On 11/11/2023 at 13:57, Mercer said:

:Reading today's posts there are two common concensuses:

• We are too nice
• Our set plays are crap

I have posted consistently in JDT's reign, including last night, that we need at least one, and preferably two, nasty hard bastards in our team.  We are too nice and the opposition know it and bully us.  Potts sent Moran flying into the hoardings early in the game and I'm pretty sure with an Andy Todd in our team he wouldn't have done or at least he wouldn't have gone on to commit other offences in the game and continue to wind Rovers' players and supporters up as he did.  Travis isn't the 'hard man' he likes to think he is and I think a eunuch would show more hardness.

Think I'm right in thinking Benson is our set piece coach.  ... IMO, Benson should not be anywhere near such roles in a Championship club and is a man at least 100 fathoms out of his depth.

 

Insomniac that I am, I decided to read tonight the twenty+ pages on this thread I hadn't read.

I've agreed with a lot; disagreed with some; but, @Mercer, the phrase I've highlighted nearly had me waking up the neighbours with laughter!! You've made the trawl through these pages well worth while.

I'm going to call it a night after that. Thank you.

On 11/11/2023 at 09:58, den said:

Harsh Jim. 
 

Rovers are playing possibly the best football outside the PL. I can’t remember the last time it was as good as we’re seeing now. We don’t want to lose that do we? We want to build on it surely.
 

what needs to happen is that those above JDT need to realise what we have and give him what he needs.

Or, to name the guilty people: i) The Venky's family; and, presumably, ii) Swaggot.

All people who can't admit that they're out of their depth when it comes to owning and "running" a successful football club (not just a team).

On 11/11/2023 at 08:43, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

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As I see it there’s no incentive for them to back a promotion team and every incentive to keep us bumping along, not making waves, in the lower reaches of this league.

They've owned us in each of the top three Divisions of English football. And by far the longest time of that ownership has been in the Championship. 

It seems obvious that they seem content - for reasons only they can fathom - for that state of affairs to continue ad infinitum.

On 10/11/2023 at 23:59, Crimpshrine said:

We may need to sell in January!

No; what we need in January is for Venky's to sell the club - lock, stock and barrel - to an organisation which: knows something about owning a successful football club; and will back JDT and Gregg with some funds to allow us to acquire some decent fringe players.

That way, we could be challenging for promotion at the end of next season. More of the same as we have at the moment; and we could be looking down, rather than up, at the end of next season.

Thinking back, JDT may have made a rod for his own back when, on appointment, he spoke of Rovers being a "three windows project".

On 11/11/2023 at 16:47, DE. said:

Never met Birdy but it's obvious he was Rovers' to his core and dearly loved the club. Great tribute last night.

Reading this tribute to him, @DE., it's just occurred to me - I'm slow on the uptake at the moment - to wonder if anyone knows whether Birdy was the original of the "Rovers Till I Die" chant?

Maybe not as the "composer"; certainly as the subject?

I've just posted what follows on the "The plot thickens ?" thread; but am copying it here because I thought this thread might get more readers, especially tonight.

"Just listening to the Radio Lancs warm-up for tonight's game and they've quoted JDT as saying that the injuries to the two players who couldn't be considered for tonight's game could be caused by weaknesses in their legs attributable to sitting for long journeys on Swaggot's wonderful new bus. (My words; not JDT's!)

"I can't remember if he was referring to Cardiff City or Bristol City - but at least one of those two clubsflies to away games in the north of England to avoid risking such injuries.

"Yet another thing to thank our disinterested owners for! 😐🤔😬🙄"

Just listening to the Radio Lancs warm-up for tonight's game and they've quoted JDT as saying that the injuries to the  two players who couldn't be considered for tonight's game could be caused by weaknesses in their legs attributable to sitting for long journeys on Swaggot's wonderful new bus. (My words; not JDT's!)

I can't remember if he was referring to Cardiff City or Bristol City - but at least one of those two clubsflies to away games in the north of England to avoid risking such injuries.

Yet another thing to thank our disinterested owners for! 😐🤔😬🙄

What a superb video; showing pride not just in the team, but the whole town.

Carrying on the theme of rivalries, I've often - sorry! - mentioned that I grew up in Blackpool the proud Blackburnian son of two exiles from the town.

