Now there's a player who would have bust a gut for us in the miserable derby games we've had. 😔

I think saying "we've lost on out on Malcolm Ebiowei" (Jackson's comment?) is misleading. By the sound of it, Palace want guarantees that he'll be in the starting XI, and perhaps Rovers and QPR have told them to do one.

I feel sorry for Walsall supporters who are subjected to the Poundland Bescot Stadium. The Super Awesome Construction Arena doesn't sound so bad after all.

I mentioned the other day that Buckley did the right thing to apologise for his red card and recognise his naivety, but what matters is righting the wrongs on the pitch, i.e., actions speak louder than words. Frankly speaking, they are just appeasing certain people and telling them what they want to hear, even if it's with good intentions. It's a load of nonsense and a waste of everyone's time in reality. I hate it when players blatantly flick the ball away to waste time. The clock should be automated. Scrap injury time, and stop the clock when it's out of play or in a dead ball situation instead of making the whole routine boring. Players will only start being honest if the authorities set the example, which they absolutely don't.

I see Bonlah have bought the league.

Putting those wrongs to right is our speciality. 😆

Tomasson is not a motivator. He can't be. Our players often look like they just want to get the defeat over with and go home instead of fighting tooth and nail. Burnley, Preston, Wigan... The way we played in those games was very similar to how we played in other heavy defeats (Reading, for example) whereby we just didn't turn up and didn't give two figs what happened. On the morning of the Burnley game, I said that I was expecting a hard-fought defeat. Instead, we just rolled over because a) they were up for it, and b) we weren't. It was never the defeat that I was going to feel embarrassed about, but the manner of it proved to be. You're right that our messing around at the back cost us, at least on paper, but our lack of effort in those games was hurtful to me as a supporter. That day went on forever, and thoughts of how "Venky-like" it was came rushing back. Distant. Aloof. Sterile. Empty. And ultimately being laughed at by our noisy neighbours. Urgh... Let's talk about something else!

The way Szmodics was talking about the training camp in Spain when he was co-commentating on the Middlesbrough game more or less verified that.

We appear to be goosed for a lone striker when Gallagher is injured. Vale and Hirst don't have the build to play in that role. Brereton Diaz appears to be favoured in the wide forward role, not just by the incumbent Head Coach. However, bringing in a lone striker, whether it's as cover for Gallagher or to start ahead of him, feels like an expensive and difficult task that we won't undertake. I really think we need to, though.

Suspect it's largely down to what we always did under Mowbray. A target gets mentioned, and then returned to a year or two later. Maybe I'm mistaken in saying none of our senior signings in Broughton's and Tomasson's first transfer window were linked with us under Mowbray: Hyam Brittain Szmodics Morton Mola Hirst I'd say we can largely forget about any names mentioned during Mowbray's tenure, including Dembele and Maja. Broughton and Tomasson will have other ideas.

Norwich have amassed one point out of six since Smith left - both at home.

His public apology and recognition of his mistake was "grown up", I'd say, although I appreciate he hadn't done that at the time of your post. I'm a big fan of Buckley. He is capable of a defence-splitting pass, and very tidy play on the ball. To me, he's a talent that we need. His petulance (if that is the right word) is something he'll have to rein in, but hopefully he'll learn from it.

Some interesting comments from Dack in the LT, referring to disagreements between him and JDT in previous times. It sounds like Dack wants to stay, and it was great to see him get through a full game the other day and grab the winner. I'm having a change of heart about letting him go in January. He's reminded me that, even if he's not firing on all cylinders, he is always good for a goal, and we are desperately lacking in that area at the moment. In all honesty, I though he had a poor game against Cardiff, performance-wise, but as he suggested, he probably needs 10-15 games in a row to get full match-fitness back.

Old meets new. Not sure who to credit for this photo.

JDT is not going to settle for a quiet window, and nor should he. We've had some abysmal and even embarrassing performances under JDT, yet we're somehow third. We said it last season under Mowbray, but surely we have to learn our lesson from that - that we can't let the squad be and hope for the best. It definitely needs refreshing. Two or three signings that can hit the ground running would be a huge ask, but it'll be JDT's first full transfer window, and he should be backed. The league position is our positive so far. Let's follow it up and put our chips down.

A difficult watch against a poor Championship side, but job done. That feeling after a 1-0 win when it could have gone either way is always satisfying. I would have given MotM to Hedges. He was the only player of quality on the pitch today. One of the RoversTV commentators made a remark the other day about how Valerian Ismael's sides don't need a midfield. I can't help but feel neither does ours. Our attacking play tends to consist of counter-attacking long balls, or when in possession, side to side at the back, followed by a long ball up top. Excruciatingly thin in terms of creativity and ideas. Addendum: Lunchtime kick-offs should be banned. They suck.

That can't detract from how pedestrian and lacking we are. We've been awful and predictable. Can't see how the players are buying into this style at all. It's going to be a long season if we continue playing a system that the players don't fit into.

I'm not so sure about that. Most Rovers supporters I know don't frequent BRFCS, but although the general consensus was he'd done a decent job, there was a muted "time for him to go" feeling in every conversation. I've no problems with people keeping their own counsel, or at least in private circles. I have egg on my face almost every time I make a post on here. 😄

Priority area is in attack. A number of players have failed to deliver there or haven't been up to speed so far this season: Dolan; Markanday; Hirst; Dack; Szmodics; et al. Six months in under a new regime and Dack is still just a 60-minute man. He's not going to get back to the standards he was at. We need reliable quality in that area of the pitch. I can live with a make-shift right-back as cover if it means spending some decent cash in attack.

I did the same with the PNE match, and almost felt like doing it again tonight, but we actually put in a performance and battled, which is the difference. The PNE match was a shambles and deserved to be walked out on.

Not taking one of our better chances in the first half cost us in the end. Perhaps Buckley was stupid to throw the ball at the player's head, even if it was a light dink, but it's just even more stupid that this is written in some rule book (apparently). We have too many Big Time Charlie officials in this league. Other than that, I thought we were the better team, but it showed that our attacking options need improving upon next month.

Have you forgotten the endless injury niggles Nyambe had?!

It's an opinion, not a narrative. Nyambe was OK, yet he was being suggested for a move up to the Premier League when he hadn't shown anything close to deserving that. Speaking of false narratives, Nyambe doesn't simply play when he's fit. Darikwa is competition for him.

And the Premier League-quality Nyambe not good enough to get into it...

That didn't age well. 😆 We deserved nothing from that. We can't even grind out a draw. Fair play to Mogga and Sunderland, although I still don't think he's going to last too long there. It'd be characteristic of a Mowbray side to flatten out after too much passion in one game. We can fault JDT for tactics, selections, and so on, but we've done that to the last umpteen managers that have been here. My suspicion with JDT is that he is not a motivator. For all this talk about local derbies, intensity, etc., we are simply not up to it when we come up against a positively vocal crowd as we did today. See Norwich victory versus today, Burnley, a big following for PNE, etc. Only positive from today is that we can't be shifted from third spot. Millwall did us a favour, and hopefully Luton can do the same tonight.