Ennis to Bolton on loan is a good move for all parties right now. Gives him a chance to play regularly at the top end of League One, and hopefully he can come back in the summer and kick on at Rovers.

1 hour ago, neophox said:

Ayari is just a waste of space....poor signing.... was average at Coventry,...

Good that we've decided to judge a player before they've even started a game for the first team.

I know we're screwed right now, but this kind of take over a player that has only just arrived can get in the sea. Give the lad a chance.

If it is true that JDT has lost the players then I see nothing but a loss in this. Huddersfield, despite smashing us 3 nil on Boxing Day are rumoured to be losing patience with Darren Moore.

Can't see anything better than a draw. 2-2 maybe? We can score goals....but we concede for fun and I worry that Huddersfield will bully our defence. Really hard to call this one.

My predicted team:

                        Pears

JRC    S. Wharton    Hyam     Pickering

             Tronstad        Garrett

                      A. Wharton

Gallagher       Szmodics      Sigurdsson

Play Wharton higher up the pitch, relieve him of some defensive duties. Play Szmodics as the striker because he's the only one that we can consistently rely on to score, and he's often the furthest up the pitch anyway. Gallagher is hopefully fit enough to start, not a fan of playing him wide left but Moran needs taking out and Markanday always flatters to deceive. JRC hopefully also fit enough to start over Brittain. Carter and Wahlstedt need removing from the team as well, the former needs a breather whereas Wahlstedt needs to learn how to catch a ball before he comes back into the side.

59 minutes ago, Gav said:

Henry was all over the Reading stuff at the weekend, supporting the fans against another abhorrent owner. He never shyd away from the Venky stuff either, Nick Harris was another.

It felt like Henry Winter and Nick Harris where the only ones in the National press that understood our situation back in the Kean days.

Just now, broadsword said:

And clear off they presumably will at some point, because you can't run the club like this, it's not a feasible proposition.

Either that or the club goes out of business?

Is this another false dawn or is the nightmare beginning to end?

I really hope it is the latter and that we're in the endgame now.

With each passing year it becomes less and less viable for Venkys to own Blackburn Rovers. It was time for them to go after 12 months, never mind 12 years. SURELY at some point they will get out of our club and we can look to rebuild.

I'm so thankful that I got to witness 1994/95, promotion with Jansen, Dunn, Duff, etc. and then a League Cup win, because Venkys have ensured that any moments like that are a distant memory.

If Rovers sold Szmodics this month then we'd be hard pushed to win another game all season. He's been the difference in pretty much every game we've won this season.

No idea what Rovers value him at.

The next 4 league games will determine whether we end up in a relegation scrap or not. A run of bad results from those and we might find that 10 point cushion has halved or maybe more.

Just now, Hasta said:

No, Wharton is often deep collecting from the defence and turning. When the opposition break at us it Wharton is often the midfielder in position to break up or stop that attack and because he isn’t very good at it, it causes massive issues, as seen clearly yesterday at the Hawthorns.

We’d be far more solid defensively if we started with Garrett / Tronstadt instead of Wharton / Tronstadt, but then what do you do with your most valuable asset?

The formation and style of play with Wharton playing where he is contributes to us being defensively weak. We either need to play slightly differently, or drop AW.

Agree with this. No doubting his ability on the ball but a combo of Tronstad and Garrett seems to me like a much better combo at the moment.

If Wharton is to play then it must be further up the pitch. Relieve him of some of those defensive duties. Given Sammie plays pretty much as our furthest forward player 90% of the time, we may as well stick him up top with Adam in an ACM role.

6 minutes ago, smiller14 said:

People pointing to individual errors, but to me it's a total lack of organisation. Remember when we had loads of individual errors under Ince? Yes - Big Sam came in and addressed a lot of it overnight. The errors reduced considerably and we were suddenly well organised. It starts with the manager and on the training ground. That being said, doesn't help when you have an absolute turnip in goal. 

Yep, you hear a lot of ex-players talk about Big Sam's management style when he was at the top of his game, particularly his man-management ability. A lot of them speak about how they'd want to run through brick walls for him. Coaching isn't just tactics after all, you've got to bring a bunch of individuals together and turn them into a team that would run through brick walls for the coach and each other. The players have to do their part as well but I tend to feel like individual errors often seep into a team when the players have lost sight of what the gameplan is and as such their confidence in the head coach / manager starts to dwindle.

If JDT was to leave, it'll either be a promotion from within or some unknown fella from overseas.

The identify of this club is in the mud. Nothing but apathy from the top down.

42 minutes ago, Oldgregg86 said:

What you are all missing the point of is he’s been instructed to get these kids to learn to play this way. That is his only remit and the next guy will do the same and I’m guessing worse 

You're absolutely right, I should've included that in my post. It's so difficult to not feel frustrated at the way things are going right now. We can all see what is needed, but sadly those in charge of the club seem determined to run it into the ground.

Next 4 league games define the rest of the season for Rovers.

• Huddersfield (home)
• QPR (home)
• Stoke (home)
• Birmingham (away)

Feeling very grateful for the 10 point cushion between us and the bottom three right now!

JDT has imploded as Rovers head coach at this point. We all know that he has been dealt a really bad hand with recruitment, and injuries haven't helped, but at this point we just seem to be playing kamikaze football without a goalkeeper.

