It seemed pretty clear to me watching the replay that he was trying to shoulder barge him a little in frustration, but Van Persil turned into him and so got hit much harder than intended. Not that clever, but understandable, and certainly not worth pursuing further.

I have to admit, all this negative press has spoilt the day a little. I had a wonderful day out yesterday. It was disappointing to lose, but we shaded the first half with some good passing football, and the 3-0 score was because Arsenal were just too savvy once Matteo had gone off and we had to push forward. As someone said above, the highlight, oddly, was when Arsenal scored their second goal, and we belted out "keep the blue flag flying high" with real passion. It brought a tear to my eye. My main impressions of the match were of Arsenal players' tiresome tendency to fall over and yet make miraculous recoveries, but also of some brilliant play by them and two really top class goals, as well as the astonishing quietness of their fans even away from The Library. I brought a couple of closet Arsenal fans with me (sorry!) and they were well impressed with our support and with the Rovers' resilience and had a great time. And yet now I'm supposed to believe that our support was crap and that our players were a disgrace, and even that we were "taunted" by the Arsenal supporters. Erm... I've never seen such vehement bile directed at any club by any reporters. It's a systematic destruction of the team and of the supporters and regardless of the fact that it's nonsense it will inevitably create trouble. I will write to Rob Hughes at the Sunday Times once I've calmed down a little, but what will he care? They know their audience, they chose their story, why do they care about upsetting us? Forever and ever, we'll follow our team....

Peter Devine - that was him. Good point - he was a Rovers player too. He was on the Nick Hancock video with surely the worst ever penalty. He basically tripped up in the run up (on an admittedly sandy-looking pitch) and stubbed the ball about 3 yards.

slimiest - Witschge biggest waste of money - Davies, clearly oddest-looking - Brotherston most toe-curlingly embarassing - McKinnon but there's only one whose lack of prowess has entered the English language, and that's Beeeeeeeeeeamo. I used to get a bit puzzled by the crowd's reaction to Quinn. There again, I also remember people singing "the mighty Quinn", even when he'd headed over from 6 inches out, so it wasn't all bad.

Got my tickets, me, despite previous moaning about the huge cost. So that's me, the wife, the 3 kids, my French cousin and a couple of old mates to swell the ranks. CMON!

Just phoned the ticket office. No family tickets left, no cheap seats, so looking at £45 EACH for me, the wife and the three kids. £225, not including travel, lunch, parking etc. You know what? Screw that.

Am I the only one who's not that bothered by his comments? It's kind of true that we don't have any real derbies - we've played the Dingles 4 times in the whole 20 years I've been supporting the club. Yes, we hate Man Yoo, but everyone does and it's a bit one-sided as a rivalry, and I confess to not really caring very much at all about Bolton. For a player brought up with the intensity of Glasgow rivalries, I can forgive him his comments myself. Ex-Rovers players like Yorke and Witschge (grrr...) have said a lot worse. And if someone tried to convince him that the fixture at the Reebok really was the Big One, you can see why he'd feel a bit let down. As you say, he didn't really cut it in the Premiership, a fact he doesn't deny, and he's off. And it's certainly not enough to make me like Celtic.

Has anyone worked out the justification for the early start? Is it the Grand National or something? What utter sh1te. What the hell is wrong with these people?

da da dadada da da da da da da da dadada da da da da da da da dadada da da da da da woooah Mokoena

Interesting to see Sheringham up there. We all cheered him at his last game for Spurs when he did his lap of honour. I remember the Spurs fans looking at us in astonishment when we joined in the "whoa teddy teddy" song. Still, it's easy to feel magnanimous when you've just won 4-0 away and unexpectedly qualified for Europe.

I do think it's a bit odd to hate someone for being "arrogant". Nothing better than a good bit of arrogance in a player or manager, if you ask me. Still secretly love Cantona. Good effort on coming up with 50 though, even if I might have to share Radagast's (presumably brown) sickbag at all this "traitor to the city of Liverpool" rubbish.

Sorry, I should qualify that (although this is arguably another thread topic) I don't think FIFA and UEFA have done anything like enough to address the proven cases of corruption in recent times. They laugh at suggestions of referee bribery, and yet there have been several well-proven cases of refs at the highest level who were corrupt (Roethlisberger and others). And yet we're supposed to believe that those are isolated cases in the past, even though nothing seems to be done to investigate whether it's more widespread. So to take the last World Cup as an example, everyone laughed at Italy's sour grapes at their blatantly unfair exit, but it wasn't so funny when the same referee, Moreno, was suspended later that year for being found out taking bribes. So with that in mind, I'd like to see more serious attention paid to serious refereeing anomalies. The examples of Meier and Frisk were thrown in there a bit unfairly, so apologies.

Urs Maier, Anders Frisk, Johansson, Blatter and most other foreign refs and administrators who tolerate all but the most blatant corruption at european and international level Roy Keane Lovejoy, McIlvanney, Simon Barnes and all the other self-appointed broadsheet media fools. Especially Barnes. Scotland and all their endless chippy carping - the Burnley of international football Richard Witschge - he joins us, he plays for 1 match and messes up our title charge with a completely disinterested performance at West Ham, then he goes around telling everyone what a crap place Blackburn is. That's a bit more than 5 there. Sorry.

I saw us lose at Turf Moor in 1987, but I suppose that doesn't count (Manx cup). Hurt at the time though. That was the one where Tony Finnigan scored from about 40 yards out and spent the rest of his career trying (and failing) to do it again.

New Wedding Present album, out yesterday. Work of genius. Wifey not too happy with me spending Valentine's locked in the living room with some beer and loud noise, but hey - Leben ist kurz, Kunst ist lang, as Goethe would say.

Another vote for "A Season With Verona" by Tim Parks. Absolutely flipping brilliant. English bloke living in Italy for 20 years, follows Hellas Verona for every match through (without wishing to spoil it for you) a rollercoasting nailbiter of a season in 2000 - 2001. One of the few books I've read twice. Interesting to see how similar much of it is to football here, or at least how it used to be before you could get chucked out and banned for life for not applauding the opposition, and fascinating to see how some of the ancient rivalries and alliances between cities still live on. Clever, gripping and at times pant-wettingly funny - some of the insults they come up with for opposing teams make "the Dingles" seem very reserved. Forza Giallobluuuuu!

My favourite Garner moment was the one he knocked in against Burnley in one of those pre-season Lancashire (Manx, whatever) Cup games, probably 1985. 5 minutes to go, right in front of the Blackburn end, and he stood there with that big daft grin and cheered like he'd just won the World Cup. And I've got a Man City supporting mate who still goes pale when he remembers that 4-0 thrashing he gave them, especially the one he scored from almost the corner flag.