It's not my job - thankfully - because its unenviable for whoever has to do it.

Priority List - Keeper: Pears & Leo both shown they're incapable at different periods. Leo will likely stay and develop as No2, can't see Pears ego letting him stay as No2. Sell Pears, buy a No1. RB: We only have one right back. Brittain needs competition. CB: Don't want either Koumetio or McFadz and we need five CBs in the squad. Carter, Hyam, NEW, Wharton, ORoirdon. LB: Pickering is our only left back. If possible I'd sign Christene, I think he's significantly better than Pickering. CM: Existing viable options are Tronstad, JRC, Buckley. Will Travis come back? Based on what we've seen it'll either be Tronstad or Travis, will Travis accept that? Will Buckley ever come good? I don't want: Fleck, Garrett or Ayari. That means I need at least one creative CM with another needed if Travis doesn't want to stay. Wide Players: Unlike others, I've been really impressed with Sigurdsson. He didn't have a pre-season and clearly signed for JDT who was subsequently forced out. I like Dolan, he can be frustrating but he's capable. Hedges is a very good player to keep within the squad. I make that three players and ideally want four. Hopefully Markanday is sold, he's shown glimpses but in the most part has been terrible. Strikers: Szmodics is obviously vital to our club. Gallagher should be sold in the summer - he has his positives but his contract is running out, he clearly wanted the Ipswich move and he's never achieved stats to back up what we paid for him initially nor his high contract. Telalovic and Vale need to be sold, frankly I'd be fine seeing both released on a free. I therefore think across signings, loans and promotions we need to fill the below, colour coded as 'green = must be experienced and permanent, yellow = could be a short term loan with a buy option, red = could be a young player either purchased or promoted'. No1 Keeper A CB that is fighting to be our third behind Carter and Hyam A right back that can push Brittain A left back that is better than Pickering A creative CM that is tall, strong and can create chances. A tackling CM in the mould of Tronstad if Travis leaves At least one wide forward who's at least as good as what we already have A first choice no9 striker to replace Gallagher A back up striker that is actually viable to replace Telalovic and Vale. That's 5 expensive, first choice purchases or free transfers. 3 top-flight loan players 1 cheap player - either a free transfer or internal promotion. Leaving the squad as: New Keeper, Wahlsted, 3rd Choice Keeper Brittain, New Carter, Hyam, New, Wharton, ORoirdon New, Pickering JRC, Tronstad, Buckley, Travis, New Sigurdsson, Dolan, Hedges, New Szmodics, New, New I make that 23 players, so we're allowed another two plus youth I believe? Youth can be: Leonard, Batty, Gent, Barnes, Gilsnan, Fyles, Eastham, Gamble, Finneran.

McGuire - minimum 2.5M Sibley - is U22 so will have a fee Millar - minimum 4M given successes at PNE Burrows - likely going up with Peterborough - captain? Dembele - like the idea, not sure 800K does it though Kamara - suspect first team at Norwich who have more money than us. I reckon your list, if at all possible, would be closer to 20M. Can't see us spending anything like that.

Because JRC has played his best football for us as a right back, Buckley has never quite managed to do what he teased he might and Garrett is not good enough.

Whilst all of this makes sense, our approach is certainly the easy route.

And unfortunately no matter how good willed it is, it won't happen because its far too ambitious for a man who's sole job is to deliver the bare minimum without rocking the boat.

Former scout Bruno Reis speaks about outgoing finance Director Mike Cheston.

Total guesswork, but his salary changes year on year so my assumption would be his salary is dictated by success on and off the pitch i.e. its gone up this period because our commercial income increased and we finished 7th in the league. It wouldn't surprise me if some of the increase was down to Venky's paying more for sponsorship to help invest money into the club, which is bonkers.

I dream of seeing @ABBEY wearing BRFCS merch.

Its vitally important we stop this mindset of selling our best players is fine because there's always a ready to go replacement in the U21s. It might have happened before but relying on it is so, so dangerous.

Give away another, give away another..!

Looking forward to the Trust's AGM. Would be great to clarification on whether this is "Q&A" or listen to Waggott and Eustace, then move on to Trust business without them?

Clearly a man that didn’t listen to the BRFCS pod with an exclusive comment from Adam where he said he would always be a Rover and would be back some day!

I reckon he’ll turn out to be the greatest ever Rovers graduate.

We’re fucking sick of doing Waggott’s job for him, quite frankly.

