Bit harsh that LD, sure they've lost 3 on the bounce in the league but they're doing well in Europe.

I like that. I like that a lot. Pin that up somewhere someone. Nice one vyeo. Rovers 2 Manchester United Esq 1. No idea how.

Oooooohhhh!! Listen to him! All laar de daarrr and high and mighty. Just because you've seen the reserves. Well I haven't seen the reserves play for years and years now but I have followed them closely on BRFCS.co.biz.com.uk. If that excludes me from having an opinion then I'm going to report you to the in-transit moderator. Are you actually daring to suggest that my reading a few snippets of match reports on the internet and in the local paper means that I can't form an illconceived opinion?

Duff began playing for Rovers 'A' Team as it was known back then in the Autumn of 1995. Which would have made sense as he'd have just left school and was 16. This differs somewhat to Wikip... sorry, Rover The Moons chain of events and proves that not everything you read on the internet is the truth. Rover The Moon talks a lot of sense. As for Derbyshire and Garner I'd like to back Tris' point up and suggest that they should be in the first XI NOW. Please note that if they ever do make it and become regular first team players I was the one saying that they should have been playing a lot sooner, that I know more than the manager and that basically the whole idea was mine (and not Tris').

Never heard of 'em. At what age was he? 14? It's like saying Rovers bought a player of Langho Juniors or Ozzy St Mary's. I take it you've never actually seen Taylor play then? Which doesn't help your arguement does it. The fact that you've never seen him play and Hughes etc see him on a day to day basis clearly doesn't place you in a better position to make a judgement. Or maybe it does, maybe I'm losing the plot.

Celtic in Ireland?! Didn't play for the Youth team? Wasn't a Youth player? Such a short sentence, so much rubbish. Which is an improvement on the paragraphs you normally churn out. Hopefully Taylor will get his chance at some stage. At the end of the day you've got to go with Hughes and his team though. UEFA qualified coaches all of them. You'd think they'd know when they see a player who is ready to make the step up. In the meantime we'll have to disregard the coaching staff at Rovers and have to listen to a couple of members of this messageboard who get to a game once every blue moon. Out of interest rover6 and Rover The Moon when did you last see Taylor play?

In England as well Alan. Who'd have thought it? Last one to leave turn the light off will you.

Fatigue, injuries, Martin O'Neill. Mickey Gray. I can see no logical reason whatsoever for predicting a Rovers win. So, predictably, I'll predict 2-1 to Rovers. That's my prediction. Peter Withe for them, Chris Thompson with both of ours.

It wasn't last year in the League Cup I can tell you. Very quiet. Filling in the gaps, rebuilding the Riverside in line with the other three stands, unfortunately it isn't going to happen unless one of the Trustees in Jersey (if that's where they really are. ) has one too many and signs off a cheque for us at Christmas. Do we really need a 40,000+ stadium when we can only get 13K for a European match at £15 a pop? I suppose the atmosphere would be better in an echoey sort of way. The Mancs would be happy. The stadium is probably too big anyway at the moment. In an ideal world you could take the top off the Darwen and Blackburn Ends and stick them on the Riverside to create three stands the same height and then the Nuttall Street towering over the rest. Perhaps that was an oversight by Jack in using Grade 1 steel instead of lego.

Full report required please...

Where's Todd?

That's what I heard as well, that's our only chance really. "Cor, it's hot again today isn't it? Thank heavens there's a giant iceburg floating down Bolton Road so I can cool down a bit". The thing I don't understand (apart from Logarithms) is these Greenhouse Gases that are making the hole in the Ozone Layer bigger. Why allow people to have them then? And if people are allowed to have Greenhouses those are the people who should be getting taxed heavily, not me, I don't even have a shed. Anyway it's obvious that Global Warming won't effect those old enough to contrubute to this debate at this moment in time. It's our children and our childrens clildren and our childrens childrens children that will be most effected. I can only see prices of property go up in value in those parts of the world that are traditionally cold. Places like Newcastle and Carlisle will become "boom towns" over night (or at least when it's sunny) so if any of you have anything about you, you start looking at getting a little flat or something there for the sake of future generations.

