PAAAARRRRRTYYYYYY 🤘

Last season, we played at Reading, Wigan Athletic, and Rotherham United on their good days. Those three stick out as awful rsults because they were all cannon fodder in the league, and we embarrassed ourselves with limp performances. On the flip side, I feel like we've already played West Bromwich Albion at a good time. Their team is not as bad as their performance suggested. That's the nature of this league and, in particular, Rovers. It's somewhat random as to what team can turn up, particularly away from home. I'd love a win, but a draw would be OK. A defeat isn't the end of the world, provided we show some fight and guile, which would be a start when you consider our performance at Rotherham United last season.

I was watching some highlights of yesterday's Carabao Cup matches and this particular bit stuck out at me. One or two mentioned Aasgaard earlier in the transfer window, but I assume it wasn't based on his penalty-taking!

Harlock, Baker, and Cirino had their options taken this summer. I'm not sure if the club triggered those options, or if the players were able to, but all three were told they could leave. I presume that was meant as being able to leave on loan for their last chance saloon at another contract at Rovers.

I think he was in a comfort zone at Rovers. When the supporters have beef with the higher echelons of a club, I suppose it's not a bad bit of protection to have for yourself when you pull out "miracles".

I think that accolade belongs to Sheffield Wednesday more than Rotherham United!

The comments from some of their fans are eerily reminiscent of Mowbray's time here. "Tactically inept. Can't organise a defence. Nice bloke." And tonight I've seen things along the lines of "Doesn't matter who the manager is, we've got bigger problems". All very familiar!

Fair play to Mackems who are joking about now being able to "concentrate on the league" after their lengthy cup run of 90 minutes was finally Mowbrayed. 😆 Unfortunately for them, they'll have to get used to dire cup runs under Mowbray. There has to be an element of contempt from Mowbray for the cup competitions. His record is absolutely abysmal. Mowbray did wonders with them last season, but it doesn't look great for them at the moment. Two home defeats against what are both essentially lower league opponents isn't a good start to their season. Suspect he'll pick up a bit, though, as he usually did with us after slow starts.

Great! Except I don't live there. 😆

Yeah, this really sucks. I was able to tune in to the non-streamed games via audio last season, including all the cup games. That's two games gone with my RoversTV pass, with audio only available for one of them. That really sucks. I'm half-expecting the Rotherham game to be unauthorised, too.

Yes. It means "not supporters".

It doesn't look like it is being shown anywhere at all other than, of course, Ewood Park. I'll tune in to the radio, I suppose!

My local sports channel is licensed to show Carabao Cup games, but they've decided to pick Hull City v Doncaster Rovers, and Wrexham v Wigan Athletic. The other eight channels are made up of UEFA Champions League qualifiers, La Liga, or some basketball.

459 plus walk-ons is a good effort considering it's the first round of the lesser cup on a Tuesday night with a fair distance to drive there and back. Fair play to them for making the trip.

Let me rephrase what I originally wrote to be a bit more diplomatic. I don't think Pears deserves this kind of stick, which is essentially being referred to as a fuck-up merchant when he has largely proved that he isn't. I think it's totally unwarranted to have a poll about how many "fuck-ups" our established goalkeeper that kept Kaminski out of the side last season will make.

Just watched Leonard's post-match interview. I love it when he says "I always know how to make that little run off the centre-half". He came across much-like Adam Wharton to me in his interview. A bit of confidence and swagger. Hopefully this lad can continue to produce.

Erhun Öztümer. Now 32. Played most of his career in League One as a 1 in 4 man. Played 31 games in the Championship without a goal. Last played in Turkey for some minions. Currently without a club.

It's Pears' shirt to lose at the moment. He's also the senior of the two goalkeepers, if only slightly. Tomasson's comments also suggest we won't be making any immediate changes: "Every player coming into the building needs that little bit of time, and that’s something we saw last season. We’ll give the boy a bit of time, but we’re really excited to have him."

For those who have a bizarre dislike of Ben Benson, Tomasson has spoken, and the argument can now be put to bed: "With someone of Ben Benson’s excellent quality, he’s someone that can become even better and that’s what you want."

The "local" media have suggested that Ennis will get "minutes". The most he's played is 45 minutes in the U21s against Stanley. I can't see him getting more than 60 minutes, but it would be good to get a good look at him for longer then five minutes in a game.

Indeed, @Silas. All teams do it because, if you don't, you miss out. That is entirely on the footballing authorities. I don't think anybody can blame us for doing what every other team does to gain an edge, except therein lies the paradox; nobody really gains an edge at all. The authorities are dreadful at enhancing the game when they reluctantly try to solve a problem. I suspect it will be tweaked, similar to how the awful introduction to VAR was tweaked, over time.

On Saturday, I thought we were quite good at not time-wasting in added time when the ball was out of play. There were a couple of quick throw-ins that surprised me a little. There is no-doubt that referees will add time onto added time for dead-ball slowdown. I think it works in our favour to keep our momentum in-play. Let's face it. It is absolutely tedious to watch players flick the ball away, grab the ball after a free-kick goes against them, goalkeepers walking as far away as possible from their six-yard box to retrieve the ball for a goal-kick, players deliberately taking free-kicks far away from the correct spot, etc. When we do that, I always watch and realise that somebody will do it back to us when we are desperate for a point or three. It's a pointless circle. The authorities created this mess in the first place because they have been allowing it to happen. It's high-time they put a stop to it. They have to try something because they can't just let it get worse. It seems Tomasson agrees.

A Sunderland supporter sums up today's Moggaball: "Pass pass pass pass pass pass pass pass nothing"

There was that Mitch Candlin lad but I don't think he technically played for us. I'm not sure.

Provided the ship doesn't sink. There is a shipping container full of Rovers shirts at the bottom of an ocean based on what Waggott said. 😆