Sunderland 1 - 0 Rovers Bradley Dack, 93’

So interesting reading this thread and arguments over who’s most at fault. Here’s my thoughts: I think this club can be successful whilst Venkys own us. I’d rather they didn’t own us, I’d celebrate them selling us, but realistically if they just shut up, sent us money and kept their noses out we could still find success. I think Gregg Broughton is doing a pretty decent job considering the parameters he has to work within, which have essentially been almost-impossible. For me, the biggest problem at Rovers is Steve Waggott. He’s out of touch, ambitionless and happy to accept mediocrity. But the biggest problem is he’s a short term thinker. The shambles that Venkys have created is going to take a medium/long term plan to turn around and every single decision I’ve seen Waggott make is kicking the can down the road. Waggott’s age and “I’ll retire if the owners ask me” attitude mean by default he isn’t the man for the job because he hasn’t got the longevity to oversee it. Ewood is falling down, we need a CEO that demands investment from the owners outside of FFP. The match day experience is dreadful, we need a CEO that understands the modern day fan. The ticket pricing is robbery, we need a CEO that understands the local area. The team is desperately underfunded, we need a CEO that can generate more income for FFP and once that is generated, demand an increase of money from the owners. The training ground is not ours, we need a CEO that can use our money to buy it back as cheap as possible - use the Wharton money if you have to. The standards around the club are ‘think small’, we need a CEO that can bring back Jack Walkers mantra of “Think Big”.

Yes, Waggott said that once we had sold Wharton we where running out of time to get a replacement in, he knew Fleck from a previous life and arranged the transfer to strengthen us. There was zero mention of any involvement from GB or John Eustace.

When I listened to Elliott Jackson's podcast with GB I thought he made it very clear - without actually saying it - that he felt someone has failed at their job for the McGuire case and the repercussions for that where still ongoing. It wouldn't surprise me if someone was serving their notice or there was an internal HR case underway. He also took accountability for the Brierley and LOB transfers and talked through the changes made to ensure it didn't happen again. Ennis didn't end up costing us much after a sale to Stoke - it was a risk free transfer. Fleck was a Waggott transfer - he told me that himself. He knew him from previous clubs, rung Sheff Utd and said would they release him on a free as he wasn't getting a game, they agreed and we took over his 6 month contract. Thats 20K / week until the end of the season we won't see anything out of. Hirst has shown he can play at this level, he's Ipswich's main striker (pre injury and Hirst being signed). Telalovic - well, what do you expect when we can't pay a fee and have hardly any money for wages? Wahlsted being the stand out failure so far, but he's young and still adapting.

I think the absolute polar opposite. He's one of the few down there with any credibility IMO and has been dealt an impossible job by the incompetence of the people above him and our ownerships legal issues. We need a young and ambitious CEO who's willing to tear the script up and do things differently, because what we're doing now does not work. Not enough fans in the stadium, not enough excitement about the team, not enough ambition full stop and constant short term thinking.

Would be a tremendous signing for them and a good move for Sammy. Can't see him making a PL player, especially at 28, so top flight Scotland is a safe step up. Don't know how much money they have, suspect it would take 10-12M to get him.

I don't think our midfield can compete - i'd be tempted to go back to the 3412 / 5212 from before Middlesborough personally. 3412 when attacking: Pears Carter Hyam Wharton Brittain JRC Tronstad Christene Szmodics Gally Dolan 5212 when defending: Pears Brittain Carter Hyam Wharton Christene JRC Tronstad Szmodics Gally Dolan

This isn’t the case. Each time we played him his buyout figure increased. But we where coming to the end of a season where a top six finish was possible, so JDT told Waggott he wasn’t willing to play a 17 year old over his established centre backs.

This really evidences how utterly shite we have been at loans. The majority of successful clubs in this league has 2/3 really quality loan players on their first teams.

Tried this on Twitter yesterday. All you get back is fans explaining how Ipswich get 28,000 fans, have a much bigger catchment area and are a much more exciting proposition to investors. When you try and rationalise that with: They had ~15K fans prior to their turnaround in fortunes due to good management and ownership A lot of the land around them is farm land, it’s not full of houses with families. The North West is the hot bed for the countries football. They can’t give you any rationale explanation and end up insulting you. Our fan base is completely brainwashed into thinking this is all normal and there’s no other way out. Which is exactly why any protests will fail, sadly.