My Dad couldn't get work in Blackburn in the 1930s; but his Mum apparently had a share in a Boarding House in Blackpool so he worked there. And the rules back in those days were that women teachers - and Civil Servants?? - had to resign when they got married. However, they, especially my Dad, made sure I had blue-and-white blood in my veins.

I find this thread a bit amusing for the way that those of us who grew up in "the old Lancashire" - including Merseyside and Greater Manchester - ignored most of the teams based there when it came to looking at rivalries. We never played Oldham Pathetic (as they were known to us) or Rochdull, as the locals seem to pronounce it, so they were never thought of as rivals.

Those rivalries often took subtle forms; for example, I remember that in 1953, once Blackpool had won their F.A. Cup semi-final, it didn't take long for the ⅓ pint of milk we had, Mondays-Fridays at junior school, came in bottles which had tangerine tops, rather than silvery ones.

So in those early days, my main rivals were Blackpool, even though it wasn't till I went to grammar school at the start of the 1957-58 season that we joined them - as well as Bolton, PNE and some other Lancashire team - in "the old Division 1".

That was the school where I made my first acquaintance with lads whose first loyalties were to Bolton, PNE and Burnleh; often because their Dads had come from those towns to the Fylde Coast in search of work. And it was some considerable time later that I discovered there had been another Rovers' fan - subsequently a member of this Board, no less! - at that school.

Right, enough of these rambling reminiscences; tonight's game will be a home win - clinched by the odd goal of three and preferably scored in the 74th minute! 

9 hours ago, Leonard Venkhater said:

Tell the Home Secretary !

I agree with you on this. 

Sorry, @Leonard Venkhater , I can't take seriously anybody whose parents named them after a character in an 80s US TV Serial!

14 hours ago, white boy said:

it does appear that way....lol,,, although without all the the other clubs you wouldn't have been able to beat anybody!

The English football pyramid the best and most interesting in the world.

Erm, well, yeah; it would rather defeat the raison d'etre of most team sports.

Excuse me asking; but what would be the sense of playing most team games without opponents? Isn't that what I'm sure more than a few of us on here might think of as "Claret logic"?!

On 07/11/2023 at 19:36, bluebruce said:

Interesting, I was pessimistic because of the law about appeals having to show the ref made an 'obvious mistake'. Whilst it's obvious after you see the right replay, I wouldn't say it was obvious in the moment. You might have the right angle, you might not. I watched extended highlights today and the commentator was saying Wharton couldn't have any complaints there, until he saw the second replay I believe it was.

For that reason, and the league generally sticking by their refs, I expected the appeal to be denied. Certainly the right decision has been reached though, for a change. Thankfully it didn't cost us any points.

Or, given our ownership, any money, either!

On 07/11/2023 at 13:50, white boy said:

Thats a rather interesting take on the standing of teams from Lancashire.  Be interesting to know what others think of this and how there thoughts work in comparison to this chart.  Clearly the dingles will never be top of any chart on this forum!

In any correspondence with my old schoolmate now in New Zealand who follows That Lot from Burnley, I always use the phrase "Lancashire's Most Historic Football Club" on the grounds that we've won, among other Trophies, The Football League; the Premier League; the F.A. Cup; and the Football League Cup.

It's the breadth of our successes that make us Lancashire's Most Historic Football Club.

(To spare his blushes, I never refer to the Full Members' Cup. That's because we won it the season before That Lot came within 5 minutes of dropping out of the Football League altogether!)

22 hours ago, only2garners said:

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Given his history and the award he got for his efforts the club would I think be amenable to some form of action to remember him on Friday night, subject of course to the approval of his wife Annette, who of course was always at his side at games.

Doubtless, given the weekend it is, both teams will be wearing black armbands throughout the game, anyway; but, surely it must be possible for the announcer to use some form of words before the Last Post referring to us having "lost one of our own." without seeming disrespectful to the soldiers whom we'll be commemorating?

20 hours ago, SIMON GARNERS 194 said:

The house Birdy lived in was also the Birthplace of Rovers 1928 Cup final winning Capt Harry Healless I do believe.

I didn't know that - or Birdy, either; except by reputation - but, if that's the case, then it's fitting in a way. He really was a legend in his own lifetime.

A taxi driver who collected me from the Car Park after our last trip to Turd Moor last December pointed his house out to me as if it was part of a tour of "Historic buildings of Blackburn"!

R I P.

