1 minute ago, G Somerset Rover said:

They obviously won’t say as much, but any chance he’s our sacrificial lamb that we’ve been waiting for?

'Family reasons' dontcha know...

23 minutes ago, tomphil said:

Charlie Cheston stepping down.

I presume all the finances might be managed in India now with maybe all bills paid directly from there cutting out the need to money transfer.

Not sure if that's possible or how it would impact their situation over there but no doubt it'll turn to shit anyway.

It would also increase the need for more revenue in Blackburn to cover any shortfall in day to day costs here, more price increases on the horizon.

Well he's been immediately replaced by Matt Wright, so I can't imagine it changes a thing in regards to where the finances are managed.

Already being linked with Celtic.

47 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

Out for the season.

FFS last thing we need is more injury woes just when most players were back. He doesn't set the world on fire but he knows how to find the back of the net and we have issues with depth. A couple more injuries on the flanks and we'd be a bit buggered. I'm not trusting that the likes of JRC and Gally will make it through the rest of the season, and Dolan and Hedges have been known to have the odd problem.

13 minutes ago, roverandout said:

As good as 

I wish I had £18 million of 'nothing' in my bank account.

15 hours ago, martonrover said:

Surely to God, but knowing us we’ll have forgotten to add a clause in the loan deal forbidding him to play against us!

That wouldn't matter in the slightest. Loan players have been forbidden by the rules of the game from playing against their parent club for years now (in England anyway). Although I gather this can be allowed if the parent club expressly permits it in the loan contract. Hopefully even we weren't that stupid.

34 minutes ago, ruggles1995 said:

There going nowhere. We have already dipped our toes into league 1, they did nothing then. I think it will just be further cuts if we did go down. 
I feel similar with those league predictions. 

They didn't have the massive hassle of going to court every time they need to send us funds last time we went down. Further cuts would likely leave us struggling to compete in League One and they may even end up with a League Two side on their books. Surely even Venkys would realise they are less than useless to us if they can't send money. Of course, the latest public message from them is highly discouraging. You can never really predict what they'll do.

I don't know why but I have a funny feeling we sneak a win in this one, and that we'll draw if we don't.

I can't really give a logical reason, it really is just a gut feeling (and I'm rarely one for excess optimism, I prefer balance and logic). Closest I can come to rationale is we have some important players back and fresher legs after the break, 2 full weeks for Eustace to finally implement whatever his preferred approach is (no, I don't rate him yet, but still), we are overdue a win and we've yet to lose against the stronger sides we've faced under Eustace. Maybe it suits his game better.

No, it's not enough to predict a win or draw against a side having a much better season and run of form than us. No, I won't be at all surprised if it's a meek 2-0 defeat instead. But nonetheless, it's what my gut thinks is gonna happen.

57 minutes ago, ruggles1995 said:

I thought he was injured.
Glad to be very wrong on my score predictions. Another draw and I think that's 1 more than most expected!

Glad to be right on mine (well, I said our form suggested a draw or a slim defeat, not the drubbing being predicted by many). I say glad, I'm still not sure if going down would be enough for Venkys to leave considering the financial issues, and my current prediction is we will scrape enough to stay up this season, then go down next season.

On 15/03/2024 at 10:15, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

International call ups are rarely good news. A handy vehicle for managers to tap up players by remote control. “ I see you’re in the international squad for next weeks friendly, have a word with Szmodics will you, see if he fancies a move here next season”. 

I don't think anybody in the Prem would need to find out if he fancied a move there, and if we go down, nobody in the Championship would need to find that out either. Even if we stay up there will be plenty of Championship clubs that will clearly be a better bet for him. The club is also desperate enough to not need much pressure to sell.

Something that is almost always overlooked is Broughton's job is NOT Chief Scout. He isn't in charge of finding players. To quote him:

“It is different at every club and has to be context specific. At Blackburn Rovers the role of Director of Football is to oversee the sporting side of the Club including the six departments: First Team, Academy, Player Recruitment, Analysis, Performance and Medical."

