Souness has always used the press to issue little messages to his players. I suspect the latest quotes are aimed more at flitcroft than Cole. He's probably one of the highest earners at Ewood and I'm also guessing that Souness was ordered to reduce the wage bill. Gary has been great for the club, but we have also been great for him. We've paid him a great wage and given him the captains arm band for years. He's had his time though and it's now up to a new breed of players to prove their worth. Souness obviously believes he has the players to take over, so its right that he should try and get him off the wage bill. He is too much of a negative influence on the younger players if he isn't playing and Souness doesn't need another player who hates the fact that he's not in the team, despite the fact that he's not good enough anymore. As for Cole - I think he'll be staying. It's no secret that the 2 don't like each other, but they don't have too. He can stay for one more season, pick up his nice pay off and finish his career in the MLS.

We do have a plan that covers this but we are desperatley trying to avoid ANYTHING that could be divisive, elitist etc. Fundamentally we want the site to be "free to air" but it is becoming very difficult. The site is simply too popular for its own good, at the same time sponsorship is difficult because the potential market is very limited. Manchester Blue Until this week it wasn't a big issue. The money was ticking along quite nicely. Suddenly, for the third time now, our hosts (different one each time), has looked at the traffic and is putting on pressure for more cash. The very minimum costs will be: Hosting Fees 12 x £120 = £1440 PO Box number = £60 Domain stuff = £100 estimate Suddenly we need £1600, minimum per year.....that's an awful lot of badges Whilst I tend to agree that the site should remain as fair and open as possible, the internet has simply moved on from where it was in peoples lives even 2 years ago. As Ste points out - we have become a victim of our own success. People have always believed that websites should be free; yet they are quite happy to pay for all other kinds of media, be it TV, Football programme, magazines etc. For the price of one pint of lager a month, we can keep this site going and not have to overly commercialise the site. I have no problems whatsoever with something in the avatar that denotes a 'sponsor' It's not like they get any special privileges, but it should be a simple way of recognising the people who are doing their bit to keep the site going. For something to be elitist - it would suggest that we were pricing people out of the market. This would not be the case if people paid £2 per month on a direct debit. I can't believe that anyone using this site can't afford to forsake 1 pint to keep it going. Like Tris says - you really notice when the site goes down. Lets not just debate this for the next month - if you like the site, then set up your debit for £1 or £2 a month. That's all it takes.

i don't remember anyone being gutted that we'd signed ferguson

forget the players leaving. . . pulling the hotel down? wow! that's got to be one hell of a write off!

the only negative thing I can see in all this - is the quotes comign from the club about what he did 2 years ago. its a shame last season was such a lost season for him. lets hope that he has a hunger to do well.

The problem is that James arranged his defenders then stood slap bang in the middle of the goal (the one place Zidane wasn't going to put the ball), with his view obscured by the wall in front of him. Seems logical that he should have either A: put a man on the near post, trusting him to be there if Zidane put the ball round the wall and allowing James to cover the far post if ZZ went up and over, or B: positioned himself more towards the near post to cover the shot round the wall and hope the wall did it's job if Zidane tried to shoot over the top of it. In the end he did neither, and it cost us a goal. i thought the goal went into the far post! shows how good a view I had! in any case - you simply can't have a man on the line, for all the reasons i said above

if it were that easy tom, do you not think just one defender would have been tried on the line against beckham in the last 10 years? if you put one man on the wall, the french players could all have stood in the keepers way and obscured his view. it would have been far too easy for a dead ball specialist to simply pick his spot - knowing the keeper would be totally unsighted.

