bob fleming

Maybe it all has something to do with The Barry Ferguson Saga Fife?

Three sides actually. As others have mentioned this really was the pits. The lowest of the low. Nevermind relegation from the Premier League, that didn't even come close somehow. The 3-1 win at Ewood was surely enough this time round we all thought. We missed out the season afterwards as well (Swindon) but to me that didn't seem quite as bad. All of what Scotty said with the addition of leaving Blackburn boulevard at around three in the morning (it was more like seven actually but I can't remember exactly what time it was and it was early) on the official away travel to eventually get to the ground 10 minutes after kick off. We lost. Courtney. Fans on the pitch. Glad All Fecking Over by The Dave Clark Fecking Five. Oh and after sitting on the coaches for three days, waiting to leave and getting grief by the fabulous Palace fans, we eventually set off. An hour later we saw a sign: "Brighton - 30 Miles" - the driver had taken us on the wrong motorway. I appreciate that none of this is your fault Palace John, neither is it Dave Clark's, but there was a set of circumstances and a chain reaction of events that took place that day that I blame Crystal Palace for and always will do. Courtney tried to make amends three years later by awarding us a couple of penalties against Leicester at Wembley when we eventually got promoted. He also retired straight after the game. He knew. Buying Kuqi for £2.5 million is just a start. You've a long way to go.

The Citizens, Blimey! I've not heard them called that for years! Great report Scotty.

We brought Nonda in to replace Kuqi. He's played 18 minutes for BRFC. I agree, he's been a complete disaster. How much longer do we give him? Another 10 minutes? Maybe another 25? Woe is me. BTW - Good post daren.

The "new one" that the refs are picking up on is the shirt pulling in the box. The John Terry penalty was probably just about fair enough but the Zurab penalty yesterday was a disgwace. You'll see this "shirt pulling" in every single game up and down the land, it's just that we're the only team to have two penalties awarded against for it. It's almost as though the refs have been told to clamp down on it and are doing so only against Blackburn Rovers. Whilst we're on this subject am I the only viewer who when watching Match of the Day or Sky Sports and sees a bad tackle go without a booking, thinks "Savage would have been booked for that, no question, in fact he'd have been sent off by now". Similarly when watching fairly innocuous challenges does anyone else think "One of our players whould have received a yellow card for that." Is there anything I can take for this? BTW the way I don't see it as a conspiracy as such, I just think the refs are fed subliminary messages when they meet up at their underground bunker every Tuesday. Posters are probably scattered around the place or on the drive in to the place that state things like "Blue & White is Bad", "Halves are Evil", "Welshmen with Blonde Hair and all Australians must be Punished", and "Hate. Kill. Blackburn" Having said all that I'm also aware that we probably wouldn't be having this discussion had we won yesterday. The defence looks dodgy (centre halves) to say the least and although the Sheff U strikers should have had a field day they shouldn't have had the two penalities. Regards Pananoia Pete

I reckon Pedersen, sorry Gamst, no Morten would give fat Wayne a right good pasting. Even if Morten had had three pints he'd have knocked him all over the "pub" with one arm behind his back and whilst singing one of his "pop" songs. Colleen would have murdered him though. Never mess with a WAG.

Exactly USABlue, no middle ground. Win and we're looking good for the Champions League, lose and it's the end of the century. It'll be a tough game make no mistake, plenty of cards flying around in a bad tempered affair. Talking of affairs Neil Warnock will totally lose his head (44) and suggest a threesome with him, the fourth official and Mickey Gray. Hughesy, ever the professional, will ignore Warnocks blarney until he feels he can take no more and has to defend the honour and reputation of the fourth official. He knocks Warnock clean out, while still sat in his seat of course (56). Rovers to sneak it 2-1. Nonda and MCCarthy. Brian Deane for them.

Who?

I don’t recall anyone laughing spencey, only at the suggestion that you could confuse Dugarry’s face with his arse. No one was condoning Todd’s actions. Some come down of your high horse you “idiot”. It can be difficult trying to read but please take the time, it’s sometimes rewarding.

That's right, he kicked him up the arse, you can you see where the confusion has arisen.

