This is a big game for Liverpool. The pressure is on and they are desperate for a result. With only three wins and already three defeats this season they are heavily reliant on their home form to get them anywhere near their expected champions league qualifying spot. The reality is that their away form has been abysmal – one draw and three defeats and their draw only coming with the benefit of the “big” teams getting favourable decisions from referees. This puts more and more pressure onto producing their results at home. I’ve read that Kuyt and Sisoko are out. The first one is a blow but the second one is crucial to their ability to control the midfield. If we can restrict them to only one goal then this game is winnable. If the defence can hold out this will frustrate Liverpool and make their support anxious. The longer we can hold them the more we’ll come into the game and with Pederson, Nonda, McCarthy and Bentley the goals can come from any part of the forward line. Liverpool 1 Rovers 2 Which team are heading for a champions league place?

Talking of gaps take a look at the following on transfer fees receivable in respect of the 2003-04 season £'000 28,589 Cost of disposals (19,518) Amount amortised -------- 9,071 Net book value of players sold 7,668 Profit on Sales -------- 16,739 Proceeds of Player Sales Principle sales that season - Damien Duff, David Dunn, Keith Gillespie, Craig Hignett, John Curtis, Sebastian Peltzer, Corrado Grabbi, Martin Taylor, Alan Mahon, Nils Johansson, Dwight Yorke and Andrew Cole. Just taking the first two on the list I thought we received £15.5m and £5.5m for them alone. OK I might have got one or two of the list in the wrong year and there may have been one or two golden goodbye payments but the figures above taken from Rovers own accounts do not stack up or we paid an absolute fortune to agents Can anyone tell me where I've gone wrong in my calculation or where the missing millions have gone to?

Brett can be summed up as the most frustrating player at the club. He's got the physical attributes to be a great player. Height, physique, football talent and pace. He's had the opportunity, being consistently picked by Souness even though he turned in performances that were by and large, average at best. He's not been so favoured by Hughes but even when the opportunities have presented themselves he hasn't turned in the level of performance that would make him an automatic choice for the team. Why are the majority of fans so negative. It's because he's wasting his talent and therefore our time. Playing wide right he should be consistently taking on the fullback. getting to the bye-line and supplying a stream of crosses for forwards to capitalise on. Each and every time he gets the chance he chooses to cut inside. Playing right midfield or full-back he never gives the impression that he is able to stop the opposition going past him. He can't tackle but does occasionally dangle a foot in the direction of the ball that's under the control of an opponent. If Bert at full back is a serious proposition then all I can say is bring back Matteo because at least he can defend ( and come to think of it he will probably be better going forward as well) A "Bert" with close control, going past defenders and supplying crosses to Roberts, McCarthy or even Kuqi - In my dreams

I don't know whether this is the right forum but I've finally unearthed some scrap- books from the attic and copied out some reports of my hero in days of old when knights were bold. This man was THE reason why I became a Rovers supporter. At times in the seventies and eighties he had alot to answer for. Read and enjoy.......... Such a genius, this man Bryan Douglas By Leslie Duxbury: Blackburn 3 (0) Liverpool 2 (2) What a man is little Bryan Douglas! Show me another inside forward in England who can breach a concrete defence with a feint of hip or shoulder and open a gap in which you could put a cannon-ball Twice as though warming up, Douglas swayed towards a watchful wall of red shirts. Twice he “willed” the holes for first Byrom and then McEvoy to go very near scoring. Then in the 46th minute he repeated his hypnotic act – the approach, the pause , the destruction with a shimmy – and there was young Byrom slashing his first League goal as centre forward and as we were soon to see tearing the heart out of the Merseysiders. Liverpool could not match the star quality of Douglas. Thompson tried, but somehow his legs seemed leaden alongside the the older legs of Blackburn’s hero…….. I would have wagered my braces on the champions making a leisurely recovery from Wednesday’s mauling at Leeds Rovers had neither the inspiration of a previous win nor even the confidence of team togetherness after manager Jack Marshall’s brusque shake-up. And my forebodings proved solidly true during a first half of Blackburn mediocrity and Liverpool flashes of genuine power. But I reckoned without the giant talent of Douglas, that mesmeric genius. ____________________________________________________________________ It’s sheer delight, the pure skill of this man Douglas By Leslie Duxbury: Blackburn 3 (2) Leicester 1 (1) The science of Bryan Douglas, Professor of Soccer, never ceases to absorb me. One incident in yet another Douglas-dominated saga demonstrates perfectly the almost contemptuous skill of this man. In the tenth minute he dollied towards the Leicester defence stretched as determined as any military red line across the breadth of the field. Mixed with the City foot soldiers were at least five blue-shirted Rovers irregulars. There was only one perfect pass to be made only one man with a chance to break the Leicester blockade. Douglas leaned casually to his right, punched the ball between two players and there was Ferguson striding free as any bird for the corner flag. It would have been like a beggar refusing the largesse of a king had Ferguson spurned the chance. He did not … his lovely centre curled gently across the goal for McEvoy to plummet between two agonised defenders and head Blackburn’s first. Please Mr Ramsay, tell me of another footballer in England, Scotland or Wales who can reduce the game to such improbable precision. ____________________________________________________________________ Douglas genius wrecks Wolves By Ronald Kennedy: Blackburn 4 (1) Wolves 1 (0) My watch showed exactly 44 minutes when that little stoney-faced fellow, Bryan Douglas, decided that siesta time was over. Before that I had visions of a set of stumps and a bat and ball being produced, so lazy was the soccer. But then Douglas went on to the taming of the Wolves. From the lofty heights of the press seats it was bewildering enough to watch. What it was like at eye-level reception point like the Wolves, I shudder to think. Wolves were utterly, shatteringly, overawed by him. Fangs bared, they sprang snarling at him. They retreated like he had the plague and then massed at the gates to stop him. But Douglas just laughed, and laughed. The first three goals-the four were shared by bubbling Johnny Byrom and sure-footed Andy McEvoy- tumbled off the Douglas assembly line. For marksmen it was just a case of sitting back while the head waiter served it up on a plate.

