Todd must be made to sit on the bench. He has hardly been on top form this season and the headbutt against spurs was sheer stupidity. Reid for Savage otherwise unchanged line up. Whats the problem with Jansen ? Was he in the reserves last night ?

What Gray does possess over Matteo is the knowledge and experience of playing at left back. He has played this position all is career and even gained an england cap if I not mistaken. Matteo seems to be square peg in a round hole at left back. We looked alot more balanced with a naturally left sided defender. Although at least we are not trying to convert our centre forward to left back ala pedersen at Bolton !!

Know we have stooped low but even I didn't think we were time wasting in the first half. Helps with the boring football tag though !!! Asylum seeker nets his first. Whats the news on the attendance from radio lancs ?

according to sky sports dickov booked for time wasting in the 44min !!! against huddersfield. Joke

Strip aggression, passion and strutting arrogance out of the game and you've got a negative, pish-poor, wet fart of a game. Spot on article. Mirrors alot of my thoughts with all that is wrong with our beautiful game. It is becoming a game for puffs thus we end up with the drivel thats on offer now.

The sooner the premiership bubble bursts the better !!! Bring on a league with competition where any team could win. A few ideas for improvement - remove threat of relegation - create and enforce salary cap overpaid prima donnas - create regional leagues. The problem with our league is that too many teams are there to finish fourth from bottom and get the sky tv money. The sport is not entertaining anymore read robbo column on the bbc website strike don't normally agree with the bloke but it is true. Football this season especially is so to dull 4 - 5 - 1 will not bring the crowds back to Ewood no goals in four games lets face it the 2 against fulham although very special would 99 times out of 100 sail into the fans (the 2 or 3 of them!!) behind the goal. So we only have Todds miss hit shot as the other goal. Has there been a general downturn in gates ? I know my comments are off the wall and we will get the usual response of how it will never work maybe so but something radical must be done to save our game. Otherwise the greedy clubs and players will eventually ruin the sport for the next generation. I would much rather see rovers challenging for the regional north championship without Man utd Liverpool etc then us bore our way to fourth from bottom of a poor premiership. Wait until Charlton come to Ewood always seems to attract the least fans sub 15,000 at a guess.

Gutless Shameless could go on. What does Owen Hargreaves to deserve a place I wouldn't have him in Accy Stanley side. Rooney well how did they keep him on after that disgraceful episode with Beckham. Although he must be ###### off being put on the left hand side he was left back at times come on give me strength. I have never said this before but now I have lost patience Sven must go he doesn't get involved we need someone with passion i.e Pearce. Seems to me that Sven only has Beckham behind otherwise he has lost the support of the players. Still beat Austria/Poland at home and we are through however is it worth it we will never do it with that Swedish knobcheese in charge.

Happy with a point lets get 3 at Villa on Sat !!!! Spurs have had a good start. Doesn't sound good for Todd going home to watch sky sports news at 7 they will have all the talk and I will see for myself

Spurs have also been inconsistent over seasons past so why should this season be any different !!! don't like predictions as I always believe rovers will win.

Oscar not really in good taste that post not humerous at all !!!!!

Took the words out of my mouth. Not trying to be pessimtic but lets say he now misses first 10 games (inc match fittness cos he wasn't 100% last week) we are left with serious problems we all know how we faired last season in the goal scoring stakes so we are relying now on a guy who failed to impressed 2 or 3 seasons ago and went to Stockport, matty big question marks, dickov say no more I am not his biggest fan even before last weeks madness, derbyshire never seen him question marks ? I was hoping Kugi would turn out fine but we can't be reliant on him as the guy to make the difference. How many times have I heard Hughesy saying that we cannot survive scoring only 32 goals as last season. Well we have less than 2 weeks for action. We have to make a good start given our first 6 fixtures !!

Craig Bellamy has been ruled out Wales' World Cup qualifier with England on 3 September because of a thigh injury. Bellamy has been named in the squad for the double-header with England and Poland, but manager John Toshack says the striker will not play in Cardiff. So he may be fit for the game against Bolton. Typical rovers luck shot our load on Bellamy now he's not match fit until at least begin of October. I am worried we need goals from some where. Go and get Benni while we have chance

Saw the game yesterday. The sending off was a disgrace they will be making the game non contact soon !!! Then I read this morning that the ref changes red to yellow. Whats all that about with eleven v eleven newcastle could have got something out of the match. Parker had a good game and emre looks like he can play a bit. If souness can get owen to partner shearer they should have a good season.

Agreed you can only play and beat whats put in front of you. If Lee is out and england go on to win the ashes the record books will not show that the australia had a wretched run of luck with injuries these things happen that is sport. Any sport not just cricket is littered with if onlys .... Lets just be happy with our victory and not sour it by saying it wouldn't have happened if McGrath was playing.

