Gigg Lane- the whole stand was bouncing (literally). Remember looking up at the flex strung between the floodlight pylon and the stand roof and it was whipping around like a skipping rope. Even though we saw him at the twilight of his playing career, Kendall was the class act on the field at a time when we and other lower division sides fielded several high quality players (Garner and Brotherston in their pomp). The way we kicked on after promotion and came so close to two promotions running was a fantastic credit to Kendall's motivational and organisational ability. Yes truly a great.

The full quote in context for jbizzie: We have been lucky in the injuries we have suffered. Guthrie apart, the players we lost are pretty well up the list of players the fans would have dropped given half a chance. That should answer your puzzlement. As for Spurr at Fulham- he was an utter liability in that game. The rest of the team rallied in spite of his performance.

Rochina scored an absolute belter for Granada recently. Following yesterday, this is the first time this season I am starting to think we could avoid going down. Our inability to get wins was looking like a massive killer for our prospects of surviving but two home wins on the bounce is very encouraging. If we get three points at MK Dons then this will begin to be a very productive run putting healthy distance between ourselves and the bottom three. We have been lucky in the injuries we have suffered. Guthrie apart, the players we lost are pretty well up the list of players the fans would have dropped given half a chance. If our good luck with injuries turns to bad luck and Rhodes has time out, we are extremely vulnerable still...

Just been reflecting on why I feel so pessimistic about our chances of staying up. Of course it is great to be three games undefeated and Rhodes scoring 5 in 4 games... Much as I rate Jordan, he is not going to continue at over a goal a game for the rest of the season... which is a reason for pessimism because with Marshall's head somewhere other than Ewood, there are precious few goals anywhere else in the squad. With 37 league games to go, we almost certainly need at least 12 wins to stay up. Judging by the season to date, this is going to be a big ask. In 10 League and Cup games to date, we have only been ahead in 2 of them. We simply don't look capable of winning most of the time, let alone consistently winning one in three for the rest of the season. I am afraid that even with Rhodes scoring regularly, we simply aren't going to get enough wins to stay up.

Eh? Since the 30 minute mark at Fulham, Rovers have put some good football together but the defence still looks woeful at times. Let's see if we can keep this up. As Kamy writes, the Hull and Ipswich games will give a good indication of where we are going.

A welcome 3 points towards the 53 we need to stay up. Saying there are X teams worse than us is bubble blowing. There probably aren't 3 managers worse than GB...

Have to say that a club that is staying up wins games like tonight's when it gets in front... twice.

We are currently three points from safety as things stand. For what its worth we are also 9 points from a play-off place (remember what one of those is?- nobody on this messageboard ever talks about them...). The dingles are in an automatic promotion spot as well just to really cheer everyone up.

Just about squeaks us out of relegation apart from the squad now being massively inferior to the squad we had at the start of the year, albeit without some high wage earning passengers.

I enjoyed finishing in the top half of the Premier League four times in five seasons. Winning our group in the Europa Cup was fun too. ....and it all happened in the last ten years too.

I prefer Premier League mid table "mediocrity" to relegation from the Championship. Big Sam has my vote every day of every week over everything that has followed at Rovers.

And we persisted with being in the Premier League....

Everyone accepts Bowyer costs us. We were a play-off quality squad last season and ended 12 points short. At best we are a mid-table squad this season. If Bowyer costs us a 12 point under-performance again, we get relegated.

More like a shameful painful howl with that home defeat to the Dingles losing us our proud 35 year record. He should have been fired for the weak gutless performance the team put up that day.

Back in the bottom 3 as things stand at the moment.

Entirely possible that we will reach 14 games played with just 5 points and no wins. To be comfortably clear of the drop zone we need 14 points from those 9 games. Is that a realistic proposition??????

Just seen the league table.

Do the worse teams also have a worse manager when it comes to gritty motivation and grinding out results? Yes Brentford, Bolton and Bristol City all look to be in heaps of trouble but they have 45 matches to learn and adapt. Are learning and adapting Gary Bowyer fortes?

We were top half of mid table last season, have sold the forward who could really force things and other useful players who could and did make a key difference in games have gone too. I cannot see us getting to 1 September with both Marshall and Rhodes still with us and given the transfer restriction we will need an absolute miracle to get like-for-like. Now add a Manager who costs us points tactically rather than earning them, nobody who would die blue and white now Dunny has gone and a clear bias by the officials against us emphasised by the Edwards netball effort on Saturday. Division One here we come Back back back where we started from Only the Division One in question is not the one we were singing about back in the days of Jim Smith....

Condolences to Tashor's family and friends and thanks to the old boy for many a smile whilst reading his posts.

Condolences to all who knew him. More sad news.

Very sorry to read of his death. Commiserations to all his family. They have lost a grand man who was very brave in the face of his illness and amputation.

Brilliant!

Nuno Gomez stsrts

Excellent preview. The sort of game we will now go and win putting Palace's play-off place in jeopardy. Holloway fair mucked Shagnew around when they were chasing him so I don't know whether that is a case for congratulations or revenge...