I didn't think I was making statements, but was expressing an opinion. There is, in my opinion, a difference in being the second or third best player in the PL and being a threat. I'm not trying to criticize England but to make observations - Henry, Viera, Pires - name the English equivalents? By which I mean players who worry you when they have the ball against your team. The point I'm trying to make is England do not have threatening, creative players and that much of the creativity in the PL comes from foreign players. When Rovers play the major PL clubs it's the foreign players who are most likey to create the threat or set the pulse racing. If we're playing Arsenal, Chelsea, Man Utd, there are few English players who create the threat/buzz. You can be a very good footballer but still not a threatening, creative player. So what in your opinion constitutes 'creativity' or a 'threat' then Paul? LAMPARD carries a huge goalscoring THREAT - as he showed for Chelsea and against France. Seeing as he's also able to pick out a pass and CREATE goals, then surely he's also creative. GERRARD is even better at picking out a pass than Lampard, as he's shown with several pinpoint passes for Owen this season, does that not make him creative? You say you wouldn't be scared if Gerrard had the ball, well I for one would be fin worried if he got the ball and was running at a defence. BECKHAM surely carries a THREAT at dead-ball situations and can CREATE goals out of nothing with his superb passing and vision. SCHOLES is probably Englands most CREATIVE player with his little passes to get attacking moves going, his superb passing ability and huge goal THREAT with his runs into the box. You also noted that OWEN and ROONEY carry a significant threat so well done. Your opinion that the best, most creative and threatening players in the Premiership are foreigners is simply a view that you've formed in your own mind to explain why England lost the other night. But the facts simply don't back that opinion up! You're right that Henry and Pires are Arsenal's most dangerous players but Vieira? How many goals and assists does he get in a season? Hardly any is the answer. He's not an attacking or creative threat. Who is Chelsea's most creative and threatening player? Crespo, Gronkjaer? I don't think so, its Frank Lampard all the way. Maybe it's Duff but he's a product of and English youth academy, not a foreigner. Who is Manchester United's most creative and threatening player? I'd say its probably Scholes, and if not him then Giggs. Before that it was Beckham. All players I would not deem to be foreigners. You'd probably say Van Nistelrooy but he's only effective in and around the six yard box and not a creative threat in the ilk of Henry lets say. Who is Liverpool's most creative and threatening player? You cannot argue that it's not either Owen or Gerrard. English born and bred? Who is Newcastle's most creative and threatening player? Someone mentioned, maybe you, that Shearer worried you every time he got the ball so its got to be him. If not Shearer then maybe Bellamy or Dyer, its certainly not Laurent Robert. So there's the top 5 clubs in England and apart from Arsenal, all their best attacking and creative threats are either English in most cases or from one one of the home nations. So basically your argument doesn't weigh up. You don't just have to be able to run at players and have some skill to be considered a threat or a creative player, different players carry different threats from different situations and create things in different ways. Please reply and tell all the lovely people that you're wrong... i think we are really talking about the difference between having the ability to dribble and take players on, as opposed to also being able to deliver the killer pass? our players tending to be more workmanlike than really having the spark of genius. our midfielders do carry a threat, but at international level, its a lot harder -hence the reason why we haven't won anything for 30 years. lampard, gerrard can all thread a pass, but then name me a quality midfielder that can't. On the flipside, zidane, pires etc are players that can dribble past 2 or 3 players and then deliver a killer ball - only rooney in the present starting 11 can do that. the days of english players being able to excite are few and far between. we have become accustomed to a different style of play. hence why joe cole is often lauded as being a player that could come on and 'turn the game on its head' why? because he can dribble and leave his man for dead hence creating an overlap.

How would Ashley Cole being on the post block David James view? you know as well as i do tom, that you only listen to your keeper when he's setting up his wall. fact. if he had left the wall, zidane would probably have curled it the other way, then you would still be making james a scapegoat. david james was excellent against france - he comanded his area very well and came out for lots of crosses - which he caught - every last one of them. inspirational skipper? he's been anything but for about 4 months now. he looked more bothered that he couldnt play in the centre. He's probably not happy at having all the limelight taken away from him by gerrard and lampard. hence he tried to knock 60 yard balls all the time instead of his usually very high work ethic.

why do people assume we had a 1.5 million bid turned down ? Just because the newspapers reported it? Come on guys - none of us know how much is in the pot, but one thing we do know for certain. Souness is an absolute master at playing with the press and getting them to write what he wants. As someone else mentioned - this is all his usual smoke and mirror tricks. If we 'suddenly' sign a player now, souness can turn around and say that the board made increased funds available. And the club come out of it smelling like roses, even though they have probably hatched it along with souey! I'll keep my optimist head on!

rev - are there any official quotes from the club? I wonder if its just coincidence that we are linked with butt for 5 million and all of a sudden we hear there is no money.

