins and left. Legendary form compared to Telalovic or Ennis.

Rovers will continue to play (a maximum) of 1 central striker. Options (as of today) are Ennis, Leonard, Gallagher, Telalovic, Vale, or the "False 9". If you don't think that Sam Gallagher is unquestionably the best option for that position - by a significant margin - then I don't know what to say to you. It's Gallagher, and it isn't even close.

Lewis Travis should have been the first name on this team sheet! Almost every game for the past month, Blackburn Rovers has showcased a mentally weak, soft and pathetic "performance" from it's starting XI... yet our captain (and passion!) is shipped out to 2nd in the league because he actually shows some cojones!

This defense is funamentally broken. Is that JDT, Rene, Benson (set piece coach?) or the players? Andrew Moran with a blinding 45 minute game of hide and seek. Disgusting half... there's playing badly (Hyam, Brittain, Leonard), and then there's hiding, which is worse? Hyam (mk 2?), Leonard and Moran need hooked. If Gallagher and JRC have 45 mins in them, get them in. Give Chrisene a run out too. I'd genuinely be making 4 subs.

Kean Orr Ward Greer Caddis Davenport Feeney Gladwin Brown Stokes

Bold prediction. 🤣

Always a fun (and upsetting/pointless) exercise. Most of the players there will have options, and Rovers never dive into priority Free Agents like we wish the would. Just looking at UK/Irish nationality you could create a full and competitive team for "free" - bit dire on the Goalkeeper and Winger front though. Bold ones being of particular interest, wishful thinking for BRFC. (Sheff Utd relegation pending!) GK: Hart, Walton LB: Lowe, Taylor, Norrington-Davies CB: Kelly, Tosin, Lascelles, McKenna, Wood, Cooper, McNair RB: Wan-Bissaka, Bogle CM: Hughes, DaSilva, Dier, Brownhill, Lundstram, Whiteman, Baird, Sibley, Saville RW: Ritchie, Dolan CAM: Alli, Connolly, Burrows LW: Willock CF: Vardy, Adams, Gallagher, Wellbeck

Never seen a "1st team coach" so reliant on a whistle.

Sorry, to clarify, I'm not trying to correlate Markanday/Hedges to loan value. They are two recent examples of a January "speculative" cheap signing (who happened to be in final 6 months) vs an expensive loan signing like Lewis O'Brien. The Crewe lad is a speculative signing who has years on a contract. I'd rather do that, than pay a loan (with no option) for any player, given the way the season has gone.

A "loan to buy" is of course the exception. I agree. Unfortunately, lets say a player is going to cost £1m, the loan may be £400k, but I bet the option doesn't come down £400k to include the fee. The only 2 genuinely good loan options were Gestede and Cairney. DJ Campbell, Vardy, Diaz etc were obligations, and the good ones we had like Tosin and Reed ended up moving for affordable prices, soon after. I much rather the Armstrong model, low fee, high sell on. Seems a win win (as annoying as it is when you lose out on 40% of £12m).

In (recent) years I've been adamant about getting quality loans in. Not doing so previously has cost us probably 2 top 6 finishes (at least!) This season already seems a like a Mowbray special dead rubber... 10pts clear of bottom 3, and 8pts off (a strong) top 6. Don't get me wrong, there is work to be done to stay up - Gallagher, Hedges, Dolan, Hyam, Wharton, JRC, Buckley and Pears all to return should likely be enough for a top 20 finish. We need what, 5 wins minimum from 20 games (assuming they pick up a handful of draws too!) - about 20-25pts to be certain of safety? Maybe this IS the year to be going for the speculative in signing £500k lads from Crewe? Maybe they will be better than James Hill in 12 months? Rovers wanted Hill when he left Fleetwood for £1M a couple of summers ago... I wonder how much was paid to Bournemouth to "loan" him? A good chunk of that I'd imagine. There'd be little point loaning in a "Prem Ace" for £1m+ (like O'Brien last year) when we're likely not even competing to sniff the top 6 (sure as shit not getting promoted this year with Leeds, Leicester and Southampton to name 3 teams we can't even compete with!). Spending money loaning a player in to get this team up from 17th-19th to 12th-10th, isn't worth it. This squad is good enough to stay up this year, but is also not going to threaten the playoffs, and has Raya money (+) coming in the summer! So not much point in loans, when they still have fees attached. I'd rather spend that money on permanent fees. £200k Hedges, £500k Markanday type deals (hope for better!) Let's have a gamble on an actual long term player. Better than paying 5x that for shit on loan (Morton, Mola, Hirst!).

He's out of his depth currently. Needs hooked as he's worse than playing with 10 men if he keeps giving it away easily. He's not quick, he's not tall, he can't hold up the ball, and apparently he needs more chances than Andy Cole to be a "fox in the box" (offside or not, that hits the back of the net!) Lad has potential for sure, but not ready for this. Needs a Loan. Also, a winger on the wing and a RB at RB wouldn't be amiss. I'm a huge fan of (RB) Brittain but he's abject as a LW. Hill has been fine, but he doesn't have the knowledge to help us in possession. Siggy looks like he's actually warming up, so I may get my wish.

Szmodics is playing absolutely woefully today thus far.

Twice now their commentary has referred to it as "This famous old stadium!" First of all, you've only been there 26 years, and second, it's only famous on a Tuesday!

Rovers needed three things to go their way to have a real chance tonight. 1. Don't give away stupid, silly or unnecessary shit goals = did it twice. 2. Get competent, lucky and helpful refereeing = 2 penalties? 3. Score your chance(s) = Leonard (46) (EDIT) Arnor (92) 4. (Bonus). Oh, and it'd be helpful to play your best XI from KO.