Glad to read that he is doing all the right things. In a way it is encouraging that he isn't the old Matt and that there is a vulnerability about him. Maybe I'm clutching at straws but if that is sorted perhaps the brilliance on the pitch will return as well.

Following an encouraging start under Sparky, we lost two games back-to-back 4-0. At that time we looked to be in deep trouble with a completely inadequate team with the worst defence and rock bottom of the table. Now we are just very disappointed after conceding late goals when needing to chase the game against one of the best teams in Europe. Wednesday is a challenge but not of the magnitude faced last November. I have every confidence in the lads.

It would be nice to think so den! At least, we can expect that Sparky and Bowen will get the lads properly prepared for it- we haven't had any Souness-esque let downs against bottom clubs from the new management team yet. Fortunately (I hope!), the ref is Rob Styles so not one of those you would be worried about being influenced by Saturday's yelping. Last two Rovers games he covered were the wins at Boton and Fulham and before that he did the 2-2 Liverpool game at Ewood. Interestingly he reffed the Palace v Norwich game on Saturday- turned down three Palace penalty appeals (apparently one was a nailed on pen.) then gave the fourth which was more marginal from which Palace brought it back to 3-3.

Two semi-final results, two three goal margins. Just read the adjectives the BBC applied to this afternoon's game- thrashed, crushed, breezed, non-existant. Then went back to the adjectives applied to yesterday's game report- combative, effective, competed, harried, finally sealed. We are angry with the psychophantic fools in the media. I'd rather by angry with the media and feel proud of the team for what it has achieved than feel angry with the team, the management, betrayed by individual players and utterly humiliated as a football club (again). Once again, its much much better to be a Rover than a Geordie. Off to look at pictures of us winning silverware recently secure in the knowledge that Rovers will be lifting a trophy again before Newcastle do.

Just out of interest, does anyone expect Man U to alter their usual approach to playing Arsenal? They always kick the living daylights out of them because they cannot cope with the skill of Wenger's sides either.

Nice. So who have you put your money on for the next Pope and why is St john such a crap pundit?

From reading the press today, Johnson can expect to spend 90 minutes looking like that on Wednesday! I listened to the Palace v Norwich game on the Radio yesterday and it sounded like Palace could not cope with Ashton, McKenzie and Huckerby running at them. Norwich could and should have scored a lot more than the three they got. Hope that Reid and Emo do their stuff for Rovers in that respect. I'd expect our defence to cope much better than Norwich's against the Palace front line- Routledge is out of form, Freedman is predictable and Johnson just needs watching all the time. Need to be careful as Palace are the penalty-winning kings. Palace are giving free transport to their fans for the trip to Ewood. I don't know how many are coming up but the Rovers deserve a good backing from the home faithful to help push them up the table in what promises to be a very entertaining game. At this stage of the season and looking at their remaining fixtures, Palace have got to come to Ewood looking for a win. PS Palace have lost their last four away games conceding 14 goals in the process.

The guy who wrote that ignorant pile of drivel in The People deserves a personal vendetta to drive him and his personal opinions out of journalism and into the gutter where they belong.

Palace have done very well to come back to grab a point against a wonky Norwich in a 3-3 draw today. Rovers will be feeling very low after the semi-final but I have confidence in Hughes' motivation skills. Rovers to win 3-1.

