To be fair, iirc Jack wasn’t a fan of splashing his cash on ageing players either. Wasn’t it the fact that Thomas from Palace was pushing 30 that made Jack refuse to cough up, eventually precipitating Dalgleish throwing in the towel?

To continue the analogy, when you were a 19-yr-old I imagine you might have been apprenticed to a 33-yr-old fully qualified, experienced guy, mostly watching him work but being allowed to fill in here and there at the back end of jobs....

That and their inexplicable failure to use every post to have a go at the opinions of one poster. Good analysis by the opening poster making a strong case that it was their ineptitude more than our brilliance.

I would love to know how Mowbray handled the fallout from the Wigan game. It probably isn’t a coincidence that the two best players yesterday were the oldest and acknowledged leaders in the dressing room. Mowbray went to the men rather than the boys. But not Bennett, who I’d assumed was undroppable. I wonder why he left him out, not that I’m complaining.

On top of all that I thought all three finishes were easy to miss. The first he had no forward momentum and had to hit from a standing position with some power to beat a couple of lunges. For the second, ones off the post are awful as body and feet position need adjusting in a split second. A top class finisher giving a masterclass. I was a bit surprised it was his first hat trick in ten years though.

A bit too much knowing what goes on in Mogga’s mind but I don’t disagree with the thrust of your argument. I saw two different points being proven yesterday: we have been missing a man who knows how to play the wide midfield role, but I don’t think that was a slam dunk case for Chapman-esque wingers. As you point out, Conway didn’t skin the fullback down the outside, but his nous in defending, holding the ball up - I don’t think he hoofed it once - drawing fouls, incisive passing, direct running at the defence and some decent shots was a delight to see. Which was really the point of my tongue-in-cheek comment: the main lesson learnt should be for everyone who had written off Conway and slammed the manager for keeping him around. Conway clearly can still contribute - who knows how often - and I wouldn’t mind another like him, a bit like when Jim Smith’s team had Waggy and Taylor out wide. I totally agree that Armstrong/Palmer etc shoukd either win a place in their preferred positions or work harder on their game till they do. Reed has proved adaptable enough to play a wide-ish midfield role effectively.

What an enjoyable game once I found a stream. I thought the front six all played very well. Every goal came from great movement, running and passing - can’t recall seeing us score four and all be tap-ins at the end of excellent moves. Conway ran the show I thought, plus gave much better support to the dodgy Williams than any of the pretenders yo the LM spot. For all the “wingers on the wing, whodathunkit!” comments, I don’t recall many, if any, demands for Conway to be picked in past weeks... The defence, despite Downing’s good showing, still doesn’t inspire. Nyambe and Williams hoof it far too much and Charlie seems a bit above mucking in and stopping a few with his bollocks - I thought the worldie first SW goal benefited from being given the room to give it a wallop. Lastly, there’s obviously been some good man management from Mowbray to get that performance today. 9th and above two of the teams relegated last year. Crisis - what crisis?

I’d be a bit surprised if Pep’s philosophy was limited to “pass it to a blue shirt”. Those days are as archaic today as 2-3-5 was in our day.

So simple to do well that the average manager lasts barely 18 months.

Agreed. A manager’s goodwill with fans is tenuous at best. I can’t but help think Mulgrew not being allowed to play for Scotland has something to do with this. First time Mowbray has stopped him and I thought the LET quoted on it implied Mulgrew wasn’t at all happy. Maybe the trust and support Mowbray has given to the group has or is being abused. If so, he needs to let them know who is the boss, and do something that shocks the players back to reality. Send Williams to train with the kids - he played like one in the last two games - or out on loan to a shit club. Let them know that while they can eventually get him the sack, he can screw the career of any one of them a lot sooner.

Best news I’ve read on here for weeks.

When I was in BA on business I was taken to see Boca play Newell’s Old Boys at La Bombonera. The policing getting to the ground was like nothing I have ever experienced: riot police, dogs, kettled in groups being passed to the next one when that had cleared. And we were in the expensive seats! Inside the ground, every square inch of steps and walkways was filled with fans who had climbed in and who spent most of the game facing away from the pitch stirring up a chanting that lasted the whole game. When Maradona appeared in his box the place went bonkers. And that was for a standard league game with only 3 points at stake, so God knows what it’s been like in the build up to these two games.

Having just watched the goals again, Williams shares blame for the first, he had no idea the guy who scored was there. And I didn’t realize live that the last goal was a two forwards vs four defenders and it might as well have been a two man breakaway. What a shambles.

Back to the game, there were clearly two major problems: the side picked and a succession of schoolboy defensive errors. But I don’t buy that the latter was caused by the former. Did the formation impede our ability to recover from two soft goals? Unquestionably. As to what Danny Graham brings to the team, I’m beginning to think it’s lot more than hold the ball up. It’s hold the ball up in dangerous areas and unselfishly set Dack up, something none of the others played up front do.

I’ll say!

Haven’t seen such shambolic defending for a long time, ruthlessly exposed today. Maybe our defence always needed Evans and Smallwood in front of them to look any good.

Williams done again just like for their second

Lenihan worries me, committed exactly the same error early in this half and we were only saved by Danny Graham stepping up and intercepting the pull back. Oh wait, maybe it was Charlie Mulgrew.

If it’s permitted to talk about what’s happened on the field, the first goal was nothing to do with who was or wasn’t up front, it was a punt from their keeper that Lenihan over-committed to and didn’t get, leaving a huge gap behind that was ruthlessly exploited from their headed flick on. The second was a pretty good goal after some neat interplay around our box down our left. The most worrying factor was Raya not reacting to either shot, he would normally do a wonder save for at least one of them. Anyway, back to the bickering between people not watching the game...

No. The rest of us prioritise crowd size over crowd income, whereas it’d be somewhat unusual for a CEO of any business to prioritise volume over cash. And if bigger crowds were correlated with winning games and gaining more income that way, Leeds and Newcastle would be perennially top 6 in the Premier League

I think the acid test will be how many turn up to the game after that.

Started off by getting rid of Waggy, which enraged the fans, then all downhill from there

I think we can officially give up on the notion that football isn’t a complete cesspit

What constitutes a legend is far more interesting than dissecting Dunn’s career. Personally I found bigdogs list far too inclusive. Nelsen? Sherwood? I don’t think people will be posting about them in 20-30 years time. Two criteria that spring to mind for me would be i) played a pivotal role in our fortunes, and ii) was our best player for many years. Example of the former would be John MacNamee, here barely a season but will never be forgotten by those who saw him single handedly stop us going into the 4th division. Shearer another. Of the latter, I’d put Garner, Douglas, Tugay etc, players who could and should have been gracing higher stages but turned out at Ewood for years. Personally I wouldn’t find a place for Dunn in either.

The £3 surcharge sounds like a classic case of a business conflating it’s own needs with those of its customers. i have no doubt it must be difficult to not lose money on in-stadium catering: how do you accurately forecast demand by game and then distribute X sku’s across multiple outlets in 4 physically separate stands. But using price to force customers to solve that problem is a management cop out. McDonalds have no idea how many people will show up and what they will order, but they have engineered in flexibility rather than priced people out of dropping in on impulse. The second quoted reason for it - to get peoples’ details so the club can market to them - is far worse: pay an extra £3 so you can get more junk email from the club? Ludicrous. Crowds will never go up much with these attitudes pervading at the club.