and The Guardian the day after Well this put a smile back on few faces in East Lancashire, not least that of Jack Walker onthe day — the club’s 120th an- niversary — that he opened the rebuilt £25 million Ewood Park. Forest’s only possible con-solation for such a drubbing was that this was not their worst defeat. Rovers inflicted that nearly 60 years ago when they won 9—1. Forest had not lost in their 25 Premiership games since February. And, not used to being beaten, let alone stuffed, they had no notion how to stop it, said their man- ager Fraia Clark. Ray Harford, his Rovers counterpart, ‘We were very good on the ball. But when we lost it we hunted in packs to get it back. It was impressive.” Cooper, who had Forest’s only two chances cleared off the line before Blackburn scored, was not the only one feeling dizzy at the end. Even before he went off concussed, after 30 minutes, and before Chettle was sent off and Lee was injured, Forest had been outplayed. Shearer opened the floodgates with the first goal of his hat trick after 19 minutes. Forest face Lyon in the third round of the Uefa Cup at the City Ground tomorrow, with Lee now doubtful but Roy likely to be back. Meanwhile Rovers, down and out in the Champions’ League, are heaing for Moscow; unfortunately for them Bohinen, who has changed their fortunes in recent weeks, adding the spice to their characteristic determination, is ineligible. Shearer’s quick turn and strike, after Newell knocked down Ripley’s cross, gave him his first goal. He laid on the second for Bohinen after 28 minutes, and just after the restart produced a header from Ripley’s corner to make it 3—a. Just after the hour, Chettle was shown a second yellow card and, from the free-kick, Shearer completed his hat-trick. With a quarter of an hour left, another Shearer free-kick was cleared but Bohinen, striding in, beat the devastated Crossley. On 81 minutes Newell bundled in Shearer’s cross for the sixth. And in in- jury time Le Saux hit a stun- ner from 35 yards; it rattled the underside of the bar and, this being Blackburn’s day, dropped in. It was Clark’s worst defeat as a manager. ‘Everything that could go wrong did go wrong,” he said. “I just hope we get home safely. It’s been that sort of day.” SCORERS: Blackburn Rovers: shearer (l9 mln. 55, 67). Bohlnen (20, 75), Newell (51), Le Saux (90), Blackburn Rover: Flowers; kenna, Berg, Hendry, Le sawl, Ripley, Sherwood, Bohillan, Belly, Newell, Shearer. Nottingham Forest: Crossley; Lyltle, cooper (Phillips, So), chellle. Pearce, Stone. Bart,Wimams Haeland, Gemmill Re1e5O: 3 WinIer (Slocklon.on’Fees)m (scanning technology's not quite there yet)

Here's how The Observer reported on the game 19th November 1995: Shearer Leads The Slaughter Alan Combes at Ewood Park Blackburn Rovers 7 Shearer 20 57 68, Bohinen 28 76, Newell 82, Le Saux 89 NottIngham Forest 0 Ate: 27.660 THIS TIME last season, an unbeaten Forest entertained fourth-placed Rovers at the City Ground. Rovers came away 2-0 winners and remained unbeaten until late January, thus establishing the substance of their championship bid. Forest, on the other hand, picked up only two points from the next 18 and fell away from the leaders. Whether this result will hold quite the same significance is pure speculation, but with seven defeats already under their belt, Rovers must have dimmer prospects this time round. The first 15 nondescript minutes could be likened to a pair of heavyweight boxers shuffling testily around the ring. Then Sherwood went narrowly close with a stunning shot from midfield and we knew we were onto something special. No one in Forest’s defence was takingresponsibility when Shearer’s diagonally struck shot hit home In the 20th minute. Bohinen was clearly troubling his former team-mates and within seconds of the first goal only a brilliant defensive header by Pearce momentarily saved Forest. Ripley absorbed Bohinen’s confidence and, combined with Le Saux’s raking balls from the halfway line, the visitors were given a torrid time. Cooper was off when Sherwood took the ball where Gemmill should have been. He found a corridor to Shearer and from his clip-on, Bohinen scored. Phillips came on for the injured Cooper and Haaland moved to the centre of defence where his spurs were to be earned against the resurgent Shearer. Forest clearly needed an early second- half goal and Lee’s slyly-placed tap under Flowers’ advancing body seemed to fit the bill, but Hendry dropped in from nowhere and miraculously cleared. Lee’s legs were mangled beneath the weight of Flowers and on in his place came that occasional winter visitor, the lesser-spotted Silenzi. Referee Winter tried to restore the friendship between Woan and Bohinen; Forest - went into dream mode and Shearer headed a simple goal from Ripley’s corner. The match became increasingly fragmented as Bohinen teased and tortured in equal portions. Stone looked a shadow of his international self and only Gemmills stumbling runs looked likely to produce anything. Chettle’s dismissal as a result of a mistimed rather than an ill-intentioned tackle on Shearer produced a free-kick from which the England striker completed his hat-trick. Forest fell apart; Bohinen snapped up the rebound from -a free-kick before Newall ran the ball past a bemused Crossley after tireless work by Shearer. Pearce went psycho. What Forest needed, their captain plainly felt was a consolation goal and in its pursuit the Forest defence was reckless. But Shearer knew his tricks and organised the wall against a Pearce free-kick brilliantly. It was Forest’s only real chance in the half. Le Saux capped the day with a long- range effort and the only remaining question was whether Bohinen’s joy or Forest’s misery was the greater.

