Ditto last night. Barely looked a £2million player

I think people are underestimating what it takes for Mowbray to be confident picking someone. Six months after Mowbray landed, Danny Graham himself was sat on the bench as understudy to Nuttall. Brereton has barely been here six weeks. Why isn’t he as good as Graham? Six months ago Graham wasn’t as good as Graham, nor Evans as good as Evans, Nyambe as good as Nyambe. Mowbray’s regime has got the spine of the team playing the best football of their careers, but it took quite a long time. Yes, Dack and Reed were able to step right in, but they are seasoned pros in comparison to Brereton. Too early to call IMO.

Almost as annoying as every thread clogged up with people dissecting what one poster thinks, said, didn’t say.

I thought Smallwood was our best performer in the first half. Swansea’s tactical change did for him and Evans. I also thought Brereton was our most useful forward in the last 15. But then I am going for an eye test this afternoon.

Me too.

Goals definitely change games. If their equalizer had been an inch either side it would’ve been saved or gone out. If Benno has slid that one across the goal, 2-2. Ditto the save from Dack. End of the day we didn’t create enough up front, before and after Graham went off, and all three of their goals came from runs at the middle of our defence, which has dented my positivity to date on Rodwell.

Cruising

Who’s that between Atkins and Newell?

Given we are joint 5th and the only reason we aren’t joint top is that we’ve been shipping soft, late goals, I don’t see compelling evidence we need another striker NOW. Yes, if Graham gets injured, but then if Raya or Mulgrew get injured, we actually need a new keeper and 14-goal centre half.

Effort isn’t optional, but the fitness to deliver our levels of effort over 90 minutes isn’t the norm. Reed has it and has gone into the team, Palmer hasn’t and is getting splinters in his arse - I’m not sure this Chelsea fancy-dan will ever get to the fitness levels required, spent his life strolling around. Personally I’m glad that new signings, no matter how expensive, don’t get handed a shirt based on what they cost or where they came from.

Always had a soft spot for Swansea as many years ago I worked there as a sales rep for Cadbury’s, one of my accounts being a chain of shops owned by ex-Rover Barry Hole and his brothers, “Give us a goal, give us a goal, Barry Hole, Barry Hole!” Also proposed to my wife on Mumbles seafront. Swansea has its rough parts but no worse than Shadsworth. Rovers 2 (Hole, Rogers) Swansea 1 (Toshack)

Excellent win. Very impressed with Rodwell in front of the back 4, Brereton did a good job too. Armstrong alone worked their keeper more than Leeds did Raya, so a well-deserved three points.

Bell and Armstrong dozed off completely for that goal

I would second that. Change the time allotment from 90 mins all in to 60 mins of the ball in play. Gets rid of time wasting and and injury time.

I see the issue as a little more nuanced these days. Firstly, the ground is too big for the catchment area; it’s only been completely full a handful of times in 25-years. If Jack has stuck with the original 23/24k plan on the old footprint of the ground we’d have lost next-to-nothing in income, but gained a much better atmosphere and a bit of a scarcity factor for the big games. One thing that struck me on my matchday visits in the glory days was that the makeup of our crowd was different to pretty much everyone else’s. We seemed to have a lot of extended families, which I suspect was the old core support getting their families interested, while other grounds were much more the usual suspects of lairy lads and fat, angry middle-aged men. So the cost of going - which shot up under Jack - was dependent on too few household budgets. A priority spend when Shearer was banging in hat-tricks against the best but not so much when Venky’s sank the ship. I think we are stuck with a half-full ground for the rest of our days. Whether that is 14,000 or 16,500 makes no difference. It’ll never average 25,000 again.

I thought we looked terrible because we were thoroughly outplayed, not that we were thoroughly outplayed because we were terrible. After we weathered the first half storm I thought we matched them much better till Williams dozed off and let Sharp get in front of him for the goal. Fair play to the Blades, it could’ve been 6.

If it transpired Mowbray had signed him after watching him for half an hour, would that be regarded as ample?

He’ll have moved down the pecking order even more the way he completely screwed up a 2-on-1 in the last few minutes and gifted them the ball

As soon as Dack missed I thought here we go, Boxing Day 1977 all over again, and it bloody was except even more heart-stopping with the penalty. Three well taken goals, two sublime assists from Bennett, an unbelievable save from Raya. 110% effort from everyone. Only disappointment for me was Bell swinging and missing at the back post for their second.

A top 6 performance that half, everyone is playing well.

They very nearly won both the league and the cup in the early 60s when it was Finney and ten others

To my mind, our poor distribution showed the difference in class between the teams. Most players can perform the basics when not under pressure; when we pressed them their passing was crisp, sharp and accurate, when they pressed us in possession we were awful. The rebuilding project still has a long way to go. As an aside, thank God Mogga was able to persuade Graham and Mulgrew to stay. Graham looked real class when he came on, that cushioned header for Dack’s big chance was sublime - good work by the keeper who got a foot to the ball and put Dack off

Biggest point of the season so far. I can’t wait to see Tonyoz’s analysis, a sea of red ink! Whether or not Mogga got it wrong, I can’t recall seeing so many unforced errors across the entire team

Getting to half time still level has been a minor miracle. More than one reason for the mullering IMO: Derby do look good, we are leaving too much space in front of the back 4 - Smallwood should drop back 5 yards - Palmer has zero defensive nous, Conway should’ve been shot for keeping that attack alive, Raya has been a bag of nerves, and Dack hasn’t touched theball for half an hour. Wrong line up but I bet Mogga has never subbed in the half hour mark in his career; that and the bodies on the line defending has kept us in it. I fancy a smash n grab 1-0 win here

Barely