Meanwhile, no Jay Rodriguez for the Dingles. Relived at that because I had a gut feeling he'd get on the scoresheet today.

Been sweating a bit on this since you mentioned it yesterday, but Sharpe is saying this morning that the only injury for Rovers is Sam Barnes.

And don't forget Kumbayah (spelling) whilst holding up six digits: Six fingers My Lord, six fingers! Six fingers My Lord, six fingers. Six fingers My Lord, six fingers! Ohhh Lord, six fingers.

And The Addams Family rendition: Your sister is your mother, Your father is your brother, You all shag one another, The B*rnley Family, Duh-duh-duh-duh *click click*...

Woke up at 5:30. My stomach is churning. It's the fear of them doing us over again, but I've prepared my mind to accept it if it happens. How lucky are we to get that feeling of nervousness mixed with excitement? I don't know what to do with myself for the next six hours. I even did a little bit of housework. 😄 Surely that deserves some sort of positive result. Anyway, I'm all set. Beers in the fridge. Rovers shirt ready. Wife has agreed to wear another Rovers shirt for good luck. Nervously and excitedly, I say.... Bring on the Dingles! #COYB 😀🍻

Watford are due one.

Indeed. A quote from Robert Page: Page is choosing players for all the wrong reasons here. Staying loyal to League Two players over somebody who is far superior in terms of ability and form two leagues higher up is insane. It's clearly "jobs for the boys" in the Wales camp. Picking Jonny Williams over Ryan Hedges is akin to Southgate picking Jack Wilshere over Jack Grealish. Nuts. I think the biggest blow for Hedges is realising he's 27 and Wales don't always qualify for the big tournaments, even if they've done better in recent years. Hedges will be 28/29 by the time the next major tournament comes, so he could still get his chance, but time is running out. Let's hope it gives Hedges some extra motivation to prove his point to Page live on Sky against the Dingles.

The "negative" aspects are to do with consistency. We have had too many away games in the league where we appear to be in the shadow of the hunger and desire of the home team. Sometimes we've put in really good performances and got our just desserts, and other times we just don't turn up. We often close in upon ourselves when we have a one-goal lead. Defending too deep is never comfortable to watch, and I feel as though we are doing it a bit too much for my liking. Having said that...! I have much more faith in us holding out a lead under JDT than our previous manager. JDT appears to have clarity about who deserves a place in the team and who doesn't. The previous manager was often billed as "too loyal" to some players. I can't help but smile when I watch him interviews. The previous manager was utterly depressing to listen to, and often made us feel as though he was doing us all a favour by being here. Without sounding like JDT, football is about passion, and JDT truly talks passionately about the game, and it doesn't come across as bullshit to me. He's really got me excited about Rovers again, and I think the whole club needed it. Ultimately, he has us sitting second, and in spite of plenty of uncomfortable performances, we don't have the best squad in the league by any stretch of the imagination, and so it's never going to be perfect. But I feel as though the team is starting to settle down and get some consistency to it.

I was impressed by Mola. He deserves a lot of credit for keeping West Ham at bay as much as possible. He was also unlucky to have a blatant free-kick not awarded in the lead up to West Ham's first goal. A shame his involvement was over straight after West Ham's second goal, but he'd been run ragged by that point. I'd give Man of the Match to Brereton-Diaz due to his excellent equaliser off the bench to take us to penalties, followed by a top drawer penalty to set the tone.

Charlton is the only club from London through to round 4, but it'll be two if United win tonight.

I think we will be better organised in transfer windows than in recent history, what with Broughton and Williams in place. Behind Tomasson's smile, I think we have a ruthless Head Coach who knows what he wants. As for Dack, I can only think that he's not doing (or not able to do) what is required by JDT. Sadly, I've seen little evidence that Dack is anything close to the player he was before his injuries. Keeping a high earner on the books who doesn't start for us is a luxury we cannot afford. At the moment, it's looking like he'll go in January, and I think that might be the right course of action if it allows wages to be put towards a player or two that JDT will utilise.

Dingles (home or away) is my first choice. If not, Liverpool or City. Better to have a local game or a game against a top club that is accessible to supporters than draw Southampton away, for example. The 2,000+ travelling supporters will be enjoying having made the effort to get down there in a relatively low key fixture! Can't say I was too excited about the game, but it panned out perfectly as a classic cup game. Onwards and upwards. JDT's blue and white army!