I'd tend to agree with Allen. The figures quoted here are that Jack's brother Fred is worth £500m, if the WT is investing a similar amount in Flybe then there must be billions floating around the secret world of The Walkers. I know that they have fingers in major property development which is not cheap, so perhaps a few millions to keep Rovers going is the equivalent of you or I buying hamster food. I'll try and get the trustees to do a Q & A if we draw The Channel Islands in the Champions League

In Jeddah he's known as Stuart Allah. No, honest.

Cough medicine myself. (cough) I raise my hat to you Mr F

Too true & Arsene had put their thruppenny bits for their bus fares back home in their mittens too. That's why Lehmann was so upset with Savage. He lost his thruppenny bit in that challenge. He had to walk home. BTW if you are aged 40 or younger, ignore this. Don't start that one again. It's been done to death.

Just another quote from the press which I found funny. Keith Pike in The Times I love the use of the word "mittens," far more descriptive than "gloves." Makes them look like Beatrix Potter characters.

This is from The Observer's match report. It made me smile:

Extracts from football365.com Wenger blames Real hangover Saturday February 25 2006 Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger believed his side were feeling a Champions League hangover after slumping to their eighth Premiership away defeat at Blackburn. Norwegian midfielder Morten Gamst Pedersen scored the only goal in the 18th minute after great work by Craig Bellamy, who escaped down the right, shrugged off the challenge of Philippe Senderos on his way to the byline and cut the ball back for a simple tap-in. "Every game you face different kinds of problems. Today we faced a very different way to play the game and we got caught one where Blackburn scored a very good goal,'' he said. "It was difficult to find real fluency because the pitch was difficult and that did not help. "It was important first not to concede a goal but after that, in the second half, we went up a gear and could not score. "I am sad for the players because they gave everything but it was not to happen and we lost another game where we couldn't score away from home.'' In truth Arsenal did have chances to at least equalise - Brad Friedel made one great save from Emmanuel Adebayor in the second half - but none of them fell to top scorer Thierry Henry. That was in part to the excellence of Andy Todd in defence, whose performance helped his side leapfrog Arsenal into fifth place. "We are delighted we have been able to overcome a very established side,'' said manager Mark Hughes, who got his tactics just right. "We have got three points, leapfrogged above them in the Premier League so and all in all I'm very satisfied. "We had opportunities. I thought Arsenal had a reasonable amount of possession over the 90 minutes, probably more than we had in the second half, but Brad had one save to deal with. "Apart from that they never really got behind us and had shots on goal." Apart from that load of tripe, Arsene, you're accepting this one. Apparantly we have leapfrogged Arsenal.

Truely he must be the "Iron Man" at the back. Joking apart, he was great today.

Baris, The last time we were in fifth place was 25th August 2003, but that was just after three games in that season. We dropped pretty quickly afterwards. Now the last time we were in fifth place after a decent amount of games was 31st March 1998 after a home win against Barnsley. Eight years ago. That's right EIGHT YEARS. So I think we all take out hats off to everyone at Rovers, and especially Mark Hughes for moving the horrible sad mess that he took over, into fifth place. A marvellous acheivement. Let's hope we can keep it going. And while everyone is lauding their favourite player today, may I put in a word for Stephen Reid? Not the most skillful player in the world, but does he ever stop running? He must put the fear of God up all opposition players. Well done to the lot of them. Roll on WHL next week.