That's quite a lot of areas to oversee at once. I'm sure our Head of Recruitment/Chief Scout, with the other scouts, does the vast majority of busy work identifying players and drawing up lists based on what budget and priorities are given to them. Budgets which have changed repeatedly and made this part of matters very difficult to conduct. I'd expect Broughton's roles in the recruitment process to involve deciding (with the manager) who from the narrowed down lists they still want pursue, and then conducting the negotiations (again very difficult with the rug constantly pulled from under you). But his role is never going to involve personally finding gems, short of being recommended someone by whatever contacts he has, and if the lists presented to him are crap, there might be no gems on them, or only polished ones we can't afford.

All this, combined with the fact the brief is now to find cheap, young, unpolished gems who will take time to polish so can't exactly be judged as failures or successes within 9 months or so, inclines me towards giving him more time before I decide if he's crap or not, though I do have some issues with him. He needs to be replacing scouting staff who aren't up to the task, I'm sure that would come under his remit, but, especially since we are always reluctant to pay staff off and may struggle to afford better staff, he will need to give it time to see if those players develop in order to judge the people who suggested them.

2 hours ago, joey_big_nose said:

Surprised by that? I thought he was very established at that level and playing well for Palace in the Premier League? Is he injured?

What's funny / depressing is Tyler Morton has ben called up despite playing at Hull and being - as anyone can see - a much inferior player. 

EDIT - just looked it up and Adam has never played for the U-21 - just the U-20... wow. Pretty amazing a player can be sold for £20M+ and not even get a U-21 call up. Shows the strength England has now in the youth teams.  Harvey Elliott despite playing a key role for the team at the top of the table still not made his senior debut yet.

I'm not sure it shows the strength of it though if Morton is being called up before Wharton. Just that whoever is selecting the squad is a total fuckwit.

2 hours ago, Sparks Rover said:

Ayari is in a different league to Bucko.....levels

So is Tronstad (is he fit though)

Lol Ayari has had a couple of good games. And some poor ones. He still has a lot to prove. Prefer him if you like, I did say arguably, but levels above him sounds a bit silly for now. Buckley has mostly looked good since he returned. Tronstad isn't fit so I wasn't including him.

18 hours ago, ruggles1995 said:

so what are our cm options for this game? Garrett, ayari and moran? 
Wonder what Scott Wharton or Pickering might be like in cm as a 1 off? Maybe put one of them in there to win headers and win the ball back, and maybe move Oriordan to cb with Hyam, playing 4 at the back.  A bit square pegs in round holes, but not sure Garrett, moran and ayari are that much better, esepcially away from home against a tough boro side. id like some steal in there away from home.

britain oriordan Hyam Christene
dolan  garret pickeringORWharton Sigs
               Smods
                Gallagher

Looks a bit of a mess I know, but just not sure Moran and ayari away from home at a team like boro will do us much good. Feel like we need some defensive minded brains in the centre of the pitch. 

probably get slaughtered for mentioning it, but i think sometimes when your that short and current options arent great, thinking out the box as a one off might just get you out of jail, especially as the only fit options dont look likely of getting a team over the line. 

Have you forgotten about Buckley, or has he picked up an injury? That's a lot of talking about CM options without mentioning probably our best (fit) one.

Just seen that Michalski has only just turned 17 today. Whilst it's great for him to have been on our bench lately and hopefully he's one for the future, it seems pretty damning of our situation that a 16 year old keeper was sat on our bench. Of all the positions, that's the one that matures latest. It's probably the equivalent of having a 14 year old outfield player on the bench 

Hopefully he becomes something special.

2 hours ago, miqaayil said:

Guys this is not about funds leaving india... their instruments are from SBI , State Bank of INDIA and constant Loss in investment which affects the bank and economy. So the gov is suspecting some kind of funneling which is why they ask to put equivalent amount in pledge before sending out more of SBI monies, which they won't ...i'm not a financial forensics expert but from what i understand this is in nutshell , The gov is worried SBI will write it off as bad debt... and they afraid to open books in UK incase of a sale which they must.