The post by Roverite just cannot go unchallenged. Tugay was and indeed still is a class act. To mention Koumas as a replacement is a joke. My advice to anyone who has the least interest in BRFC is to get down to Ewood whenever you can for the rest of this season because if he dosen't sign a new deal, it will be a long time before you see a player of that high calibre playing in a blue and white halved shirt. So Sunderland didn't have a midfield eh? Stange that their manager stated that he played the 4-5-1 formation for the first time this season. No forward passes from Tugay eh? Just replay the timing of that pass he made to Reid in the first half. Can you remeber any of our other midfielders playing a ball forward? Who is the player who makes himself available for the ball in virtually every part of the field? Who do the other players choose to pass the ball to when they are in tight situations? OK so occasionally he will make a mistake but his mistake ratio will be far less than any of the other 10 players in the team. He just seems to make more mistakes because he given a far greater percentage of possession than anyone else in the team. Stop complaining and start appreciating while you still can.

The facts of the matter are: We played what was probably the worst opposition in the premier league and got stuffed. The level of creativity in the midfield was poor and with the exception of the Fulham game has been poor all season. The contribution from the "wide" players with the exception of Pederson's in the Fulham game has been negligible all season. Our most consistently creative player game for game has been Neil at full back probably to the detriment of his defensive duties. If we are to change the 4-5-1 system, which I don't think for a moment Mr Hughes will for the next two premiership matches then I suggest 1] Tugay must play to give us some creativity, probably instead of Savage 2] He only plays one "wide" player with one on the bench from Pederson, Reid and Emerton. 3] He plays two out and out forwards being Bellamy and one from Kuqi and Dickov. 4] Jansen is given a free role behind the two forwards. 5] He sticks with the existing defence with Matteo preferred to Gresko and keeps Mokoena in the midfield holding role. 6] The bench will then consist of Enkleman, Savage, Bentley, Todd and one wide player. It's a constructive post and doesn't reflect the degree of ###### offedness I felt having lost 0-3 to a team that was as bad as that on Sunday.

The facts are that Rovers only came into the game when Kuqi and Bentley were introduced with the benefit that Reid could no longer play in the middle and took up a position on the right flank. Bentley looked good because after he'd made a pass he instantly ran into space for a return ball - thinks !! must be something to do with how they train players at Arsenal. Kuqi at least presented some kind of challenge in the air to the Bolton defence which is a good job because previously everything we'd played forward was in the air and asking alot of the 5' 10" Jansen against the 6ft+ Bolton central defenders. The question is why play Jansen if you're not going to play anything on the ground for him to either use his skill or his pace. Perhaps its because in the first half the midfield of Reid and Savage whilst effective defensively hadn't got a clue how to pass the ball forward. Bentley looked good when he came on because anyone would when compared to those two in midfield. As for Emerton I haven't got the time or the energy. Come to think of it neither did he. To say he improved after Bentley came on is boll...ks. He was really cr..p before, afterwards he was just cr..p. Does he have a clause in his contract that means he has to play if he's fit? To be fair to Reid, I thought he had a good game when he went wide right. The defence were good (including Matteo) and Mokowena did the job asked of him which was to cut out the high balls to the Bolton forwards. Overall, entertainment value 3, performance 6 (7 when you consider we did it with 10 men (Emerton doesn't count)