Whats the big fuss it was said over and over again last season that we missed Andy Cole. Again another free transfer which still allows for McCarthy. He still got 12 goals last season and I for one would be glad to see him back. It is obvious there is a great deal of respect between cole and Hughes !! Potential Forward Line from Benni, Cole, Kugi, Dickov, Gallagher. ( I won't include Jansen as I have been waiting 3 yrs for his return to form and I have resigned him to the scrapheap hope I am wrong!!) SouthAussieRover all that sunshine has gone to your head pal !!! Obviously you must have been one of the bandwagon additions to our fanbase to post such cr*p.

Well it gives me something to moan about, but your probably right.... With hindsight, my comments about Parker may have been more suited to the Premiership transfer thread. I was interested to see the "Sack Race" betting, Oscar. I was expecting Graeme Souness to be among the Top 3 favourites to get the boot first in the Premiership. I was rather surprised to learn that with William Hills, Souness is only the joint 6th favourite to get the sack first, at 12/1. I certainly think that Souey is more likely to get the push before Alan Curbishley at Charlton, for example, who is only 8/1. Curbishley is the third longest serving manager in Britain after Dario Gradi and Ferguson. Alan's been in charge at the Valley since 1991. He seems to have a supportive Chairman, he's on a long contract at the club, and generally has quite a good relationship with the supporters - who appreciate the job that he's done for them over the last 14 years. The only circumstances that I could see Curbishley getting the sack would be if Charlton got off to a horrendous start, being around the bottom of the table near Christmas, and the Charlton fans started to get on Curbishley's back - leading to the chairman panicking about their Premiership status. Otherwise, provided Charlton don't get off to a dreadful start, I think that Curbishley's job is reasonably safe. The three favourites to get the sack first are Chris Coleman (who came under pressure last season, admitting that his job might be under threat from Chairman Mo) , Alain Perrin (Some Portsmouth fans are not entirely sure about the Frenchman's credentials) and Alan Pardew (Despite promotion via the play-offs, Hammers fans may get on Pardew's back if the club doesn't get off to a decent start in the Premiership.) Here is the full list of betting odds. (Courtesy of William Hills.) First Premiership manager to leave: 7/1 Chris Coleman, Alain Perrin, Alan Pardew. 8/1 Alan Curbishley 9/1 Bryan Robson 12/1 Graeme Souness, Paul Jewell, Mick McCarthy. 14/1 Sir Alex Ferguson, Steve McClaren, David O'Leary. 16/1 Rafa Benitez,. 20/1 Mark Hughes, Steve Bruce, Martin Jol. 25/1 David Moyes, Stuart Pearce. 33/1 Sam Allardyce (On a very long contract at Bolton.) 66/1 Arsene Wenger 100/1 Jose Mourinho. 40/1 - No Premiership manager to go before the end of 2005/6 season. 324787[/snapback] Rafa for me when he disappears to Real Madrid taking Gerrard with him before the season starts!!

1.8m springs to mind. Dickov isn't worth 1.8 washers !!!!

[ Give the kids an incentive to move back into the family stand and let the "hardcore" fans retake the BBE and rebuild the atmosphere. Although I am presently exiled away from Ewood. My biggest annoyance with the 'new ewood' stadium is the family stand. We need a family stand with incentives i.e pricing but lets have it moved to Riverside or Lower Jack Walker. On my visits I have to sit in the Darwen end with a scattering of people with only the away fans for entertainment (given our football entertainment this season has been nil) I would much rather prefer and I think many others in the Darwen end would like to sit in the upper tier of the BBE and try and re-create the atomsphere of the old terrace days. Also the drummer etc should be banned it was alright at the beginning for a season or two but now it is such 'old hat' and boring and detracts from the atomsphere as all we sing now is 'get into them' to the beat of the drum. c'mon give me strength.

L Neill 59 M Pedersen 60 A Todd 61 Bookings on the BBC a mad few minutes. At least it keeps our reputation in tact.

You want to try listening to the overseas commentary I had to endure. Gary Bloom was his name I am sure he was sat there in an Arsenal top calling for rovers players to be sent off, continually knocking the way we play and making derisory comments about the fact that we couldn't sell our allocation. At one point he said the cynics amongst us think that should they get to the final blackburn wouldn't sell their allocation. He also said that blackburn have only come to stop arsenal playing their magnificent football. Who is this guy ? I wanted to rip his head off. Did any other US based rovers fans feel the same way ? or was it just me.

Forgetting the relation between transfer fee and performance the worst player in a rovers shirt is without question Kaba Diawara he was awful. Thankfully we binned him before his months loan was complete.

What is the script with Savage ? He seems to have been out for some time. Prediction Home win of course although I want 4 points from the Soton and Palace home games so a draw in one of them doesn't bother me. Not forgetting we owe soton after robbing 3 vital points from us earlier season with that dubious pen in injury time. We should have had a 9 point cushion with them going into this game. Lets hope the swings and rounabouts scenario rules in rovers favour this time.

Pedersen

Just listening to the Kaiser Chiefs this weekend. What a belting CD well worth a listen.

damn sorry just read the link properly I apologise if this causes offence moderator please remove post link doesn't work anyway.