McClaren is anythign but a weak personality. he may seem a bit wet when he talks to the media, but he's totally different with his players. (I've seen him in action a few times.)

unfortunately not. i'm back in blighty now!

its just my humble opinion ! But I still managed to argue about the game with my clients for about an hour at the aiport! It took us about 2 hours before we really spoke to each other after we left the stadium as we were all just dumbfounded the final result. The point is - we will always disagree with each other - but just remember - Paul and I are always right!

Rooney , Gerard , Lampard , Owen.....I think you're over playing the French a bit , Mr Paul. We more than matched them last night . If (hopefully) we play them again I know who I'll put my money on . Owen, yep agree always worry about him when Liverpool are in town. Rooney - well not on the basis of seeing him at Ewood but after last night, yes. Rooney looked like he might create something and of course, did. Gerrard, Lampard - no dont agree. They wouldn't worry me every time they got the ball. That is the sort of thing I'm trying to get at; the "oh ######, it's Owen/Henry/Zidane" factor. It's the feeling every time Shearer had the ball - something was gonna happen. I'd agree with that Paul. Rooney was the only player to get the fans out of their seats in anticipation. Everytime he picked up the ball, you sensed something could happen. Didn't get that feeling from anyone else!

Well here's my tuppence worth! I arrived in Lisbon Saturday morning and spent the weekend. The atomsphere everywhere was incredible. We tended to stay around small bars, mixing with some of the locals, playing football etc etc. Over in the main square, there must have been about 5000 england fans singing, drinking and kicking footballs all day. Quite a few drunk, but the only crimes being comitted were signing en ger lund out of tune! I'll post some pics up later, but we had turned the whole square into a sea of st georges. It really did look amazing! The locals were going up to groups of lads and asking to have there photos taken. Hardly the act of someone quaking in their boots! The only trouble I saw in the ground, was a minor scuffle in the stadium when france went 2-1 up. There were quite a few english in the french areas and vice versa, but the police moved in quickly and sorted it out. I've also got to praise the police in the city centre. They stayed well out of the way and didn't look menacing ( unlike france 98) , but you had the feeling that if anything kicked off - they would be there very quickly. As others have pointed out, you will always get a minority of people willing to do stupid things, but it has to be put into context. AT one point in the afternoon, a very drunk portugese man was stumbling / trying to run into the square with a big piece of 2x2. His 2 friends ran after him and pulled him back. Goodness knows what would have happened, but yet again - it was just the action of a mindless idiot. ( I might have a picture of him, so Ill post it if I have! He was quite a state!) Finally, on the saturday night, we went into the main portugese area for drinks and again, there were a lot of english in the bars along with many different nationalities. no problems whatsoever. If we lose to croatia or switzerland, then it may be a different story, but on the whole I thought the fans behaved very well indeed.

this board never ceases to maze me with such a diverse set of opinions after watching the same game. I've just got back from Portugal and gutted does not even begin to describe the feeling. The weekend started off so well. The weather was gorgeous, drinks were going down nicely and we had a big game of keepy up in the street with about 60 people! Forget the Carling and Nike ads - this was football for the fans at its best! Got to the stadium nice and early due to the warnings about getting in ( which proved to be correct, as a lot of people missed the kick off) Queued at the Carlsberg tent only to find they were only sellign non alcoholic beer! Oh well, the prospect of watching us take on thw world champions was probably enough to keep me going! 5 mins before kick off and the stadium looked awesome. We outnumbered the french by what looked like 6:1. St George Flags draped all the way around the stadium and a see of white and red from our boys. Now, most of our pre match banter about the game had centred around our dodgy defence and how henry et al were going to rip ledley apart. ( I based this on a) my limited knowledge of him and watching andy cole come off better against him towards the end of the season) How wrong could I be! He was excellent, as was the rest of our defence. Sol was probably the best player on the pitch and ashley and gary did nothing wrong all match. If only we could have said the same about the midfield. It's always different watching a game from the stands, as opposed to the TV as you get a much clearer picture of the whole thing unfolding. And apart from our goal and 1 or 2 rooney moments, we went into the half time break feeling quite lucky. In the 2nd half, things seem to get more negative and the space in which we allowed france to run with the ball so that they could pick off there passes with ease was a major cause for concern. We had the feeling all the way through that we were just inviting trouble. That if you gave france as much time and space as we did, then they would start to smell blood. Scholes looked like he'd runa marathon the day before and beckham was remarkably subdued. Gerrard and lampard were ok and covered a lot of ground, but can't help thinking that they gave france far too much time. Another amazing run by rooney and we should have been 2 up. Now can anyone explain why silvestre was not sent off? I haven't seen any replays, but surely he was the last man? The less said about the penalty the better, although noone will be more gutted than the man himself. Lets hope its stirs him onto greater things. The substitutions were a bit of a gamble. Scholes definitely had to be replaced as he couldn't run at all. I wonder if it was the humidity, but he looked very short of fitness for most of the game. I think he may have bought rooney off, to save him getting red carded. He was putting himself about a lot, and the more the game moved on, the more likely he would get tired and therfore miss-time a bad tackle. Heskey did quite well winning some headers, but I still hate the fact that we are a long ball team. How many times did we launch the ball up to owen! WHy does the england team seem incable of getting hold of the ball and putting 20 passes together. Heskeys challenge wasn't a great one, but it looked like he prevented a shot which could have gone in anyway. Nothing wrong with james - he just came up against the best player in the world. In fact - he made quite a few crucial saves and commanded his area really well. Lazy for people to brand him calamity. He is such a different keeper these days. And gerrards back pass. Oh deary me. It was like watching the whole thing in slow motion. We were screamign at the players to just keep possesion after it went 1-1, but another hoof up field and we're on the back foot again. I still cannot believe they scored another. The england fans just burried there heads in disbelief. To add insult to injury, the portuguese were about as competant as the greeks when it comes to organisation & everyones flights were delyaed by about 3 or 4 hours. Total and utter chaos at the airport, but at least the england fans behaved. Was there any trouble in Lisbon last night? Sorry for the total rant. I think I needed to just get it all out!!! Up the Rovers