I didn't know you were a hotdog USABlue. Good luck with that then. If it's any consolation, I'll not be having one Meanwhile, Sky Sports teletext thngy says that Michael Ballack is likely to start.

2-1 Rovers.

2-1 Rovers.

OK Kevin, hopefully they'll take that on board. Apologies if I was a little short.

Totally disagree. Should be encouraged when the curcumstances are right. That's a right knees up that site.

You're kidding me? Spurs and Villa actually pay Rovers for advise on their Club Shops?!? How does that work? "Good Morning Mr Spurs, Good Morning Mr Villa. Please take a seat. I understand you want some advise on our club shop? Well, we don't have a club shop anymore, we sold it to Sports World on a ten year contract. We do however have a DVD for sale, but that's only available from our Ticket Office. Thank you for coming, I hope that's helped. Our consultancy fee is £10,000 please. Good day."

He scored a great goal last season from an acute angle, I think it was against Charlton, he also scored a good goal against Wolves in 2003. He's scored 7 league goals in 3 seasons. He's versatile apparently. He's good at running up and down. He's sorted his hair out over the last couple of years and we get to call him Bert instead of Brett. Other than that I'm struggling.

I very much doubt that that has anything to do with it to be honest. We've always had scapegoats let's not forget, even when we were winning the Premiership we had to have one, and he was English. That fact that Emerton is Australian is probably just an added bonus as it annoys you. What do I think? He hasn't done the business has he? Surely there can't be any debate on that. I think he's a bit slow in the footballing brains department. Having said that he is versatile and maybe Hughes has him down for the right back slot? So it's a strange one alright. I don't dislike the fella, far from it, he's a Rovers player after all, I just don't look forward to seeing him play as much as some of the others. Let's see how he gets on, his confidence may be up after the World Cup and Rovers have just showed what they think of him with a new 4 year contract. Maybe a new Bert will emerge next season? Then again.....

[Mr Burns] Excellent [/Mr Burns] Fife, can you get cracking on this? I'll expect the first five chapters, as above (with the exception of Chapter Three - amended to "Don Revies Dirty Leeds and their cheating no good centre half Jack Charlton") on my desk by Monday 9.00am. (BTW - Chapters One and Two will need some padding out, just put some stuff in there about Dougan and Cup Final tickets or something)

Writing a book!? "Blackburn Rovers legend Ronnie Clayton wore the number 4 shirt." There's not enough material for that den. The sequel "Blackburn Rovers legend Bryan Douglas wore the number 7 and number 10 shirts" would flop as well. Florida Rover asked me (obviously thinks I'm clued up or I'm getting on a bit ) but didn't want to start a new thread. Which I'm glad we did as it's been a good read. He's thinking of doing the retro shirt thing. Which is a good idea for the "club shop" really - selling the Toffs shirts but with "CLAYTON" "4" on the back etc etc So, in what year did Rovers first go to 4-4-2?

1-1

OK chaps. Thanks for the info. Som more questions for you old timers / people fortunate enough to have watched a golden era of football, then, 2-3-5 appears to be the formation everyone adopted and was popular with the fans as there was more attacking play. So, who / when / which bright spark came into training one day and said "OK lads, we're not going to play 2-3-5 this weekend, we're going to try a 4-4-2 formation." Who can we blame? Did football change almost overnight? Did things go straight from 2-3-5 (as such) to 4-4-2? How did football fans react to this change? and how did this effect the fortunes of BRFC?

Thanks Al, Jim. Yes, you're right we do need to listen to the guys who were fortunate enough to watch them play and that's why I asked the question; of anyone who saw them play and would therefore know the answer. My powers of deduction tell me that the pi and phone number stuff was just a gag. So in summary: Ronnie Clayton 4. Bryan Douglas 7 (although he did also wear 10 but that was at the end of his playing career). Cheers

That's what I'd originally heard Bryan. Did Duggie have the 0254 number on as well? Clayton was known to hate maths, and for good reason. School kids could really mix it in those days when it came to random pi questions. "Excuse me Mr Clayton, I know you're Captain of England but could you show me a simple method to calculate pi accurately to an arbitrary number of digits?" It wouldn't happen these days of course, which is probably a good thng. Having said all that I think I'll just go with the "4" and "10" answers.

Many thanks for the replies chaps.