Have I missed Zulu? I would have thought our resident Twotter would have been fairly prolific this week.

To be fair, he seems a decent sort and was expecting him on here with some Notlob perspective.

thats not right,plenty on here gave ince no chance

ince was slaughtered for bringing men in from lower divisions,please tell me were leeds are :

Why lower yourself to their level?

Waggy, our situation has certainly changed since Summer - we're no longer in a season building/maintaining 7th place, we've now got a fight for our PL status. If Sam had been appointed in Summer then yes, I wouldn't have been overjoyed - partly to do with him being Bolton through and through. But now I think we can both serve purposes for each other - he needs to do well in order to maintain his (recently tarred) reputation and we need to stay up. We can only hope that Sam will be an impact manager and will take us from there in Summer.

I agree with people who say that Bolton played ugly, long-ball football. Well if Chelsea were allowed all their boring 1-0 victories to win the Premier League then I'm sure we can be forgiven for simply grinding out results to stay in the Premier League. We will certainly have to do some fighting, but I think Sam's style of football may surprise in a season or two.

Give him a chance, waggy - we all gave Ince a chance and Sam only deserves the same.

Exactly. Chill out and enjoy survival.

Where is Jay McEveley now, I hear you cry?

Answer: Still being made a fool of by opposition forwards. This is from the Plymouth v Preston match report (Plymouth won 1-0).

"Mackie had the beating of McEveley at will..."

I say it again, McEveley was one of the more defensively hapless left backs we've had in recent years. Anyone who thinks that he is a better player than Andy Taylor or Eddie Nolan, surely, does not have a strong argument. I strongly suspect that within two years time, the latter two will be playing at a higher level than McHeavily.

Blimey! Did Jay spill your pint or summat?

I've drawn a lot of comfort from schadenfreude this nervy summer.

The world's most odious club being made to squirm by The Winker and Spurs, tappers up in chief, squealing like pigs over Keane and Berbatov.

Marvellous

Barton is a disgrace, in no other job could he get away with the things he has done without being sacked.

I dunno about that. There aren't many building sites/groundworking companies where the majority of employees havn't got previous.

If Barton isn't allowed to play football professionally it's down to those of us paying taxes to keep him for the rest of his days. Let him play on.

........as long as it isn't for us.

Nicko reckons Neill is off to Ci'eh. M.E.N.. reported last night that the Aussie clogger was on £60k a week at West Ham . I doubt this mercenary ******* will head to the Beswick circus for a penny less.

Or before he has chance to insult the Hammers fans and google "Man City" enabling him to claim inspiration from Bell, Summerbee, Trautmann and Steve Kinsey.

I still have no idea how we won this match. I was nervous beforehand because Everton were a team on the up at the time following Joe Royle's appointment as manager. We needed to win the match, a draw wasn't good enough.

Any pre-match nerves were quickly dispelled by Chris Sutton's left-footed finish after thirteen seconds. Then Alan Shearer drilled home a free-kick to put us 2-0 up after seven minutes. Stuart pulled a goal back for Everton with a superb chip.

Then Everton proceeded to throw everything at us. They battered us in the 2nd half. Anybody remember that goal-mouth scramble? Hendry trying to head the ball on the floor? Shearer belting the ball into the stands in injury-time? The final-whistle brought a surge of joy and relief to the Rovers support. So many memories - Tim Flowers doing his trade-mark salute to the Rovers supporters following a victory, walking through Stanley Park believing that it was going to be our season. Six weeks later, it was at the other end of Stanley Park where we finally achieved the dream. Jack's dream. Our dream.

We almost made a complete hash of it, but all's well that ends well.

I spent most of that game staring down at my feet!

Sorry to be slightly off topic.

On a similar theme however, the bias against Rovers referred to by Darth Paul seems to replicate itself on the local BBC Radio Lancs.

It's as if they feel they have to over compensate for the fact that we over shadow our neighbours in relative terms of success and therfore feel they are obligated to give more coverage to our rivals.

I also notice a bias generally toward PNE, over and above any shown toward both Rovers and BFC.

Funny how people interpret things differently. I always thought that there was an enclave of Dingles on Darwen Street.

I would agree with you about their Rovers coverage though. They have had journalists like Howard Booth and Guy Havord who have gone on to bigger and better things. They obviously didn't come from the area and with both I felt that they were struggling to mask a dislike of Rovers (Booth in particular).

