Mashed Potatoes

From the Guardian article it appears that certain changes are being imposed on the Womens League Championship division which will lead to a substantial increase in costs - notably the requirement that players are full time professionals. That appears to have prompted Ewood Park management to have a long hard look at whether it is worth it. The level of investment required may be substantial, maybe enough to deter new investors. If one looks at the Womens leagues every team in their Premier League is in the Premier League proper, and of the teams in their Championship only Birmingham, Charlton, Bristol City, Sunderland, Portsmouth, Sheffield United and ourselves were not in the Premier League proper (there is also London City and Durham in the league).

The two matters are totally unconnected. If the club feel the Ladies team is no longer viable - which principally will be because not enough people go to watch - then closing it down is justified.

I agree with you that no employee should be told that they will lose their job via a message from their employer via WhatsApp. However it would appear that the post on WhatsApp was from one of the players.

The difference is that the Academy has a track record of making a significant contribution to the performance of the first team, as well as generating significant funds. Nobody sensible wants to see the Academy go.

It might be a good idea if all those getting worked up about the possible closure of the Ladies team said how many times they went to see them last season. To indicate the lack of interest there is, the thread on this forum about the Ladies team was begun in October 2018 and six and a half years later has reached page 12.

Thanks. Presumably everyone is free to join the group after being vetted and then the panel members are elected via secret ballot. Would you envisage there being a requirement for a guarantee of representation for female supporters, disabled supporters, gay supporters, supporters of South Asian heritage ?

Thank you for your reply, and the courteous manner of it. As I understand it you envisage an open to all forum. This strikes me as having two practical problems : 1. How do you ensure that everybody coming forward is actually a Rovers supporter as opposed to say Burnley supporters trying to make trouble. 2. How could the forum operate in practice. There are 11000 or so regular match attending supporters plus a few thousand more attending from time to time plus all the others who live far away and don't attend games. How would this work if several hundred wanted to attend ?

Grow up. See my reply to Glen above.

Given that the club are yet to announce how they intend meeting their obligations for fans' consultation I would suggest it is somewhat premature for you to describe those arrangements as "exclusive". Perhaps a more constructive approach would be for your group to publish a set of proposals as to how you would like these arrangements to work. Everybody will have their own views as to how this should work. For now I will restrict myself to simply suggesting what I think should be the composition of the representative group of fans : 3 members of the existing Fans Forum, of whom at least 1 should be female 3 members of WATR, of whom at least 1 should be female 1 member of the Disabled Supporters Association 1 member of the Pride Supporters group 1 member of the South Asian Supporters Association It would be best if these people were elected via secret ballot. More generally there have been explanatory notes setting out how the new legislation and regulatory system should operate. The most relevant is Bill 213 EN 2024-25 which I think you should read if you haven't already done so. The manner in which the fans group consultation is expected to operate is set out on pages 51 and 52.

The Football Governance Bill passing through Parliament imposes an obligation on clubs to hold regular meetings with a representative group of supporters. Are you suggesting in the above that you want something in addition to that ? I think the club may simply throw the new legislation back in your face if you are.

To be fair, Montgomery returned from loan to look as if there is a reasonable chance that he will justify being in the first team squad.

Complete nonsense. I don't think as the poster who makes a spectacle of themselves disparaging some of our better players is in a position to lecture others as being in a desperation to appear contrary. I deliberately used the phrase "with the best will in the world" to make it clear that I wasn't belittling Jack Walker. You appear to be the only poster unable to grasp that.

According to the Transfermarket website Dennis' contract at Nottingham Forest still has a year to run so it looks doubtful he will be with us.

I'm not sure that's correct. When this story was flying around at the time I think somebody came on here and said that players pay in to an insurance policy which pays for their first six months if they are injured and out of contract. The club did let Gladwin use their facilities whilst he was recovering but that won't have cost anything.

That's terrible news. I think years ago Gary Lineker used to refuse to practice heading in training for precisely the reasons outlined in your post.

I don't really understand why anybody would begrudge Newcastle fans winning a trophy again after all this time - but there you go, it was your choice

Why is either of those things so important to you ?

Spurs have not won anything for donkeys years but United have won trophies in each of the last two seasons

With the best will in the world I don't think Jack Walker - he was never knighted - did not put all his money into the club.

I've no idea about season ticket sales, which is why I didn't address the point in my post. What I do know is that the statement in Penwortham Blue's post that our average attendance is down when they are up everywhere else is factually incorrect.

Per the Football web pages website the average attendance this season was 16,161 which is the highest since we were relegated from the Premier League. Maybe we stand alone as having supporters who delight in making inaccurate statements designed to show their club in a bad light.

Source ?

By whose accounts exactly ?

But didn't the club open negotiations for a new contract early last year ?

Correct. It was 1-1. I haven't checked but I think Bobby Hoy got the goal.