Apart from the fact that Yorke has been a big time under achiever I think that his mere presence has been a major negative distraction for Cole.

Think about it, Cole was good until Dwight came and then came the lack of effort the attitude problems and the clear look of not giving a toss. Once it became clear that Yorke was finished at this club Andy's whole game improved, of course this could be attributed to the emergence of Gally and Stead too.

I think the theory has some credibility, Yorke brought down Cole's game and his work ethic and heightened his attitude problems.

Towards the end of the season I thought Andy Cole was doing very well on and off the ball, now if he could just figure out how to beat offside traps better (or the players passing the ball can learn the timing of Andy's runs better) I think we can expect good things from Andy next season.

That's absolute rubbish.

Cole's performance hasn't changed that much, he's played the same way for the majority of the matches since he joined us. It's just that most people remember the sitters missed and not the dragging the defenders away from the central area or holding up the ball etc etc. Yorke's got nothing to do with Cole's performance. The major factor in Yorke's performance is his pace, he doesn't have any. His game used to be about pace and running at defenders, he can't do that anymore, so when he gets the ball, he's more or less standstill which makes it easier for the opposition to regroup. Souness did try Yorke behind the strikers and he did ok but just like Tugay, the options aren't there and so that failed aswell.

I bet the same people who claim that Cole's performance was rubbish when Yorke played can't even figure out who is who when watching the game and do the lazy option which is just claim they both were rubbish, at the end of it.

That Yorke is crap - how did he miss that sitter?

That was Cole

They both are crap then

hahahah

£3m in prize money at stake in this game.

The Rovers cannot do better than 13th after Southampton collected a point last night but with Pompey and Spurs having easy games on Saturday (Boro home and Wolves away), we can expect to slip one or two places if we fail to win and throw away £1m.

Brum could slip two places if they lose but gain two places if they win so the game is worth £2m to them.

With all that cash at stake, it will be a true mark of managerial ability to see if either or both managers can motivate their players to provide sufficient commitment to avoid the sad end of season, nothing to play for, sort of match I expect it will be.

After Newcastle failing to win at Southampton, the game at Anfield will not be the £10m shoot out that Chelsea v Liverpool was last season end (in fact £200m for Chelsea as Abramovich might not have invested had they not come fourth).

The biggest money game this Saturday is Charlton v Southampton with both sides having four places at stake or £2m each.

According to the BBC:

Highest achievable: 13th (Merit payment £4,360,000)

Lowest could finish: 15th (£3,270,000)

Come on Rovers

Some interesting stats:

Birmingham last in the form table (i.e. 6 last games) with no win, 3 draws and 3 losses. Blackburn closer to the top (third I think) with 4 wins and 2 losses.

Dermot Gallagher will be the ref for the game, we've lost all three matches this season when he's been the ref (Villa,Leicester and Chelsea)

Prso was a reserve for Monaco for quite a few seasons prior to this one. He's only played more games this season because their top striker, Nonda has been out but he's starting to regain fitness and has played abit the past few weeks.

Prso is not a prolific striker, the most goals he's scored in one season is 13 - and that was in the french div 2. He's scored 26 goals in 100 matches in the top division for Monaco.

I can see why Sam wanted him, because he has shown that he can play the lone striker role very well and the rumour mongers placed him with AC Milan for the exact same reason however I believe Rangers signed him based on his reputation which has for some reason soared after that fantasy score against Deportivo last year.

But then scoring can't be that hard in Scotland, can it?

Surely Nissa-Short would be more logical?

I'm hoping he would play them aswell.

Reg Todd

Tony Parkes was on SSN and he said that Todd hasn't been released, he still under contract and if he leaves then Rovers would want a fee.

If Todd has been told he can go then why was he in the squad for last week and why is he in the squad for tomorrows game, surely if there's such a problem and Souness is so keen to get rid of him then why is he still in the squad

I wouldn't expect Todd to be on the bench for the Spurs or Brum match even if he's in the 20 man squad. With Short back in contention, it'll be Short-Babbel with Nisse on the bench.

Ok, I got rid of Mahon.

But I'll add

Gordon Greer bought for 200k

Corbett bought for 500k

Curtis bought for 2.25m

Hignett bought for 2.25m

Ostenstad swapped for Davies

Grabbi bought for 6.75m

Pelzer bought for ???

soon Todd bought for 750k

soon Yorke bought for 2m

My point isn't about getting rid of them, most of them weren't going to figure in the team but it's the fact that we had to give them free transfers.

I just hope that we become more sensible when buying players and their wages. A club like Rovers can't afford to be buying players and then selling them for nothing.

What worries me, but hopefully it's slowly changing - is the transfer policy. We seem to releasing all these players for free, meaning that we're actually paying an agent to help flog them off our wage bill. I sincerely hope that our next few buys are players on the right side of the 30s and good enough -whom will command a fee when sold and not just released on a free transfer.