Agreed. Didn't you say that that last year but it was dismissed on the grounds that it would only confuse Bert? This year, with Bert Mk II, it wouldn't be a problem. Just don't drop the thing that's all I'm saying.

Where do you suggest it should be moved to in Blackburn? Shadsworth? Pleckgate? Mellor? Brownhill? Roe Lee Park? Where abouts in Blackburn should the ground be that'll ensure we get higher gates? How and who is going to fund this utterly pointless exercise? The stadium is a lasting testament to Jack Walker and a constant reminder of his legacy. Three stands are as good as anything in the Prem. Unfortunately The Riverside isn't the best but perhaps that should stay as a reminder of where we've come from and our history (whilst I sit in the Blackburn End ) No offence to people from Worthing near Brighton but they don't half talk a load of pony. *sits back and waits for Lancashire bloody United to get a mention again*

Have a look at yourself will you?! Come on, it’s time to leave the Special Brew alone for a few minutes, you’re not doing yourself any favours with that stuff. So, grab a Supermodel, stick on a Babyshambles CD, take copious amounts of Class A, and let’s delve back to the beginning of the month the Romans used to call “October”. Sunday October 1. Rovers 2 Wigan Athletic 1. Simple Blackburn Beat The Piemen, Wigan say “Not Fair!” Emile Heskey, who has been on the Peter Crouch diet for professional footballers, has a habit of scoring against Rovers and did so again after just two minutes of this category A++++++ local derby. Rovers were a little jaded it would appear following our game in mid week against Salzburg. We equalised on the stroke of half time, David Bentley curling one off after good build up play involving Liverpool’s Lucas Neill and Rovers’ Francis Jeffers. The second half was a different story and Rovers played some of the most attacking football that Ewood has seen for weeks. Both full backs have been given licence to roam it would appear this season. Unfortunately Oh Yeah? was left a little exposed and decided to bring down Emile Heskey, who by now had lost another stone in weight. Penalty to Wigan. Jason Brown, making his debut, pulled off a fine save and then stopped both follow up efforts. That’s four penalties out of five saved this season. This spurred us on. Neill played a simple ball over the top of the Wigan defence. “Offiside! Not fair!” shouted Paul Jewell but McCarthy had the simplest of finishes after great work from Roberts and Kirkland. That’s us up to 9th. More remarkably we’re only five points from the top, how did that happen? Tuesday October 3. The UEFA Cup group stages draw. We’re now old hands at this Europe lark and after recording our second ever victory, confidence was high that we can progress this season. We drew FC Basel and Nancy Lorraine at home. Swiss club FC Basel were formed in 1983, the Rovers connection is there for all to see, they were named after ex-Rovers left back Mick Rathbone. There is nothing even remotely amusing about us playing a French team called Nancy and Lorraine. Nothing at all. The away games are far more interesting. Wisla Krakow of Poland. Could be colourful, as could Feyenoord of Rotherham. I’ll be making the trip for Feyneoord but not Krakow. Three of us setting off Thursday morning at 7.00 from Liverpool, we’ll fly to Leeds and then get the train down to the porn and hash capital of Europe (or was it pie and mash?), Worksop (Travel lodge £45.00). Then it’s the tram up to Rotherham for the game, before getting the hell out of there afterwards. The riots of 1992 when they played Spurs are still fresh in the memory, a lot of Spurs lads still have the scars after they were on the receiving end of a barrage of giant Yorkshire puddings and whippets thrown at them by the home fans. The impressive “Space Age” Feijenoord Stadion, Rotherham Wednesday 4 October. I think it was today, it was around this date, that Rovers announced they would slash prices for the Bolton match on Sunday 22nd. £15 a ticket for anywhere on the ground. A shame that the Telegraph didn’t mention it for two weeks. Those who say that going to Ewood is too expensive surely now have no excuse for missing this one. Although I’m sure they’ll find one soon enough. How’s about “I just can’t be arsed to be honest, I’d rather just slag them off to anyone who’ll listen to me down the pub than actually go to the match. Still if anyone asks when