Always amazes me that TM rotates regularly, sometimes when, to my mind, he shouldn't, but then we have three games in six days and quite a few players have played in all three. Not the first time he hasn't made changes when they do seem merited (and that's before we get into continuing to play out of form players week in week out, whilst rotating players who do better). I get why the same team is out though, they've done fairly well the last two games, just hope this isn't a game too far for their legs.

You definitely win.

I remember finding a player on an old FM that was called Angel Fux (may have been spelt Fuchs).

Nah not for me. I've considered his ball-winning a weakness until now, due to his light weight, easily knocked off the ball, lacking aggression approach. Now he is applying himself in terms of aggression and being braver, he is winning the ball well too.

Nah I'd say that's a relatively recent development as far as his first team performances go. The last two games in fact. The odd patch aside.

Here we had two players going in for the ball, both having every right to, a 50/50 basically where our man was slightly slower to it. It was facing away from goal, in a fairly innocuous position, and as you say, landed at their lad's feet for a chance anyway, which it wouldn't have done without the contact. Compare that to 2 minutes into the game, BB bearing down on goal with only one defender to stop him, who simply throws his whole body at him, clattering him off the ball and making no real attempt to play it. And that one isn't a pen but the other is? Fuck off ref, you biased bastard.

Well, it's been a long time coming, but Buckley finally had a game. Not a few flashes, or a solid game still speckled with some wtf moments, but an honest to god full performance where he finally showed the majority of us that he can impact games, and that he could be a proper player for us to merit all the hype he has had. Well done John Buckley! Long may it continue. Nobody plays without the odd bum match, and this one swallow doesn't make a summer, but if he can continue in this vein he will be a good player for us. In this game and the one before, his application has been exactly where it needs to be. He looks braver, more committed, more confident, and I think that's made all the difference. Even when he was playing sloppy passes first half against Millwall, his head didn't drop and he kept getting stuck in and wanting the ball until it clicked. Go on lad!

Would have likely been game over at that point.

We have one, he is injured.

Today, yes.

Jesus BB, really has to be finishing that. Chipped it to the wrong side.

Oh look, that stupid kickoff we always do failed again. Shock!

I could perhaps have forgiven that penalty decision if it weren't for his other calls. Bottling the early one for us which was far easier to spot. Letting us get smacked around all half. To give that in light of his other decisions was absolutely unforgivable. Amazing how they get away with it all the time at this level, total fucking buffoons.

Buckley looks like he wants it today. Playing well.

I can see why. He's fucking atrocious. Playing well so far. Dolan is important for us.

There's a ref, I forget who, that never gives Brereton anything. Clearly seen that he dives quite a bit so assumes nearly every fall is a dive rather than calling them on merit. I know other posters have mentioned it before, so although I can't remember the game, anyone know if it's this ref?

I realised last night and had to book an hour and a half off work today. Do we know why there's this weird kickoff time, Sky or something?

Not liking their kit. Almost camoflauged too. Absolute horeshit from the ref, he bottled that because it is early. Then giving two free kicks against us for similar level fouls. Already a prick this bloke.

🙄 I mean, I know the simple answer is no. But since the manager has been banging on about how controlling possession results in success, and unlike most football tactical debates this one can be boiled down to hard numbers instead of opinion, it seemed worth putting those hard numbers down in public. Yes, there is a table which just shows possession per team, and a league table, and you can contrast those as I did in the second post to show possession doesn't always bring success, nor is necessary for success. But I thought it was worth seeing if the data also showed that for us as a team, we specifically do worse when we control possession. Not just that it isn't giving us any advantage, but that it actively makes us worse. Quite frankly, I hope (against hope, of course) that the undeniable facts of the matter find their way back to the coaching setup and the Stubborn One considers tailoring his approach better. If that unlikely scenario did happen, it would be more than worth the half hour or so it took to put the data together (I type quickly, all the additional waffle didn't take long). Of course, I'd expect the data analysis team to have already broken this down for the gaffer, if they dare.

I don't believe we can recall players at this point of the season.

Graham was only 1 in 3 for us. Less, actually (57 goals in 191 appearances so one every 3.35 games), but since a bunch were sub appearances later on I'll call it 1 in 3.

The data I've used to put this together. Opponent, percentage of possession we had (51% upwards are bolded to make them easier to differentiate) and the points we gained. I haven't specificed home and away, which tbf might be interesting (for stattos) since teams come to us and shut up shop, and maybe I'll do that at some future juncture if I can be arsed. Bournemouth - 51% 0 points Newcastle (LEAGUE CUP) - 65%, defeat Wycombe - 70%, 3 points (RED) Derby - 37%, 3 points Cardiff - 61%, 1 point (RED) Notts F - 62%, 0 points Watford - 66%, 0 points Coventry - 67%, 3 points (RED) Reading - 66%, 0 points Swansea - 59%, 0 points Boro - 49%, 1 point QPR - 51%, 3 points Luton - 59%, 1 point Preston - 75%, 3 points (RED) Barnsley - 63%, 3 points Millwall - 56%, 3 points Brentford - 32%, 1 point (RED for us) Bristol - 60%, 0 points Norwich - 58%, 0 points Rotherham - 68%, 3 points Stoke - 69%, 0 points Sheff Weds - 72%, 1 point Huddersfield - 49%, 0 points Birmingham - 45%, 3 points Doncaster (FA CUP), 68%, defeat Stoke - 55%, 1 point (RED) Boro - 47%, 3 points Luton - 58%, 3 points QPR - 53%, 0 points Preston - 65%, 0 points Barnsley - 51%, 0 points Forest - 63%, 0 points Watford - 53%, 0 points Coventry - 66%, 1 point (RED) Reading - 68%, 0 points Millwall - 49%, 3 points

