and the Manx, don't forget the Manx

i am sure he has, however, since he didn't have much of a clue how to make us beat WBA at home, i can't attribute newcastle's lead to the souness touch.

i would like to see the result of souness using his tactical nouse to think of a way to beat a theoretical rovers team also built using his tactical nouse. that has the makings of pure comedy.

i liked souness for his no-nonsense style, his post-match interviews, and for how well he managed to get us out of our division 1 malaise and win the worthy cup. however it seems that there's only so far he can take players (eg dunn) and the club, his man management skills seem to be very 1-dimensional, which will only work for some of the people some of the time, and when things aren't going his way he seems to lack the knowledge to turn things round. he managed it last season, but only just. i think the indicator that this season was going to be no better came with the way he started the first two matches. to me that seemed to label the club's ambition as relegation dogfighters, when myself and the majority of fans demand more, especially given the 6th place finish in 2003. i actually feel a lot more optimistic about the season ahead now, i just hope that we can get a decent manager and not lapse into another pre-souness style slump.

Not that I'm doubting you but how do you know that? i heard this on yahoo! sport

hopefully he now has the squad in place to put out a balanced team and wont have to resort to playing people out of position... we'll see tho... i am glad we've finally got someone (or two) to fit in on the left, hopefully both will start to show signs of class. i was a bit dissapointed that cole went, especially after the partnership he was forming with towards the end of last year. i like dickov's workrate and his willingness to get among them but i'm not sure he has cole's class. i would say the squad is probably looking slightly better than last year, but it really depends how the new players perform, and how stead and gallacher develop

How could we make it better when it was open?

let's take it point by point 1 - he didn't have much of a choice with duff, i think most people backed his sale of dunn at the time, i'm not sure what the deal is with cole, tho there were enough people on here who were happy to say he was rubbish. 2 - boss' management style always varies, as you can see from the people we've had at rovers over the past few years. sometimes souness may be over-hard, but look at where the softly softly approach got us. 3 - i think he has a clue, he may be a long way off being a good tactician but i think he's better than you think. it's all very well saying "you should know your best 11" but football now is a squad game, and the team you put out isn't necessarily your best 11, it's the best 11 to take on the other team, to exploit any weakness and to cope with any strengths. it's for teams like arsenal to put out an 11 and say "so try to beat us", we're not good enough to be able to do that. today he set his stall out to pack the midfield and it was working, until a player error cost us a goal. 4 - yes, because harford won us lots of things didn't he 5 - see point 3 and also note that after player error that cost us goal, tactics were changed which got us two goals. their 2nd was poor defending (more player errors) followed by a superb shot. their 3rd was a gift from the referee. 6 - normally i would agree, you make your own luck, but today i thought that the ref was definately against us.

It's a perfectly understandable reaction when you're in a position where x-thousand people truely believe that they could do your job better than you.

looks like a blatant hatred for us he struck me as being very petty... dickov booked after that skirmish in the soton penalty area (why?) then ferguson and johanson booked for nothing challenges (surprise surprise they were the people arguing the toss with d'urso after the little fracas earlier). the penalty decision was unbelievable. there must be 100s of worse challenges and little niggles than that in the penalty area every match. what a cock, cost us the draw. tho our shocking defence cost us the win

did he actually say that or are you just taking a small part of a bigger quote out of context?

it's my understanding that duff had a clause in his contract that meant that he was free to talk to anyone who bid over a certain amount, chelsea bid that amount, it was duff's choice to stay or go. one game in is a bit early to have your knives sharpened yet. the result was a little dissapointing, but that's the way it goes. teams like west brom are going to be like so many of the teams we played in div1 - they are going to come to us and play 10 men behind the ball. and at times in div1 we had a lot of problems unlocking teams like that. it's a shame that we have a fairly tough run of fixtures now, i hope we can get a result agains southampton because with arsenal and man u after that it could be a while before we get a win, and that could put another huge dent in the team's confidence.

or he could say "this is the best squad we've had for a long time" and have people rip into him for it for the next 12 months

this is the key phrase. it's cool to like football every 2 years, and also to wave flags and shout en-ger-land a lot. remember also that it's patriotic and to go to the pub and cheer on our boys - this is a good way of showing how much you love your country, other good ways to show this love include breaking glasses and bottles, dropping litter, and small acts of vandalism whilst making your way home after a disappointing result.

tho obviously, not enough of them. this has been a fantastic week, we have seen 3 of the "big name" teams who played with the attitude that turning up on the pitch 3 times would be enough to see them go through get knocked out by teams who have played with a real spirit and sense of purpose. why is that a shame? why should anyone shed a tear? why should we feel any sympathy for teams that only decide to play in the final 45mins of their 3 games? and yeh it would be gutting if england went out in the way that spain, italy and germany have, but it wouldn't be gutting in an "oh how unlucky were we, the lads played well and didn't get what they deserved" sort of a way, it would be gutting in an "it's embarassing that one of footballs supposed great nations can play in such a dull, insipid and negative way, and lacking in any sort of spirit." we would be gutted that the boys put in such a poor show, and let the nation down. it''s one thing to play with heart and get beat (why we all love the scots? ) it's another to go out on the pitch and mince around for 90 minutes in the hope that the other team will recognize that you have the "better" players and let you win.

after interviewing the uefa bloke, itv hatched a little conspiracy theory that england wouldn't get thrown out because they are a glamour team and bring in higher global tv ratings (due largely to the beckham brand) than any of the other teams in the tournament.

did you actually read the article phillip, it's definately anti-english: prime example there of anti-englishness. because violence doesn't exist in other countries wtf - collective responsibility? i suppose that not only has the writer never heard of self-determination, he's also crying into his valium right now at the guilt of our sorry nation.

this was a great game to watch, a bit like zulu but with football, oh and the english loosing at the end. not really sure how people can put the french win down to luck - yeh so they didn't create much, how much did england create? even less. france controlled that game for maybe 60 or 70 minutes, except for that spell in the first half when england got back into it, and managed to score a goal from a well worked free kick that you might also say was "lucky". i tell you what is lucky though, that after defending on the edge of their box for 45 minutes england hadn't already conceded a goal. if france can make it happen in the final 3rd, then i can see them powering their way to victory in the tournament, their play has a fluidity to it that can be awesome to watch. the consolation for england today was that both croatia and switzerland looked equally as inept as each other, and should get thoroughly turned over.

i can see the plus and minus of this: minus - as a few people have said, he's not the most exciting signing, and it's probable that the only thing he will add to the team is a bit of depth however... plus - in the good old days we'd be throwing around millions of pounds for players of a similar calibre. so in that sense it could well be a good bit of business. though this deal hasn't exactly made me pee myself with excitement, i hope mr dickov does his job for rovers and bags a few goals too.