I dont think it is unreasonable to expect a degree of bias from the local media. With Radio Lancs it's almost as though they resent Rovers being in the Premier League.

As for Gary Hickson - ffs.

Very surprising news about Andy Neild.

I always thought his match reports were quite good, and nowhere near as poor in comparison to Peter White's as people make out.

However I also thought that under him the LT coverage of Rovers generally was far too bland and non controversial to be really interesting. No doubt for reasons Ive already outlined above.

Difficult to give someone a match rating of 3/10 and accuse them of not trying when you might be coming face to face with them at Brockhall on Monday morning!

Nonetheless, I would have thought he was one of the few, if not the only person holding up the Rovers end of things on the LT sportsdesk and If you thought the Rovers coverage left something to be desired under him, god knows what it will be like if the likes of Gavin Gibbon or Gary York get the gig.

Wonder if Suzanne Geldard has been lined up for it?

I dont want impartiality from my local paper. Within reason Rovers matters should be reported on from a Rovers supporters viewpoint, if I want to read how every body including tea lady and turnstyle operators want out I'll buy the tabloid rags.

Is Suzanne Geldard a Rover? I know she covered Stanley a lot for the L.T. but I was under the impression she was six fingered.

I work In Ci'eh territory. They've just forked out £19m for a Brazilian striker. You honestly dont hear that many complaints.

Not a nice thread this.......if you know what I mean.

Yes but the other staff did not. Is he actually a Rovers fan? Certainly the others who contribute articles on the Rovers do not seem to be.

This is irrelevant though...as it appears Neild has actually just now quit as reporter for The Telegraph to take up a position in PR.

Neild quits Premiership and Lancashire Telegraph for PR.

Interestingly on the link there is a picture with the tagline below reading "The Guvner: revealed by Neild"

I believe that is Paul Agnew's (formally L.E.P) company. As the article suggests they have strong ties with Rovers and work closely with the club. It seems an odd move for both parties as Neild has never come accross as a Rovers fan and I think he admitted as much on here about 12 months ago.

This is a big oportunity for the L.T. to restore some credibility with the Rovers support.

Don't think you can compare the two.

Mr Nield works for a local newspaper in which a story gets ready to be printed about 14 hours before its read, as we all know football stories have a habit of changing very quickly.

Mr Nixon works for a national newspaper and has the kindness to put up info on to this site but doesn't have to put out a full page story about Rovers every day.

Maybe we need to invite Nield on here to have his own thread, that way we can have a battle of the journo threads and see who gets the most views.

Andy Nield has been on here, around a year ago I think.

He was defending himself and his employers against some angry punters.

I think it's fairly relevent Simon. Albeit Neill was a lot more considerate toward BRFC.

1. I'm sure that Neill informed Hughes and the club of his intentions and that all parties came to a gentlemans agreement to sell him in Jan. The 'fans' bless em immedietly translated it as disloyalty to Blackburn. The fact that it was by an Aussie obviously never entered their heads.

2. Suppose Ince wants Bentley to stay? Bentley, his agent and the directors will all rem the childish treatment meted out to Neill making any similar option a difficult runner. Forcing a sale in this manner will only result in the club being in a position of backs to the wall with the net result a reduced bargaining chip and a likely reduced transfer fee. And that would be plain STUPID.

Those of us who gave Lucash the stick he deserved are childish?

How does our childishness compare to your reaction to Ince's appointment?

I fancy a go on Colin's Adrian Chiles book. I think Chiles is a bit of a pillock but I've a soft spot for books detailing that level of footie obsession. Fever Pitch is another one (one I'm sure has cropped up on this thread before).

Last night I read the first chapter of Tim Park's A Season With Verona (recommended by Mr Creosote on one of Nicko's threads). If it continues as well as it's started I won't be able to put it down all weekend. Expect a glowing review soon!

I forgrot to mention "The Damned United" by David Peace which I read on my last hol. For those who havn't read it it's a fact based novel based on Brian Clough's ill fated tenure at Leeds in the mid seventies written from the perspective of the man himself.

A real "page turner" as the airport paperback blurbs like to say.

I don't know him but that was Neil Arthur.

As for Warhurst - still injured probably.

I saw Warhurst playing for Barnet at Stanley season before last. Glided through the game at centre half. A real talent who didn't quite fulfil his potential through a combination of injury and imo, a laid back attitude and lack of a mean streak.