Very disappointing time to post number 6,000. Shame we cannot only play 40 minutes each way against the Arse! Over all the Rovers were magnificent- some brilliant tackles and distribution. I disagree with anyone knocking Matteo or Neill but MGP did his little boy lost routine again in the second half. Arsenal were superb- no taking it away from them. This was close to last year's invincibles and the youngsters coming through are beyond belief. Every time I've seen van Persie I've been amazed by what he can do. The reality is that Rovers, playing very well and headed for a solid mid-table finish are simply not in the same class as Arsenal when they turn it on. If they play as well as that against Chelsea midweek, the result will be very interesting. We had one chance- Thomo played through right at the start and didn't have a clue where the hell he was. I'd have backed Dickov, Emo, Reid or MGP to have scored in a similar position. With that went our chance of an upset- we were only going to get one and a place in the Final depended on it. Concluding comments- 52,077 is a lot more than Villa Park can hold so FA vindicated. Glad there were no convenient Malta-Cardiff flights in the end; need to be back and had too many bad experiences to trust over land travel on a BR engineering week-end. Andy Todd will get banned and you will all agree it is totally deserved when you see the behind goal replay. Nasty vicious short right arm jab. The headlines for Rovers will be about us being brutish thugs because of that stupidity. Still a last hooray for Short or a chance for Amo to show how he has benefitted from proper coaching- if he can concentrate he is a much better footballer than Todd anyway.

Yes you are right- no wonder we ended up in Div 3!

Brilliant work 1864! Hope you all have a fantastic day and that as the organiser you don't hasve too many "oops we left little Johnny at Newport East services or was it Charnock Richard?" moments. There is one last laugh- as I understand it, the gate receipts for the two semi-finals are added together, the FA bit deducted and the pot divided in four. So our lack of support hits the other three and the FA as much as it hurts us. Or putting it another way, thanks to the Manc, Arse and Geordie supporters for the subsidy.

I once inadvertently found myself between a mother beaver and baby beaver in a lake in Lithuania. They make a shrill whistling sound when distressed.

Weren't transfer medicals introduced into the English game because of the Martin Britt fiasco? Typical of Rovers' luck at that time we ended up on the wrong end of that particular misfortune. Glad to see Parker gets an "honourable" mention. Parker and Shepstone were attrocious. Given they both played at times when Rovers were close to their all time nadirs, awarding them the "accolade" of all time worse is probably accurate. The youngsters who are nominating the likes of Dailly, Davies, Grabbi, Peacock et al simply have not got a clue what went before! As for the suggestion of Cowans- he was one of the most skilful players seen at Ewood in the 40 odd years I've been following the Rovers and would have definitely made it into the greatest votes in the way Waggy did had it not been he was playing for us on the cusp of the great side of the early/mid 90s. Speedie rightly was a hero for scoring so many goals with such elan but "Sid" was the wellspring of that team. Jimmy Quinn did put in some decent performances for us (as well as for Swindon ) and Paul Round is exempted because he scored two crucial goals (good ones at that) when we beat Stoke (I think) 2-1 when we perilously close to going down from the old second division and sparked a revival of belief in the team.

I would say it is obvious- Savage will replace Flitcroft. The prospect of Reid playing in the hole between the front man (hopefully a fully restored Stead) with MGP and whoever has coordinated his head with his boots between Thompson and Emerton is an exciting one for the balance of this season. Reid deserves all the plaudits going. Hopefully, the tightening of the muscle which forced Reid's substitution yesterday is nothing serious as we desperately need him at Cardiff. I would say Ireland's need of Reid is as great if not greater the Rovers' if they are to sustain their challenge for a place in Germany 2006.