Singing the Blues is too "Birmingham City" for me. Sacking people because they chose two top songs is harsh. Ultimately, it's all irrelevant, just a bit of fun.

At Coventry, we didn't create any clear-cut opportunities, whereas we had several against Huddersfield. While we were hanging on for the win, we were also very resolute. Against Coventry, we were calamitous. Away from home, particularly mid-week, we never look up for it, and look like we just want to go back home. While today's performance was far from comfortable, there's a confidence and belief that we will hold out. That's the difference.

A fun read from some supporters with delusions of grandeur given their current squad. Are they aware they're mid-table after spending several seasons in League One? I remember seeing a quote after they played us saying "we'd be second if Stewart [one of their strikers] wasn't injured". Also, Alex Neil isn't sitting too well with Stoke supporters so far, with one claiming O'Neil' was doing a better job.

When you take a breather from this place, you dread taking a look after a period of time. I've seen comments such as "we won in spite of the manager". Well, it might not always be comfortable, but we do it more often than not, don't we? Frankly, I think fair criticism goes out of the window on here, and it's just a habit of some to need somebody to blame for us sitting second. #COYB

Just another typical Championship game, and we got through it. Knew this one was a tricky one when we've got the Dingles game on our minds. Overall, a great day. Dingles humiliated on TV, and Rovers keeping it steady and within striking distance. Well done Rovers! Although I'm dreading it, let's just face the music, now. Bring on the Dingles.

HOME POINTS PER GAME Saturdays = 2.1 (P7 W5 D0 L2) Mid-week = 3 (P2 W2 D0 L0) AWAY POINTS PER GAME Saturdays = 1.8 (P5 W3 D0 L2) Mid-week = 0.6 (P5 W1 D0 L4) Something I've noticed in mid-week away games is how all of the home crowds seem to have been really up for it - for no reason other than enjoyment of football and wanting to create a good atmosphere. Well, it certainly works. When I think of the Blackpool away game, we took a large contingent, and I don't recall the Blackpool supporters being very vocal. However, when we've been to places like Coventry, Reading, Sheffield United, and even Wigan, their home crowds were noticeably behind their teams from the off. People can point to odd selections, but we've won when playing Hedges at wing-back, for example. I think there is something in our mid-week travels that affects the players - probably a mixture of tiredness and a motivated home crowd. Either way, I think the pattern speaks for itself. It's probably naive to suggest we keep up our form in the other areas and turn some of the abysmal mid-week away performances into average performances and we're OK.

No Nyambe. Let me guess. Injury niggle with a tight hamstring.

Attendance estimate Home: 11,713 Away: 1,571 Total: 13,284

Rovers have sold an estimated 12,386 tickets based on the seat map right now (that's season tickets plus match tickets). I'm assuming ~2,000 west Brom fans, so with walk-ons included, I'm estimating a 15,000+ crowd for the game.

By my estimation, Rovers supporters have bought 4,641 tickets so far. That excludes walk-on supporters and a minimum of 350 Hartlepool United supporters.

Pointless count here, but the seat map currently suggests home ticket sales for the first game of the season at 9,266. Regarding the 7,820 figure, if true, it would mean my estimates are around 500 north of reality. I'm not sure why that would be based on the seat map availability because I thought I'd taken everything into consideration, so it's a bit of a flat feeling not knowing where a 500 shortfall could come from. If anybody has any ideas, give me a shout.

To wrap it up: The last reasonable season ticket sales estimate was 8,197 on Tuesday 12th July. This is due to daily match tickets being made available to purchase thereafter, which will be unavoidably included in the count. The daily average sales stands at +25*. The daily average dictates another 425 season ticket sales by the eve of our first home game. This results in 8,622 season ticket sales by the time our season kicks off**. * The daily average excludes counts run when visibility of front row seats were made available and the loyalty scheme ending. ** This figure does not take into account potential sales boosts to the daily average, e.g., player signings, last-minute buying patterns, pay day, etc. I will run a final count on the eve of the QPR match to give an estimate of the crowd, and check it against the official figure. I'd expect the official figure to be higher because I won't be including on-the-day sales. Over and out for now.

You could well be right, @Mattyblue . The estimating may well have reached its demise.