Arsenal's away record this season is pretty poor Played 13, won 3, drawn 3, lost 7 So it looks like we are in with a chance. Lots of injuries, Gilberto Silva is being slated by the Gooners as no good, & TH is being accused of being disinterested. If we beat Arsenal, & West Ham don't win at home against Everton we'll be in fifth place. I'll need oxygen.

...and four days later we were at Sparta Moscow and the infamous Batty/Le Saux spat, and on the wrong side of a 3-0 hammering. It's a funny old game.....

10th May 1992, first of the two-leg play-off semis, we went on to beat Leicester 1-0 at Wembley I'm glad that others remember that match for the atmosphere, a very strange occasion. It was almost like collective hysteria with the Blackburn End chanting non-stop throughout half time. I don't think that has ever happened since. It must have been just one of those days when everyone was feeling a bit bonkers. Peter White descibed it as "A magnificent game of football...saw Blackburn Rovers supporters transformed from heartbreak to the edge of hysteria with an attacking performance that could only be described as brilliant." Gabbadini 2 mins Johnson 14 Sellars 35 Newall 44 Speedie 66 & 70 Rovers; Mimms; May: Wright; Cowans; Moran (Richardson 56m); Hendry; Price; Atkins; Speedie (Shearer 71m*) ; Newall; Sellars. *Duncan, not Alan.

I've just posted details on the West Ham game post that Den started

Not exactly a match report, but there were some other astonishing scores on that day. Have a look here You'll need to scroll down a bit.

A fairly dull match, it was though both sides had agreed the 2-0 scoreline before KO and then played for it. Just about the only highlight was our second goal where Tugay played an inch-perfect ball from the centre circle to Peter on the left, whose excellent cross was met by Bellamy who put a looping header over and beyond Davies. Three great touches in a really precise move. Tugay was marvellous, another great game, he ran just about everything as a deep midfielder. MGP looked as though he was suffering from something and was rightly subbed. As for Sunderland: it must be depressing for them Mackems. They wee-ed on everyone in their league last season. This one, they are the urinals.

Keeping your options open there with the Wigan crowd I think that City will sell out the Darwen End, they usually do.

Cobbler, I'm sure that other here will be able to tell you a lot more than me but, at the moment, we seem to be off-loading some young players who are doing really well at other clubs: Neil Danns went from us to Colchester and is doing really well there (OK it's a few divisions down) Paul Gallacher is doing OK at Stoke City Jonathon Douglas is doing the business at Leeds. I hope Derbyshire does well for you. I have a soft spot for Northampton due to circumstances lost in the mists of time, I hope he & The Cobblers do well.

Not "supporting" Hughsey, "watching" maybe. They get to see PNE play Brighton & Hove Albion and Crewe Alex. We get to see a 4-3 win v The Red Scum.

24% for me. Being an old git probably knocks some of the excitement out of it all.

Scott Sellars was pretty nippy too.

Newcastle United's search for a new manager ends here

We haven't given him his sobriquet "Rat-Faced Whinger" (RFW) for nothing. The man is nothing but a bad loser who gripes and clutches at anything to excuse a defeat. This goes back years: to the colour of the shirts when they lost at Southampton; rugby was played two weeks previously at the Theatre Of Merchandising; the ref was wrong; the linesman was wrong; the Anfield crowd frighten the ref (if only it happened at Ewood) blah blah blah blah. On and on he goes with his pathetic excuses. The man is becoming a parody of himself. My big grumble is that far too many managers are following suite. Allerdyce is currently running RFW a close second with his non-stop moaning about fouls.

What a decent bloke: my e-mail to him, & his in return below. Makes a change from calling each other rude names +++++++++++++ Adrian, Good win for your lot, seems like you deserved it. Six points above the drop zone now, good luck for the rest of the season. All the best. Over & out Colin +++++++++++ thanks mate. it was just our day I think enjoy the rest of the season. I'm quite big on omens so I'll have to write something for you every time we play you