I’m on holiday, I’m a big Rovers fan.” Oh, but I jest. Really the club can do no more. We’ve all been critical in the past and rightly so (£36 for the BBE vs Wigan is not the future in my opinion) but this is superb. This and “The Card” are cracking ideas. Anyway, it could be worse, we could have to watch Steve McLarens England week in week out. They’d be lucky to shift tickets at 10 bob if the performance in Croatia was anything to go buy. Absolutely bobbins. Saturday 14 October. Liverpool 1 Rovers 1. Rovers travelled to Anfield, home to one of the favourites for the league apparently and now UEFA Cup hopefuls, Liverpool. No doubt we were in good spirits, we’d been on a good run. Rovers took the lead through the boy McCarthy who couldn’t miss after the Liverpool defence opened up for him when Dave Bentley crossed from the right. Shock horror some bloke called Bellamy scored the equaliser in the 2nd half with a free header from a corner. Another good performance from Rovers though After the match Sparky Hughes voiced his delight at how Lucas Neill and Bert Mk II are able to play football after spending 24 hours sitting on their arse watching films and listening to music on a plane coming back from International duty after playing for Australia. Thursday 19 October. Wisla Krakow 1 Rovers 2. Ah yes! The magic is back! The ridiculously early kick off time, the inability to get time off work, the cheeky, chirpy Scousers that you work with telling you that we’re one nil down (after you explained that you really didn’t want to know the score as you wanted to watch the match in the evening. They really do have a great sense of humour), the Sky+ box going on the blink so the commentator sounded like a drunk Roy Hodgson, the inept refereeing, the constant diving and theatrics that you’d normally associate with a team from more Mediterranean climes, the fouls on our players that went unpunished, the officials with comedy facial hair, the needless bookings, the racism. The magic of European football! But none of that really mattered did it? (racism and ridiculous facial hair apart) Hurrah!! The 400 odd fans who made the trip witnessed history, we’d finally done it, we’d won away in Europe!! They took the lead through Flukeski with the help of a wicked deflection in the 1st half. We kept at it and by and large played the better football throughout. Bob Savage equalised with a well placed header from a Dave Bentley cross and Dave wrapped it up in the last minute smashing home from the edge of the six yard box after a double save from Unluckyvic. A great start to the group stages, we go top of the group after Feyenoord and Mickey Rathbone only draw. Nancy and Lorraine didn’t play, I can only think that it must have been raining or something and that they didn’t want to get their hair wet. That was our eigth game in an unbeaten run. Friday 20 October. The Lancashire Telegraph promote the Bolton match at last, two days before kick off. Celebrity fans Carl Fogarty, Wayne Hemmingway and Jim Bowen (Mark’s brother) all say what a great offer it is to be able to watch Premier League football for £15. Were they there though? Did anyone see them? More to the point will anyone from the Sports team at the Telegraph be there apart from Andy Neild? Sunday 22 October. Rovers 0 Bolton Wonderers 1. The Entertainers came to town. Every credit to little Sam Allardyce for assembling a team capable of playing such free flowing football. At times some of the Bolton play took the breath away, like a bad asthma attack. Yet despite Bolton’s obvious footballing superiority Rovers managed to keep things pretty close. The only goal of the game was scored by that clown Campo. A free header from a corner. That sounds familiar. Campo: Clown Johnny Slippers (aka Zurab) looked to have scored when his header appeared to be over the line. Rovers also had two harder chances to get something out of the game in the last three minutes. Jason Roberts, on as a sub, was brought down twice in the box. Instead of awarding us a penalty goal the referee made us try and put the ball in the back of the net from twelve yards by kicking it. Harsh in my view and it was asking a lot of our strikers. Sure enough we didn’t score and opted to pass back to their keeper on both occasions. With hindsight that was probably a mistake. But surely even the biggest Rovers fan couldn’t begrudge Bolton the win, they have style and guile, play the game with a smile