Using this site https://www.fctables.com/england/championship/ball-possession/ I've also had a look at our possession stats relative to other sides, for how much merit there is in the notion that you need to control possession to get out of this league. On there, we have the 4th highest possession stats in the league, which clearly does not correlate to our position in the actual table of 15th. There are some sides at the high end on both tables - Norwich top both tables. Watford are 2nd in the real table and 6th on this one. Brentford 4th in the real table, 5th for possession. Reading are 5th in the league, 8th for possession. However Swansea are 3rd in the real table, only 11th for possession, Barnsley are 6th in the league but a lowly 19th for possession, and Cardiff at 8th in the league only rank 21st for possession. Meanwhile, high possession teams doing crap include ourselves, Huddersfield (2nd for possession, languishing in 18th in the real table), Derby 7th for possession, 19th in the league. Again, I'm not saying possession games can't work, there are sides clearly playing it and doing very well. But I think you need both the personnel and the right approach to it to be a success. The high possession teams who are also doing well in the proper table all seem to have a bit of a different class of players to most of the rest of us. And possession clearly isn't the only way to success in this league.

Last season, some time around December 2019 I think (though I can't find it), I posted the data showing that when we had the bigger share of the possession, we actually came away with less points. I suggested this showed our real potency was as a counter-attacking side and that when we tried to control games it didn't work. Since then, we have actively transitioned to base our whole game around keeping possession. The manager has actively talked about this, and recently has talked about how all the best teams and those which go up are possession teams. With this in mind, I thought it was time to parse over the data again and see whether he is right, that controlling possession helps us, or if my instinctive observation is correct that it is actually hampering results. Possession data was taken from Google (type Blackburn Rovers in Google, then click matches, then select any given match to see stats). I appreciate the data might show differently via other sources, but this was the simplest way for me to put it together. It's for this season only, and does NOT include the two cup games (defeat to Newcastle when we had 65% possession and defeat to Doncaster with us on 68% possession), as I'm looking for points per game, but if these were included it would only look worse. I've done points per game to 3 decimal places, rounding up if the 4th decimal was a 5 or above. I'll post a full breakdown of opponents, possession and points in another post here after, if anyone wants to cross-check the data I used, pick out interesting outcomes, etc. When we have 51% possession or more Games: 27 Points: 29 Points per game (PPG): 1.074 When we have 50% or less (note - all were 49 or lower) Games: 7 Points: 14 PPG: 2 This is an admittedly small sample for less than 50%, as we have frequently controlled possession (which in itself given our league position shows that possession doesn't equal points). However, in just 7 games we took nearly half the points we took in 27 games. Nearly a third of our total points in just 7 games. Nearly double the points per game. It's also worth noting that in our only defeat in those 7 we still had 49% possession, the higher end of this bracket, nearly an even split. One of those 7 games where we only got a point involved us losing a man to a red card. Meanwhile, the 27 games where we had more possession included 6 red cards for the opposition, none for us. 12 points out of those 29 points were gained in the 6 games where we played against 10 men. When we haven't been able to get a man sent off, we have taken 17 points from 21 games when controlling possession. Which is 0.81 points per game (which by the way if extrapolated would be just over 37 points from a season). Alright, but what about degrees of possession? After all, there's not much in it between us having 51% or 49%. So I broke it down into roughly 10% sections for the main sample size of 51% or over. When we have 50-59% possession Games: 11 Points: 11 PPG: 1 When we have 60-69% possession Games: 13 Points: 11 PPG: 0.846 When we have 70% or more possession Games: 3 Points: 7 PPG: 2.333 OK, so some better news for possession fans here, in a way. Although when we have 60+ we actually do worse than 50+, which once more affirms the more possession we have the worse we do, when we absolutely DOMINATE possession at 70 upwards, we come away with a terrific return. A few problems there though. 1) 6 of those points came in the 2 games where the opposition had someone sent off. The other game was just a draw. 2) It's a very, very small sample this time. 3) You can't go in with a gameplan of 70% possession every week, it won't happen. I'd say the data pretty heavily confirms, along with our eyes and our league position using this style, that basing our play on keeping possession rather than going for the throat doesn't work for us. I'm not saying possession games can't be successful, they absolutely can. I'm saying it doesn't work for us, with this team, under this manager. I feel we are more dangerous on the counter attack, as well as more susceptible against a counter attack. Last season's data told a similar story when I gathered it, and although I didn't finish last season's, anecdotally I'd say it appeared to be a continuation of the same pattern, as I did keep an eye on it. I think this has been going on long enough now that the coaching team need to be reconsidering their approach. With all the data analysis staff and facilities these days, this persistent failure of our possession game has surely come to their attention by now. If I've made an error with any of the data here, feel free to correct me.

I'm picking a side...the sidelines. Don't rate Buckley at this time, and Whiteman clearly isn't coming here any time so couldn't give a hairy shit about him.