If that's true, the irony is that by withholding funding and thereby preventing any effective trading (as players get sold cheaply due to our weak position, we have no chance of ever buying a Szmodics/Armstrong etc again, and inevitably get relegated this or next season, potentially resulting in administration) hugely increases the chances of the SBI having to write it off as a bad debt.

5 minutes ago, Lancaster Rover said:

All schools teach Spanish and/or French from KS2 Y3 onward, so the notion that languages aren't taught in Britain until high school is factually incorrect. The general attitude toward learning languages and the small man mentality vast swathes of the nation has toward Europe is the root of the problem. 

I definitely wasn't taught it until high school. If it's changed, fair enough.

Just now, Theopinionatedone said:

A fan has just told me the venkys have done the honorable thing since being here so...

 

Well now they're incapable of doing 'the honourable thing' so that fan needs to change his mind, get a lobotomy or shut the fuck up.

7 minutes ago, Rogerb said:

Accountants need to be sure the business is a going concern when they sign it off don't see how they can be until the final hearing in August.

That seems strange to me, as I don't see why that matters to an accountant and surely there need to be accounts for the authorities to go over regardless. But I'll take your word for it.

12 minutes ago, Theopinionatedone said:

Worst part is, chant anything anti venkys or anti waggott and either:

A - nobody joins in
B - Our own fans boo you and have a go at you

Most of our fanbase actively deserve this now and have blood on their hands

There's a chance that will change after this latest news. If not, that's their problem, chant it anyway. Fuck those fools, the club is at stake.

2 minutes ago, Devon Rover said:

 

I guess the best case scenario is they find a way to reroute sufficient cash to get through until the summer then sell Smod and Carter to keep the life support electricity running a bit longer?

That's the worst case scenario. The best case scenario is they sell the club. I'd take administration before the scenario above.

14 minutes ago, Rogerb said:

Don't see how the accountants can sign off the accounts at the end of this month.

Those players where rovers have an option to extend their contract for another twelve months this summer can take it that won't be happening.

Didn't think about that. If we can't even offer Dolan the same terms we will lose him on a free rather than getting compensation.

Don't the accounts get signed off if they're accurate and not suspicious, rather than because the club is financially secure going forward?

The only positive contribution Venkys were able to make to this club was to send us funding. If they can't even do that, they're precisely zero use to us, yet still the enormous cancerous liability they've always been. Surely even those who bizarrely wanted them to stay, and even Venkys themselves, must admit that now. They were going to go crawling to the Indian courts every 3 months or so it seems, but by the time the January one is dealt with there'll have been an additional 7 months passed. Utterly unsustainable, and we'd have to sell an Adam Wharton a season just to tread water in the same inadequate way we have been doing for years.

The only chant at Ewood now should be 'we want Venkys out' or variations on the theme.

4 hours ago, OldEwoodBlue said:

Don't be daft. We haven't played anyone, failed to beat anybody and got battered at home to Plymouth Argyle.

We got battered 1-1? Don't be daft yourself.

Failing to beat anyone doesn't mean you're odds on to get beaten by more goals than you've been beaten by so far, when only 2 out of 8 teams have beaten you at all lately (9 if we include Stoke) and a strong Prem team couldn't beat us over 120 minutes. As for haven't played anyone, Newcastle aside, Norwich are 5 points clear of Boro and Cardiff and Preston are tied with them on points. So by that logic, Boro aren't anyone either. We also drew with all 3 of those.

I'm not saying we definitely won't get pasted, absolutely that may happen, but there's nothing daft about pointing out the concrete fact it would be against recent form if it happened. Form suggests a draw or a slim defeat.

4 hours ago, Armchair supporter supremo said:

 I didn't like your tone and think it's just "lazy" of you to simply label British people lazy👍

 

Does that answer your question precious? 

 

Eithervway who actually gives a fuck, whatva boring subject and why did i get involved (more fool me!) 

You had just said British people are shit at learning languages, implying an actual lack of skill. I think saying we can't be bothered to learn them because there isn't as much need is an improvement on that.

I'm also British, so reckon I'm alright to give an opinion on a people I belong to. But you do you.