I don't think I recall any other Premiership club buying (not Bosman deal) players and then releasing them for free as many times as we have.

Of the top of my head:

Curtis

Hignett

Mahon

Ostenstad

Grabbi

soon Todd

soon Yorke

feel free to add to the list

Think you'll find that we had been watching Stead since last Season (inc Souness I think) so it wasn't a bolt out of the blue.

Think? I posted this on here before we signed him, and mentioned since Souness had had him watched for quite a while, so the likelihood is we would have ended up getting Stead (probably at the end of the season) regardless of the Mcbride situation.

Didn't he say last week, that he didn't watch Stead live, just saw him on tapes after he was recommended by his scout/source/etc.

Whatever your opinions of Souness, or whatever opinions you have about the individual stories I've mentioned above, what can't be denied is that none of this is good news for Blackburn Rovers FC.

I've said it before, the Rovers PR is non existent, all we hear is the bad stuff. Anytime Rovers is mentioned in the news is when there's been a bust up etc. Rovers need to start sending out some good stories or the decline in ST sales will suffer once again. If they don't have money to hire some PR staff, just have a look at Bolton and see what they've done.

I think it's hard to predict what McBride might have done for us but with the beauty of hindsight we can all thank god that Stead did the job.

What puzzles me is why we went for Stead. McBride was the type of player (strong in the air, can hold the ball and score a few) Rovers has cried for seasons and we nearly got one during the Hodgson era in Dublin but ended up with Blake. Souness saw this and went for McBride, so he turned us down but why did he then switch attention to a player he never saw and is clearly not the type he wanted. It seems to me that he was so down by the whole saga and desperate for a new striker he would have taken anyone but luckily it ended well.

oh A and C, I, see??????????

sorry I meant A and B.

Glad you can see tho.

It's a shame. Both, his attitude at the Leeds game and him told he can leave. He was brought in as a squad player and he did his job well this season and a handful of matches last season. I'm sure he'll have a few Prem clubs offering him a contract.

However on the bright side this means that Souness:

A: has finally realised that Nisse is a more than adequate central defender

B: is close to signing a central defender

C: A and C

I used to like Alan Smith. That was until Friedel saved a penalty from him at Ewood. After the game I thought it'd be funny to wind him up, so when he was getting on the team coach, I told him that was the worst penalty i'd ever seen. He then basically said if there wasn't a barrier between us he'd batter me. I won't repeat exactly what he said or I'll get banned from here. Then he through some kids pen at me like a big girl. Absolute idiot.

The same could be said about you.

Can Someone please tell me what bolton have to offer that we don't??? it's crazy does sam put vallium or some other drug in the tea over there. Rivaldo could go to japan, saudi arabia or usa on more than triple what he'll get at bolton. Has bolton changed alot since i was last there???

The word is that he will be getting around 100k a week, around £5m a year. I'm sure he'll get help with a car, house, a few girls and a few players in the club that can speak his language.

What more would he want at his age? Oh I almost forgot, he gets to play aswell.

Superstella- There's no confirmation of a press conference at the Reebok today anywhere.

Peter Harrison, his UK agent was on SSN earlier and he was abit coy, he was determined to say that he hasn't spoken to anyone else - he must have said it more than a couple of times- which means that he might be hoping that a bigger club comes in for him.

It's abit of a riddle this one. Okocha was still playing when they got him however Rivaldo hasn't played much since the start of the season and the season before he started only 16 matches for AC Milan. So in playing terms, this signing could either be a Djorkaeff or a Jardel. The premiership being a league that's getting stronger for every season, it won't be easy playing without having played for so long and with his age, this could be tricky but the Reebok is a small pitch which could mean easier to adapt than playing in Nou Camp which is one of the largest, if not THE.

But off the field, this could be a huge coup. A huge coup for a club outside the top 4 as this would attract more attention and attendance. Now if Bolton were playing in a semi full stadium like Ewood, they would fill it but they're already playing in almost full stadium this season so not sure if it would increase the attendance as much as but this signing would definitely soften a raise in ST prices and matchday tickets.

Also in terms of attracting players to the club, a signing of this magnitude would mean a cutting edge when looking for new signings over clubs like ourselves and the rest of the outside the top 6.

PR is invaluable to a small club, which is something our club hasn't realised and something Bolton have.

Every Year a clubs Xmas party always gets out of hand, this year it's Celtic's turn to to make the headlines after 3 of there players arrested during a incident in the North East.

About 3 weeks ago I was reading a article about which premiership clubs were having a xmas party I think about 4 clubs which included Rovers were not having one, although last week I read there was a get together at Flitty's house, maybe that is the best way to do rather than go round a city centre , get reconised and then get rather offended when somebody takes your picture

Rovers did have a xmas party at a club (Tiger Tiger) in Manchester earlier this month. It was reported in the LET

Just thought you may be interested in the view of a Vigo fan last night -

What the Spanish are saying about us

Celtic have showed solidarity with the people of Vigo making a donation of £5000 to the disaster caused by the collapse of the Prestige oil Tanker.