Brilliant sox! So onto Arsenal and the most valuable game of Rovers' season (unless there is a chance to leap five places in the Prem in the last game of the season!). Victory will assure the Rovers of at least another £1.5m in revenue from FA Cup semi-final winnings and Cup Final gate receipts and no doubt will increase the value of commercial sponsorships during the summer. Added to that the probability that Bumbling U will beat the half of the bar codes not suspended in the other semi and a win for us in the semi is likely to secure UEFA football at Ewood for the third time in four seasons. Unfortunately, Arsenal will be able to select the team which went unbeaten in the Prem all last season for the first time in the current campaign- all the injured and wounded will be back refreshed with T Henry quietly limbering up at the rate of a hattrick a game in his previous two Prem outings before Boro yesterday. Wenger has tipped his boys to pass their way round the Rovers' increasingly respected defense. Let's face it all logic points to an Arsenal victory. No way can Rovers be expected to still be in the Cup by the time next Saturday's Prem programme kicks off. So clutching at straws- >If Arsenal score first, its probably curtains. But the way we ripped into Chelski at Ewood after going 0-1 in the fourth minute gives a scintilla of hope. >Arsenal see Rovers as a bit of a bogey side. If we can frustrate them long enough, the obdurate blue and white shirts facing them might begin to pray on the Gunners' subconscious. Desperate straw clutching. >Even a full strength free flowing Arse are going to find the current Rovers' defence plus the Axe and probably Savage disrupting their supply lines a tough proposition. Then we need a superman performance from Brad. Not so much straw clutching as utterly essential to avoid a humiliation. >MGP in front of goal when not kicking fresh air is pretty lethal. We will get a chance or two. Hope and pray they fall to MGP as he's the only player up front likely to convert them. Extreme straw clutching. >If it is 0-0 at FT, we will be as fit as the Arsenal in terms of surviving the next 30 minutes. Then we might have a 20% chance from the penalty shoot out given our miserable track record and the Arsenal's regular qualifications through them. Straw clutching-it's an outside chance. My forecast is Arsenal 2 Rovers 0 and we are left to dream for another day.

To be fair, Southampton have suffered some ill-fortune against the Rovers on occasions- a remember a completely unwarranted red card at Ewood a few seasons ago and us being played off the park a couple of times and still winning. However, for Andy D'urso them coming back from 1-3 to 3-3 Osgood getting John Bailey sent off. TIME TO GET EVEN LADS

If we achieve a result which continues our average over the last 12 Prem games, we will win by 0.7- 0.5 Depends which way you take the rounding, I suppose.

Paul, BRFC already do cheap tickets - they are the standard prices! However, if the initiative brought prices for Rovers supporters going to Stamford Bridge or Highbury into line with Ewood prices, surely that would be a very good thing.

I know a Virgin trains inspector who is an avid reader of brfcs.com.

I think Lucas is an excellent player but not the best. If Souey is sniffing, the fee should be a silly one which should allow plenty to get an even better replacement.

What a pathetic excuse for not being at the match jim j! Congratulations and all the very best for the future (PS don't listen to Abbey on the subject of women at the moment!). This brings a sense of deja vu- I got married the day we played Southampton at home. That day we lost 0-2 and Roy Hodgson got sacked so we don't want any repeat of that. No Savage by all accounts and I wouldn't be surprised to see Dickov's rest continuing so he is fresh for biting Arsenal ankles in Cardiff. I expect Southampton to treat it like a home game and attack freely in an unexpectedly open and entertaining game. Rovers 4-5-1 to work out, with either Tomo or Emo to surprise us by playing well and a 2-1 win. Stead to get them both to set up a selection poser for the Semi-Final.

If Souness goes in for him, the money will do the talking- wages for Neill, silly money for the Rovers. If Boumsong = £8m, Lucas = £?m. I would get a pet hack to start talking big numbers if I were JW/Sparky to get Fat Freddie acclimatised. A straight Neill/Bellamy swap? Why not be cheeky. He is good but there are better RBs out there.

That £7.75m list starts from 1 July. Add Darren Purse £500k, Martin Albrechtson £2.5m, Richard Scimeca undisclosed (rumoured £1m+) who were bought in June 2004 and its in the £12m range. I thought Horsfield, Gaardsoe and Kinsella (another £4m to £5m for those three) were closed season signings but they arrived last season. Contra is a loan and Kanu and Campbell were completely free transfers. OK I was wrong - but its still a significant transfer outlay.

Look at the Baggies' current form (three wins in four). They are the team down there producing the results at the moment and with the near £20m spent on transfers, they probably have the most class, most depth and best-balanced squad of the strugglers. They had two against the woodwork as well as the one they scored against Everton today. The 4-1 win at Charlton two weeks ago didn't flatter them either and unlike Palace and Saints, they kept their good run going inspite of the long break. I don't fancy our chances of getting three points when we go to The Hawthorns and am only grateful that the Semi has pushed that fixture back. As for the sun, it has been 13 and raining all day today.