couldn't agree more. his agent did a very good job on the PR front. however - I have come around to the view, that hopefully he won't be playing much, except for the odd game where our first 3 strikers aren't fit / suspended

and that hits the nail squarely on the head !

Well if that's the case, no worries but it's a glaring omission from the journalist. which is also the reason why you still hold rovers responsible for selling duff. all because of that first press release that was sent out by the club saying we had agreed to sell duff. instead of the actual reason, when John Williams was interviewed and said the words - " the last bid triggered the release clause' all i would say rev - is that you seem very quick to jump on a press story before finding out the truth!

he's also probably correct cocker. remember duff after his first few weeks with chelsea saying how different training was. That at rovers, they just had 5 a sides etc.

You only have the tabloaids for proof that those meetings in rome were about future transfer targets though AESF. How do you know they were not about his imminent departure? It's very easy to jump on the anti chelsea bangwagon - just as it was to hate rovers when Kenny was splashing the cash. It makes a far better newstory when it's david v goliath.

stead was originally bought as one for the future. someone who clearly knew where the back of the net was as he was banging in the goals for fun at his hudersfield. Most people were excited that we could have a real gem on our hands. sadly - we know what ( limited) offering paul brings us. feel free to have a go when he tops the scoring charts next season and is instrumental in getting us back to playing free flowing attacking football. what will probably happen though, is that he comes off the bench when things aren't going well and we will change our chest high balls to even longer punts up field. jeeeeeez. i really am having a bad day!

You've never watched him play, have you? I've seen dickov many times. Mostly on Sky, but enough to know that he is neither of the 2 things I mentioned.

billy, greggyk, bryan etc etc I know we are not in the market for a Henry. I never even remotely suggested we should be signing players of his calibre. I like to watch a certain style of football. My biggest worry is that we are now signing players that I don't see as taking us forward in footballing terms. Sure - he will put himself about and make a nuisance, but i don't particulary like that style of football. As Scotty points out. He's neither a big target man, or a pacy forward. How I would have loved to sign a fast young centre forward that is not the finished article and needs some proper coaching. Saunders etc can then show us what they can really do by turning him into a proper player. My reference to the kidd days was purely a comparison of the type of player dickov is. I see him as exactly like ashley ward and look where that got us. Plenty of commitment, honest running etc but very little class. My post also had nothing to do with being 'controversial' I simply believe the game should be played a certain way and it's such a shame that Souness used to talk about our attacking exciting football, but now talks about needing a team of grafters. And as 1864 said - the minute he pulls on the shirt - he gets nothing but encouragement from me in the ground. On here though - I can say what I really think whilst not being to the detriment of the team.