The Celtic Foundation, the Charity branch of Celtic FC, made the donation to help the cleaning up operation on the Galician coast.

Also the club will make another £5000 donation to the Federation of the Rocks of Celta who are providing aid to those effected by the disaster.

Well looks like the Celtic Foundation better start raising money for some female charity because assaulting a female stewardess isn't going to do their PR any good.

The two UEFA home matches proved it to me, that despite the players we have, we can't break down a team that comes to Ewood Park to defend. We have failed to break down teams like Sunderland, Villa, CSKA, Spurs etc whereas we've had done well against Newcastle, Liverpool even Leeds - teams that come to Ewood looking for more than a point.

I thought Souness should have left Curtis on a for a bit longer because bringing Gillespie did no good as players like Dunn, Tugay and even at times Thompson were more interested in taking a player on and moving through the middle rather than utilise Duff and Gillespie. What';s happened to the team that was used to getting it wide and crossing it in? We lost last night because we didn't have a battler in midfield. I know I've mentioned him a millions time by now but have a close look at Everton this weekend and have a look at their key figure in central midfield, Gravesen. The guy is known for his hard tackling but have a look at the assist league and you'll find him up there aswell.

Rovers organisation last night was very poor. I even witnessed two celtic fans trying to buy tickets from two young lads before the match and when they refused, they started threathening these boys and it wasn't until a police officer came by that they stopped and left the scene.

How could they have kids/teens as stewards for this match was surprising. I was standing outside the cordon in the JW/Family stand corner and when some Celtic fans tried to walk past steward, the steward tried his best to stop them but couldn't so he asked for some backing by a few other stewards who saw the whole situation but just stood and laughed at the whole situation while this guy had try to run and catch these fans. I walked to a police officer and told him about it and he got a few others and managed to get them out.

Then they were the "monkeys" who tried to climb over the fences when the teambus arrived, again I had to tell a senior steward before anyting was done. The normal stewards were more interested in seeing who was getting of the coach than recognising what was about to happen.

Sitting in the JW stand, I was glad to see the officer throwing out the fans after the first goal but wasn't too impressed with the stewards for having a lenient attitude towards the celtic fans who were in the comfy seats next to the vipbox. These "business men" had sold their remaining places to common fans and these thought that they had immunity because they were sitting in these posh seats and during halftime a couple of people had complained to the steward and even gave description and wrote down about where these people sat and the steward said he couldnt do anything about it. But after the second goal they got rowdy again and half of them on my row got up and said that if they didnt throw them out, they'll finish them. This worked and they got kicked out.

Overall, poor performance by the team but I felt the club should have hired bouncers instead of stewards or atleast stewards that weren't 15 years old. I dont care how experienced they are but I can't see them telling a Celtic fan to sit down or to refuse entry.

And regarding tickets, I think it's about time the club moved towards a clubcard (swipecard) method that's already in used in Bolton, Rangers etc.

I'll be writting to the club about the above and I suggest the ones that have been involved in any situation do the same, even if the message is a positive one.

If Celtic or Rangers do join the Premier League, I doubt clubs the size of ours or smaller will be able to handle the away fans due to the ammount of them that travel. The cost of the police and security would be more than any normal match and after last night I doubt it's worth it.

Christmas Shopping !

It feels like Christmas morning, when I was a kid.

Woke up early, cant wait.

See you all at Ewood, for the party tonight.

So true.

It's going to be just like our cupfinal in feb, can't wait.

Come on Rovers

Cole has done nothing for me this season as well. Its all very well talking of injuries, but when your only goals are as a result of poor goalkeeping from an ageing has-been and a last minute "poachers goal" against Southampton then something's wrong.

I do agree to an extent about Cole, but then too be honest, his goals are the type that we were lacking before he arrived to the club and eventhough they may not be classy goals like Zola or Henry, they're two goals that ensured we got a point from both matches.

It wasn't long ago when everyone was crying for someone to score these goals

There's no point moaning on here about it. Everyone on here either goes already or is precluded by geographical limitations.

Well lets just shut down the messageboard then.

Well its just that this club is "too big" for Blackburn. Aren't we the smallest town in the Premier League and it's good to see the club trying to address this by trying to encourage people outside the area to come watch, however it's not an easy thing when it's hard to get fans who'll ditch their club to come watch us unless the tickets are cheaper or even on par to the ones at their clubs.

It'll probably take a few seasons before it can be evaluated to see it worked. However I'm very sad to see us not seel out a tie like this although like I said before, it's definitely got to do with the result from the first leg.