I'm afraid this is only going to get worse. Many will point to the fact that Rovers have one of the lowest wage budgets, lowest transfer budgets and most inexperienced squads.....and they're right to do so. BUT these tactics are not helping.

We all know that this starts and ends with the owners, but right now its about staying in the league. JDT doesn't appear to be the man to do it.

Our bench will certainly look a bit stronger today but I'm expecting a pretty similar line-up to what we've had in recent weeks. I do wonder if Ayari can play one of the wide roles though, because Moran is much better central.

Trafford goes down far too easily. Heard the clip of the Burnley fan in tears on Talk Sport, claiming that the goalkeeper had it covered....he was nowhere near it! It was a half hearted attempt to get the ball and he goes down like someone has dropped a boulder on him.

Despite that, my biggest takeaway from last nights game was how much I miss Kaminski as our goalkeeper 😭.

1.5m for Gallagher? Snap their hands off!* I like him as he always gives his all, but it's never quite clicked for him as the main striker at Rovers, and he's well past the point that we could get all our money back on him.

* Must have a replacement lined up....unlikely.

9 minutes ago, Bohinen1983 said:

To say I'm not a fan of Venkys is an understatement, but remember under Mogga, the season prior we had signed Breo, Arma, Gally and then the added Harvey Elliot etc.

That was our opportunity and it was squandered.   We've had some class players of the past few years.

Didn't we finish something like 15th the season we had Harvey Elliott, after another Mowbray death spiral? Absolutely unforgiveable really given the players we had, we should have been at least top half and possibly even top 6. Brereton was starting to show some form playing on the left, Armstrong was banging the goals in and Harvey Elliott got something like 11 assists. It's as bad as having Rhodes and Gestede both hit 20 goals in a season and not even make the playoffs 😭.

1 hour ago, roverblue said:

Morton was an enigma to me having watched him at Ewood over a full season. I still believe there was some sort of deal where he had to play.

He couldn’t defend or tackle.

He didn’t assist or score.

Instead he just existed in the middle and recycled possession like it was a hot potato.

Wharton and Tronstad are massive upgrades on him in my opinion. Fair play if he makes it in the prem but he showed nothing at rovers to make me think he will.

I agree on Morton. Tronstad does seem to be a much better player. Morton seemed like a good lad but seemed a little bit lightweight last season. I didn't see a premier league player in him during his time with Rovers.

Not sure how he's getting on at Hull, but being up and around the playoffs with a side for the 2nd season running won't do him any harm at all.

Yeah can't see anything for Rovers in this one. With our defensive and goalkeeping woes it'll be a comfortable win for the Baggies I reckon.

2 - 0.

Losing Wharton for anything less than £20m would be a huge disappointment. GB has not exactly lit the place up with some of the incomings to the club (particularly the striker department) but he's done an exceptional job in tying down our academy assets. Something the previous setup failed miserably with.

3 hours ago, Exiled_Rover said:

But Pears is literally a worse GK than Wahlstedt...

Not sure about that having seen Leo play now.

Harry Leonard going out on loan is an awkward one. On one hand I think it's the right thing for him to go and start every week and get some goals in League One, give him confidence to come back to Rovers in the summer and stake a claim for that main striker role.....BUT, we are so lacking in striking options and although its only 4 goals in all comps, he's our third highest scorer this season. We would simply have to have an incoming striker with more experience on the horizon if we are willing to let Leonard go out on loan.

Garrett potentially going out as well seems utterly insane given we've let Travis go out on loan already. Again....unless we've got someone coming in who can walk into our starting 11 instead of Tronstad or Wharton, I'm struggling to see the logic in letting Garrett go out on loan.

Doubt we'll bring a new keeper in this month. They'll be banking on Pears coming back in....cheaper option than bringing a new keeper into the club and all that.

What an absolutely shambolic turn of events. Trav has his limitations but as a club without a pot to piss in, why on Earth are we trading our club captain with bags of experience for ANOTHER inexperienced and lightweight loan player.

Forget the style of play. We're 17th in the league and in danger of getting sucked into a relegation battle, not fighting for the title. It's about getting results and doing whatever it takes to get them at the moment with the way Rovers form has fallen off a cliff. If that means adapting your precious philosophy to suit the players you have then do it. The best coaches can identify when they need to change tact....even Mowbray identified this the season after we sold Armstrong and didn't have Harvey Elliott on loan anymore, we went from a possession based side that finishes 15th to a much more direct counter attacking side that narrowly missed out on the playoffs.

32 minutes ago, davulsukur said:

Yeah, really strange. Can't really get my head around why they had to be retained.

Aren't they on contracts that expire, similar to the manager/assistant manager?

Typically yes, backroom staff are on similar contracts to managers and players. The thing is we appear to have certain coaches that happy to coast by and be part of the furniture. It'd be on Greg Broughton to negotiate contracts with staff I imagine, but I would also imagine that our budget for backroom staff is tiny, so we'd be unlikely to bring better coaches in....which is why I'm assuming that JDT was only able to bring in one assistant.

2 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

Ideally they're sizing us up for a sale - but we all know they're seeing what else they can cut back on.

Absolutely baffling why they continue to hold onto the club.

I just don't get it, why not look to try and sell the club? It makes no sense for them to cling onto something that they care so little about and lose money on.

There must be someone decent, somewhere that would be willing to buy Blackburn Rovers.