1 hour ago, JohnD said:

The loss set a new unwanted club record of eight successive top-flight home defeats for Burnley,who also lost their final two games at Turf Moor when they were relegated from the Premier League in 2021-22

Hey @JohnD , who says it's an "unwanted" record?! 😉😁

I heard about the PL Record when listening to Radio 5 this afternoon, but they didn’t say anything about adding on the two games from the season before last!

Every Sunday morning, I ring my Dingle-supporting mate from schooldays who now lives in New Zealand. Our conversation inevitably involves the previous day's games and I'd texted him and promised to tell him about the EPL record.

Without telling him what it was, of course!!

His response was, I thought, totally inappropriate from someone who'd be at church before he could read what the record was!

Now you’ve given me that extra information, however, . . !

33 minutes ago, grizfoot said:

I must be a little mad like any football fan traveling such a distance on a midweek, setting off at lunch time not getting back till gone three. All in the hope, the dream of another memorable night like in Leicester, like at West Ham's rented Olympic Bowl.  Only this one would be a magnitude or two up, to find one on a similar scale you'd have to hark back to 2013 when a Michael Appleton led Rovers side won at The Emirates with Colin Kazim-Richards bagging the winner.

As if jolted by our third kit, images of playing Chelsea past flashed up in my mind. Mourinho grey-coated, Hughes grey-haired prowling the touchline. Back when a player nicknamed 'The Axe' was allowed to live up to his nickname. Back when players wore baggy shirts, Back when you could name the Chelsea one to eleven and know each one of them had genuine class. Back when we could bring Tugay off the bench for the last twenty minutes to see out games. Back when we got under the noses of the supposed called Premier League elite, yes we might not have always won but we nearly always give them a game, especially at Ewood. Sent many multimillion pounds worth of footballers and their managers back home to London like a group of sulky children who've just been told the Pleasure Beach is shut. Picture Big Sam chewing gum, wry smile, a looming spectre of a lost decade of us not being able to even play games at places like Stamford Bridge.

As for the actual match itself. The announcement of the teams, the fact Chelsea had gone more or less full strength and we had strung the best team together JDT felt he could, easily five or six short of our very best team. Set it up for an even more difficult task. The approach and message was clear, five across midfield, one up front, try and play but keep things tight and maybe we can get more adventurous as the game wears on. I don't think the endeavour was ever in question. But Chelsea passed the ball around well, as you would hope of a team that cost a king's ransom to assemble. Yet in front of goal they weren't particularly great, they squandered plenty of good chances, a thing to give hope to a team chasing an unlikely victory. 

Then came the individual errors that led to the goals.  Leo not-any-better-than-Pears-no-matter-how-hard-we-all-try-to-wish Wahlstedt flapping one down into the middle of the box for some defender, fittingly named like a French supervillain, to slot home and dash our hopes. Perhaps unfair to think such a thing but you'd never have seen Brad Friedel do that now would you? not in a thousand years.  Second Half was much the same as the first, on the back foot. Then here it was, a chance. A good chance at that. One long ball over the top, a glitch in the blockchain, and we could all dream again if only for a few seconds. Again maybe unfairly my mind flashed back, a Bellamy or a Benni McCarthy would have slotted that one away in their sleep probably. Why perhaps even Shefki Kuqi or Jason Roberts might have hit the target. That being said perhaps I do Leonard a little bit of disservice as it wasn't by any means the easiest of chances, but on nights like this those are the ones that need to go in. I do like Leonard as a player, shows plenty of good traits of an old-fashioned no.9. Keeps getting in good positions, hopefully with more time and experience he'll be putting away more of those types of chances.

Then the second error, Brittian playing a sloppy pass into midfield that was intercepted, whilst not completely gifting them a goal it did offer up a very presentable chance that a player of Sterling's quality was only too happy to take. Not to sound like a broken record but I thought again, perhaps unfairly, I can't imagine Lucas Neill or Brett Emerton ever playing a ball like that. From that point on the game kind of petered out, although Sigurdsson really should have at least given us all goal to celebrate deep into stoppage time, the only consolation is that it would surely have only been a consolation by that point anyway. 

