Agreed but we would all have been gutted had he got injured in such a relatively meaningless trophy. I am being very parochial but I think there is a more than decent chance Adam will be the stand out player in the Championship next season and we want him to be available for as many Rovers games as we can get from him.

And the answer was we play better against clubs that come out and attack us.

Spurs have a longshot of European qualifying riding on their Elland Road trip. Villa have Brighton so could easily not win.

And Adam doesn't have an invisible friend either. We are going to have interesting midfield options with Adam, Travis, JRC, Buckley and Garrett and that is before any transfers or the next batch of youngsters

Everton GD -24 Pts 33 Leicester GD -18 Pts 31 Leeds GD -27 Pts 31 Leeds likeliest to win their game despite a Kane farewell goal being an inevitability but are in the worst position. Goodison will be the very definition of a collective neurotic break down. Remember these-

Bournemouth are. the sort of nasty side with quality players who can mix it you don't want to be playing on a day like this coming Sunday. Would far rather have Spurs or West Ham as the visitors.

If you say so...

The three who went up in 21/22 stayed up and we have to steel ourselves for the trio going up now staying up although Sheffield United will have relatively limited free cash despite the Premier League windfall. Even Luton in their literally back yard kick about stadium should be able to recruit a side capable of staying up with the 100 million free cash coming their way and use the leftovers to chuck their new 17,000 seater together. I expect the dingles to finish closer to Fulham's finish this season than Forest's. Of course there are times when I am happy to be wrong...

Fingers crossed finishing above all of that trio is as irrelevant in 23/24 as we would probably be in an automatic promotion slot.

The decision in principle not to renew Mowbray and Venus was taken early in 2022 even though we were still so high in the Championship. I cannot be certain but it was driven by the DoF decision and I doubt Broughton was the deciding factor or even under consideration at that time. Bodo is inside the Arctic Circle, famous for the world's largest whirlpool and roughly a third the size of Blackburn with Darwen. But Bodo/Glimt have had group stage Champions League Football and being in Norway are not short of a bob or two. I doubt GB had to subsist on smoked herring up there, nor when with Malmo, JDT wasn't appropriately rewarded for winning back to back Championships at what is easily Sweden's richest club.

Even at 11 days shy of his 19th birthday, I would be building the Rovers team for next season around the strengths and covering the youthful weaknesses of Adam Wharton. He is good enough to steer us to automatic promotion in 23/24. And yes I would play him a little bit deeper because when the Championship learn they have to man mark him, oppositions will be pulled out of shape to do so.

Potter is close with Jim Ratcliffe of INEOS. They own Nice but are also a bidder for Manchester United which is apparently Potter's destination if INEOS prevail against the Qataris. This is why I knocked back Mercer's Potter to Southampton. I suspect INEOS will not get Man U but I fully expect the Glazers to take an eternity to decide and the decision is as likely as not to be no decision. So Potter will be hanging on/ getting parked pro tem at Nice.

What cut backs on the football side? Broughton and JDT themselves would not have come cheap. We got ourselves in the contract pickle on the back of covid precautions and weren't the only club caught that way. Read the accounts.

Ploughed my way through this lot. Correct me if I am wrong but Slot is still in his job in Rotterdam and Levy the unpredictable is still in his job at Spurs. There are credible reports of JDT relocating his family and GB clearly said they have been visiting schools for JDT boys which is the litmus test of family relocation. If JDT objective (we don't know if it is) is the Premier League, leaving an English Championship outfit which outsiders would judge well positioned to get promoted wouldn't be the most obvious career move. It would question JDT ability to see through what he had started. And a move away from English football would be a detour. Of course this pre- supposes the Rao family are following through on their commitment but the quarter of a billion which has gone into Rovers over the past 13 years suggests that money isn't a limiting factor for them. Talking of Raos, the call to MGP is the first indication on a personal level of them valuing the opinion of anyone that was at Ewood prior to Anderson bringing them in. I maybe mistaken but I cannot think of any other examples.

What does finishing above Watford, Norwich and West Brom count as?

Gerrard is a catastrophe as a manager. Ditto Lampard. People skills close to nil.

Big Sam knows how to win the games that matter in the Premier League. Plus Bournemouth are the sort of party poopers who have beaten Everton already this season I wouldn't want for my PL survival game.. Despite Everton having 2 points and a vital 1 goal advantage, I shade it for Leeds to survive.

The 10 most expensive goalkeepers of all time Player Clubs Fee Season Kepa Arrizabalaga Athletic Club to Chelsea €80m 2018-19 Alisson Roma to Liverpool €62.5m 2018-19 Gianluigi Buffon Parma to Juventus €52.88m 2001-02 Ederson Benfica to Manchester City €40m 2017-18 Jasper Cillesen Barcelona to Valencia €35m 2019-20 Thibaut Courtois Chelsea to Real Madrid €35m 2018-19 Manuel Neuer Schalke to Bayern Munich €30m 2011-12 Jordan Pickford Sunderland to Everton €28.5m 2017-18 Aaron Ramsdale Sheffield United to Arsenal €28m 2021-22 Francesco Toldo Fiorentina to Inter Milan €26.5m 2001-02 Note how long ago those transfers were. Kepa and Allison were the 3rd and 5th most expensive transfers in the world in the 2018/19 season. So if Raya makes the top 10 in 2023/24, I would expect him to top 40m.

The Premier League is showing its competitiveness. The European Super League wannabes in other countries are good for European qualification - all in the Champions League except AC Milan. But only 3 of the English "Big" 6 are headed for the Champions League and 2 will probably miss out on European football altogether.

I believe it is 10% on any profit on sale. We have received 3.5m on transfer + 1m on promotion + 1m on first Spanish cap. So if the fee were 40m, we would receive an additional 3.45m. Given the prices international class keepers command these days, I'd hope he would go for a lot more than 40m.

A benefit of us missing out is the message board isn't full of complaints about prices...

Stick in the ground was about my level at my best...

Never watch it live in person but wangle seeing u21s whenever there is live coverage. My impression was he started badly at Rovers then became a bit of a goal scorer and became nearly unstoppable then cooled off again. Injuries took their toll. So needs a lot of working on and anybody's guess if he makes it...

We all remember and cherish some of the sensational saves Kaminski has pulled off. I think those memories are blinding us to the fact that there were quite a few goals let in during the season just gone which TK shouldn't have let in. I think it is much more nuanced as to who is the best keeper between Pears and TK. Had you asked me after that Wigan FA Cup defeat, I would have also argued it was nuanced as to who was the best keeper between Pears and me, and for that matter, I could have offered myself as the better central defender after one particular Hayden Carter "performance" three years ago... Real players develop. Pears has the advantage of years on his side to become much better and he doesn't scare me in the way TK does when we are kicking it around at the back to bring on a high press creating space upfield.

Southampton are dropping like a stone and will lose Ward-Prowse. The club needs a lot of work on it. Leicester is losing the Turkish central defender and Thielemans on frees. Barnes Maddison and Ionaci will be sold. Everton and Leeds are both shambles behind the scenes. By no means a given these clubs will thrive in the Championship. The three coming up from League One are all capable of doing a Sunderland.