Thanks. Getting the two confused in my mind’s eye.

Proper big club, Villa. Victorian supremacy, European cup winners, the Holte End, traditional kit (ish). I remember when they came down to the third division in Furphy’s time, beat us good and proper at Ewood with more away fans than we’ll see on Saturday. Two cracking 5th round cup games under Kendall, we equalized last minute at Ewood with an OG then went to a packed Villa Park and took the lead, oniy for Tony Morley (I think) to rip us a new one. And then the Steve Archibald 3-2 win was one of my top 10 Ewood games. The excitement of seeing a player like Archibald, a cracking game with cracking goals. My prediction Rovers 3 (Crawford, Kennedy, Archibald) Villa 1 (Withe)

True, but our exceptional team spirit that it supports will win us a lot more

I think he will drop Smallwood when it’s clearly justifiable to the other players that someone else is better. Which means Richie has to fail on the field a few times in succession and one of the new lads has to be burning it up in training and subs appearances. I think we are nearly there on both aspects. Merit has to be seen to be earned and lost with Mowbray IMO.

Given how transparently fair Mowbray is, I’d expect him to restore Williams as Bell hasn’t unequivocally earned the shirt while Williams has been injured.

I’ve been struck by the comparison between Bradley Dack and Dominic Samuel. Dominic spent summer working to improve himself; Bradley spent summer getting fatter. Both have encountered a personal set-back; Dominic bears up stoically and promises to come back fitter and stronger, Bradley snivels in court that he’s terrified of prison. You should be matey, that’s the point. And a pretty boy like that should be doubly terrified - that arse might be good for holding off defenders, but may not fare so well against a 20- stone Neanderthal cellmate.

Here’s an alternate theory: the problem isn’t due to him mixing with the wrong sort, it’s that he is the wrong sort.

Wouldn’t surprise me if the club now employed a minder to physically take him to and oversee the unpaid work after training. I have zero faith he’ll “sort his head out”, he’s got to 24 earning a bomb surrounded by hot women without doing so. Sell in Jan.

Puts turning up in ripped jeans into perspective a little. We are in danger of him being worth nothing soon

Take away the local hero status and the cheeky boy smile and this is just another entitled footballer who thinks rules don’t apply to them and is a blight on society. We’d better get our £20 million in Jan before he gets sent down

Having watched the goals again, rather than blame tactics, subs etc, the fact is that Lenihan was utter cack for their second and third goals, completely at sea for both of them. Who’d be a manager.

Bull Hill also, on a Saturday at 3pm

Didn’t see that second half coming, Ithought they’d buck up. The two stand out disappointments for me were Bell but especially Armstrong; if you are going to always shoot and never pass - 5 times by my count - you need to at least test the keeper. Being greedy is a privilege that has to be earned. Defending was rubbish but, man for man, they were far better players than we came up against last year.

Impressed with Evans and Smallwood so far, getting us lots of the ball and using it well. Both our fullbacks are being left exposed in a regular basis which is a worry. Palmer after poncing about in Chelsea youth teams most of his life needs to learn to graft more. Still fancy us for this, we have subs who can improve things.

At one time or another over the last 18 months many on here wrote off, or wanted dropped: Raya, Nyambe, Evans, Bennett and Graham, so I’m happy to let Mogga call this one.

Venkys could find £20 million down the back of Balaji’s sofa. I think they have the whiff of redemption in Pune, wouldn’t surprise me if we bought someone for £20 million in Jan

I don’t think it’s too happy clappy to observe that the last 12-15 months have been somewhat different to the previous seven years; that Tony Mowbray has nothing whatsoever in common with Steve Kean; that Waggott isn’t Agnew; that Venkys (who visit Ewood as often as the Queen) have done nothing in that time other than send money to be well invested by the best manager since Hughes. Does this erase the previous 7 years? No. Is it logical to think that nothing at all has changed since then? No. The catalyst was clearly the two accountancy consulting firms coming in. That was VERY different, and everything has been different since.

You might have spared us several thousand words of conspiracy theories then.

You weren’t going off actions though, you were going off outcomes and then negatively inferring actions, resources and motivations which all contradicted what the manager was saying, and all turned out to be incorrect. Words are cheap but groundless cynicism is cheaper.

I’m not sure the question applies. Mogga has made it clear his philosophy is horses for courses. And we now seem to have enough decent horses for any course

All this not getting ahead of ourselves, consolidate etc is cobblers, we are going for it! Maybe Mogga told them we have one more year of Dack, Lenihan and Raya, so it’s now or never. Geronimo!!!!

Is this the first time a Joan has scored against us?

Sarcasm, dear boy. Mogga is da man

I assumed they meant the 3,000-year-old mummy of the Egyptian pharaoh who built the Great Pryamid

IFollow have been pretty positive about Caddis, while putting him in the frame for their goal