Perhaps rather forlornly then this fixture only cemented one thing in my mind, and that is the chasm between clubs like ours and Chelsea nowadays, the knowledge of how much we have fallen and how far off our team of today is from even our mid-table scrapping Premier League sides of years gone by let alone those lucky enough to remember the heights of the mid-nineties. Yet if there's one thing to be proud of. One thing that remains a constant, it is the fantastic support. What else can you feel but immense pride as the Rovers fan belt out a rendition of "There's Only One Jack Walker" forth into the hushed backdrop of Stamford Bridge. Amidst the epicentre of London's wealth and at the very birthplace were all this modern day mega rich football owners began it seemed a more hauntingly poignant tribute than ever before.

I've picked this post out; but, really, I could have picked almost any of the posts from all the true fans who can bore their kids and grandchildren with their pride - come on, @grizfoot; you know you were proud to be there, really! - at being there last night.

So what if I can - and do from time to time!! - rattle on about a fortnight on Saturday being the 70th anniversary of the first match I can remember my Dad taking me to sit in the Riverside stand (Mk 1!) to watch a 2 - 2 draw with Fulham?

So what if there's a chasm between Rovers in their Venky-owned era and any team from the top half of the Premier League?

They're still our Venky-owned Rovers and we're - mostly - all proud, especially in the JDT era, of what they're producing. It's just such a pity that there isn't, in this modern era, more reinvestment in the squad. Then we might well, eventually, "punch our weight".

Because of health reasons - I keep failing a fitness test!!😉 - I've been unable to use use my season ticket so far and had feared I was becoming jaded about the Rovers. But thanks to you, @grizfoot and all the others who were so proud and pleased to represent those of us who, for whatever reason, couldn't be there last night, for being there on behalf of those of us less fortunate than you.

Oh, and @jim mk2, it doesn't really matter if some messages are longer than others!!😉🙂

19 minutes ago, windymiller7 said:

I'll be honest, I actually like him. He's only young & obviously comes from a continental background where punching, rather than catching, is the norm.

As daft as it sounds, I'm not as nervous with him in goal as Pears. Not a patch on TK obviously, but I at least have confidence in him stopping a shot.

This punching shit needs to stop though & needs coaching out of him him - is BB the man to do this? I very much doubt it. All the drills I see online are shot stopping!! Nothing relating to dealing with crosses into the box under pressure! 

I could have sworn we bought Kempinski from a continental background??

18 minutes ago, Exiled_Rover said:

I think we'd be a better team with him starting as a #10 (he's a much better footballer than Szmodics) - but unfortunately (for him) our only consistent source of goals plays at #10. 

Yes, isn’t that where he plays for both his "parent club" and the Irish Republic u-21s?

1 hour ago, JohnD said:

Some good, some bad, could have been worse. Need a Striker and GK in Jan 

.... .... .... ....

Now where have I read that bit in bold before?

Sorry; I couldn’t find a "scratches head" smiley!

34 minutes ago, superniko said:

It was said tongue in cheek as I believe it is only Millwall twice, QPR twice and West Ham 😄

Ouch - that sounds like a shocker at West Ham!!! I can imagine all the fans coming on to the coach after the shootout absolutely buzzing whilst you’ve been there all along!

My own fault; I obviously bought too big a bottle to drink at the Motorway Service Station!!

48 minutes ago, New Jeru said:

Time to start naming 11 outfield players and having them take turns in goal like we did as kids.

Now there's a thought; would we win if we played 11 outfield players, and alternate between Wahlstedt and Pears??

37 minutes ago, Tugayisgod said:

A good first half performance marred by another poor goal conceded.

You accept that keepers will make mistakes from time to time but it's happened a bit too often this season

And yet, apparently, the Head Coach has every faith in Benson.

43 minutes ago, Ricky said:

Is there no VAR today? 

According to Radio 5, there's no VAR in any Carabao Cup game.

They didn't say whether that's just tonight or in every Round of the competition.  Only 'reason' I can think of is that there are so many EFL teams still in the competition, the League - it's still the Football League Cup, after all - doesn't want us getting used to something we won't have in our 46 League games every season.

13 hours ago, superniko said:

JDT has still never lost in London. 
Keep the faith. 

I hate myself for thinking @superniko 's clutching at straws here. Especially when posting at h-t on Wednesday night.

But who knows, it could be a repetition of last year's trip to the London Stadium. (Writes the bloke who left that game when 2-1 down, so I could go to the loo and went on to take my seat in the supporters' coach. Only, eventually, to find that in that time that the goalkeepers had picked had picked the ball out of the net 22 times!!)