Exactly, what happens if two players run into your zone ?

This lot beat Bristol City ( who beat us in midweek ) quite comfortably yesterday. If it's the easy peasy Rovers that turn up we'll be in for a shock.

I'll have any you have if you're giving them away.

Yes, It'd be interesting. I think he's a bit shell shocked at the moment. It's getting to " Make Your Mind Up " time for clubs thinking about changing their manager. Apart from Rovers that is. If those other clubs are hoping to stay up that is. Maybe they're following the Dingles game plan - go down and then come back a bit stronger. It's not looking good for Dunny at Barrow as well. They lost again yesterday.

Yes, I'd examine it carefully, it might turn out to be a 10 Euro note.

If they can keep 11 on the pitch it'll be a tough game. If we get to play against 10 again we'll murder 'em.

If I lent Mowbray a tenner I'd trust him to give it me back. Do I trust him to get Rovers promoted ? I'm afraid not.

There's a " Maybe " missing of the beginning of the last sentence. I just find it strange that the guy who was achieving real success with what amounts to be the reserve team and was being looked upon by some fans as Mowbray's heir apparent was suddenly appointed chief drone pilot and sums man. That's not even a sideways move. Plenty of blokes with no real football background can and do get jobs sorting out stats, flying drones etc. I was expecting whoever coached the team at that moment to be down graded to that job and Johnno being appointed as Mowbray's right hand man with responsibility for sorting out how we play.

It looks good on paper but in concrete terms it's pretty meaningless. Especially if 3 or 4 off your better players bail out in summer.

Even as 15 year old kid I knew you had your best markers on the opposition danger men. Most forwards look at marking up as something slightly beneath them.

In what respect does it matter where we finish between 7th or 14th ? As far as I can see there's no money in it and I can't see Amstrong or Nyambe thinking " Well I was going to leave when we were 10th in the league but now we've finished 7th I think I'll stay ".

As far as I can see Johnno has had zero impact on first team performances. As a result he's just gone down a big snake in the Ewood Park game of snakes and ladders. Maybe that was Mowbray's plan all along ?

That's what can happen when you have a forward marking a forward.

Of course he was, but we gave him his first job as a manager. He was a complete unknown in managerial terms but somebody ( Jimmy Armfield ? ) tipped off the board that he would be good managerial timber.

He's only had four goes at getting us a left back - Bell, Hart, Cunningham, Douglas. Maybe it'll be fifth time lucky ?

If we had a competent board with a group of directors with their ears to the ground like we had in the past they'd have a good idea who the up and coming guys are in the game. Ken Furphy, Gordon Lee, Jim Smith, Howard Kendall were all very good appointments that came from lower divisions, Don MacKay was a good one, even Saxton wasn't bad. A proper board, even if they were happy with the current manager, should always be thinking - " If Tony goes who'd be a good replacement ? " Our problem is the club is being run in a vacuum, we're on automatic pilot with nobody in the pilots seat. There's no point anybody making suggestions regarding appointments because nobody is listening. What I do know is the next young top manager is out there but we've no chance of appointing him because nobody is looking.

There's so many things wrong with this it's hard to know where to start. I bet they love being at Rovers - it's an expectation free zone from top to bottom. You can be playing like a drain ( Lenihan, Douglas etc ) and still get picked for the next game. You can go on one of our regular death spirals and absolutely nothing happens. No criticism at the club or in the press, it's as though we weren't losing 6 or 7 games on the bounce. They're all on easy street, especially with no fans in the stadium. Has Bennett kicked a ball for us this season ? If he has I must have missed it. One of the best defenders ever to kick a ball, Paul McGrath, was known for never saying a word on the pitch or in the changing rooms. Do you really think Armstrong has loyalty to Mowbray or to Rovers ? You're deluded, wait while this summer, you'll see what loyalty looks like then. That's if he's still here in Feb. The only manager modern day players have loyalty to is their bank manager. For your information I was gutted when Sam left and the first thing I did was look in the paper to see how many points we needed to get to 40 because I knew we were in big trouble. This bloke has had long enough to fashion a team with a coherent way of playing that is capable of beating teams around the top of the table. We're no nearer now in that respect than we were 3 years ago.

What's the squad going to be like when the more ambitious players bail out in Summer ?

I mentioned it earlier. I was playing that day and after our game we all crowded around " Radio Rentals" shop window. They had all the TV's in the window set to " Grandstand ". When the teletype score came up - Oxford Utd 3 - Blackburn Rovers 1 I turned around to my pal and said " They'll have got that the wrong way around ". They did make mistakes from time to time but usually they corrected them shortly afterwards. Not that day though.

Me too. As I said the other day I've come round to accepting lack lustre performances when the chips are down. Nothing will change with this guy in charge. The writing was on the wall for me in the promotion season. The best squad in the comp and we played lackadaisical, constipated, dull football lots of the time. I'd have said thanks for getting us promoted Tony but we need someone who can set us up for another promotion push and to be honest you aren't that man. 3 wasted seasons.

I've got a few of those " Philosophy Football " shirts, my favourite is - " Beyond The Touchline There Is Nothing ".

That's one of the reasons why he wouldn't be anything like as successful at the top level. He'd need a much more effective shots to goals ratio.

We don't have Magloire at the moment.

Yeah, if Armstrong isn't on song scoring goals just got a lot more difficult.

I get the feeling he's not that bright.