on their face, never moan to the referee, they have El Hadj Diouf, a manager gracious in victory, a team that never employs dirty tricks such as time wasting from the first minute and they have a purple away strip. Every credit to them. 27,500 people witnessed this festival of football. Tuesday 24 October. More or less recovered from the Bolton defeat. Wednesday 25 October. Rovers 0 Chelsea 2. The League Cup or whatever it’s called these days. Chelsea came, Chelsea won, Chelsea did enough, Chelsea players moaned a bit, Chelsea are a good team. We made a few changes, Jay McEveley played at left back, Stephane Henchoz made his second debut and brought the weather with him. Davey B played in the centre with Th’Axe, Doctor Congo was carried off with a shin injury, The Artist also hobbled off and was replaced by Sergio Peter who played very well I thought, very efficiently (although he clearly lacked a little sense of humour at times). Talking of people from a European country that started a couple of world wars several years ago, that Michael Ballack is a big lad for a German isn’t he? Joe Cole should have been sent off for swinging a punch at our Davey but the referee, noticing that it was Ewood, that the culprit wasn’t Lucas Neill, Andy Todd or Robbie Savage, but England International Joe Cole, decided against it. He also managed to book Davey for not ducking. Anyway, they scored twice, Joe Cole and some other fella. Whatever. Wednesday 25 October. Quarter to ten in the evening. More or less recovered from the Chelsea defeat Sunday 29 October. West Ham United 2 Rovers 1. Pardew’s last stand? Are you having a bubble? Have a butchers, that was never going to happen was it? Pardew must have used his St Louis’ to kick one or two Aris’ into gear before this one. We went to West Ham with them right up to their Gregory in the Eartha. Eight straight defeats,their worst run for 70 years. We lost. It never really happened for us, we missed too many players Lord Edward of Sheringham scored with a free header. Th’axe reminded us, although it wasn’t necessary, why he isn’t a centre half by ducking down behind Sheringham rather than making a challenge (see also Portsmouth). We played well in patches but there was no end product. Another injury as well, Jason Roberts broke his toe and will be out for “months”. (See that there? ‘Toe’, so much easier to spell and shorter to read than metatarsehole). West Ham won a corner after they punched it out, Mullins scored from about six yards and practically unchallenged. Groundhog day. The 92nd minute, Benni lost his man with a great turn, got a shot in and Davey followed up. It was all too late unfortunately. There is obviously a lack of strength in depth and this was probably Mickey Gray’s last game. Hopefully West Ham will move to a new stadium in 2012. Upton Park is clearer cursed. October crashes to a disappointing end. Three straight defeats to go alongside our earlier two wins and a draw in October. The size of our squad, or rather the size of the quality in our squad, is a concern. So, it’s onto November, Villa, ManU, Spurs, Mickey Rathbone and Rotherham. It should be an interesting month. I can guarantee they’ll be fireworks.

2 - 0 Rovers. Benni and Serg.

All but done roversmum, if it wasn't for all the games I'd have had it done a lot sooner this month Damn our success.

He said "I'm English. Or was that a joke?" Ozzie. Anyway, Ray Stewart 76 penalties. As Tyrone pointed out that's complete nonsense isn't it? Surely? He's a sofa now apparently.

Thinking aboit it, it was definitely Ray Stewart. He scored 76 penaties I seem to recall and went on to be a chauffeur. Sorry Speeeeedo - I didn't see your post!

Sent you one of them PM thingys Capt!

That's who I thought it was as well, couldn't remember his name. Good work OJ.

2-1 Rovers. We don't have carpets. ( )

No CAPT, extra time, then pens.

We're in there an all.

2-0 Rovers. Neill and Emerton to suffer a massive bout of jet lag after flying back from Poland. Emerton with the first, picking the ball up in his new right back position he'll beat 5 Trotters in a mazy run up the pitch before slotting one in from 20 yards. Unfortunately he'll be found to have been sleep walking and will never again repeat this amazing feat of football trickery. Savage to score yet again despite breaking his back in seven places against Wisla. Diouf to be sent off after 4 minutes for a premeditated act of just being himself.