I refereed McGrath towards the end of his career when he went to Sheffield United. During a break in play I had a chat and I could smell the alcohol on his breath. Despite that he was the best player on the pitch and his natural athleticism was apparent.

I watched the excellent Cause of Death yesterday (recorded from Sunday) and it featured four people killed by being run over (one casualty was from Langho). What was alarming was that the three drivers who were responsible all failed basic eyesight tests carried out by the police and when the police obtained their medical records it was recorded and they had been told. One of them could only see a number plate clearly from 2.5 metres away. The real worry was that there is no mechanism to stop them - essentially they have to self report themselves to the DVLA and have their licence revoked. The Coroner has written to the Minister of Transport to highlight the anomaly and hopefully something is out in place to prevent and other unnecessary deaths.

Me neither Carl. I was really surprised when I read it and to me it makes no sense. Given our suspicions about the club I feel there could be some ulterior motive not necessarily football related.

I was at Wembley yesterday for the League Two playoff final and I bumped into an ex refereeing colleague from Birmingham. He is a Birmingham fan and we discussed ownership and he couldn't give their current owners enough praise. After many years of poor ownership (I recall being at a game there when the fans tried to get into the Directors area) he told me the supporters are delighted. In the past he said they have struggled to sell twelve thousand season tickets but now have a waiting list of twelve thousand. The owners spends every home game in the fanzone pre match and put £10k behind the bar in a local pub recently. There is serious talk about a new ground too. I honestly never thought I'd be jealous of Birmingham.

In my opinion keeping the likes of Wood and Stritch just creates a bottleneck which reverberates through the under 21's and 18's. I think they will be loaned out again (Woods couldn't cut it at Annan last season) which makes their signings even more pointless.

What a great analogy. 😂

And not a prawn sandwich in sight. 😂

If you offered Leeds, Burnley and Sunderland a fourth bottom finish now I'm sure they would snap your hand off.

Buying young and developing them will just not work in the Premier League. If that is their policy they will at best be another yo-yo club.

I honestly couldn't see Sunderland winning this match but Sheffield United seemed to go to pieces when Hamer went off injured. Credit to Sunderland for seizing the initiative but the game summed up the Championship to me. A few incidents aside there was very little quality with poor ball retention. I wasn't really bothered who won but good luck to Sunderland - they'll certainly need it. Their dilemma will be whether or not to throw money at it or just to be conservative and consolidate. It's a dilemma I'd love to have for Rovers.

Rovers are on the Big Match Revisited next Saturday at 10.30 am. It's a game against Oldham from August 1975.

I don't believe it will neither. As it stands there seems little chance of them selling which will see us carrying on as we are unless something radical happens. Radical in my view would be proper appointments to run the club.

We took him from Accrington for a small fee. Sadly we are low down in the food chain now and bigger clubs take advantage of this. It really is up to FIFA to clamp down.

I would see him going as another of the cornerstones being removed. If he is removed it will be a victory for the supporters and particularly the coalition and will attract more unwanted media attention. I would love the owners to leave and pray they do but there are no signs that they will so maybe there would have to be a compromise. A start would be employing and listening to people who have the best interests of Rovers at heart including supporters.

The emergence of news about Pasha wanting to control what the owners see on TV doesn't really come as a surprise to many who are capable of thinking. It was said to me that Pasha (with the support of Gestede) told the owners that we didn't need to spend and money in January and this was pretty much the tipping point for Eustace. He is said to be the only direct contact with the Punekars and will throw anybody under the bus to protect himself. And as such he has Carte Blanche to tell them anything. He is in a permanent state of self preservation mode and is a controlling individual. The owners are pretty much untouchable for us so the focus should be on him. He doesn't take criticism well but he will have to bear the brunt of it now Waggott has departed. The trust between him and the owners is the only thing he has left now. Once that is broken he will be gone.

There is definitely more to this than meets the eye. During the PR disaster with Radio Lancashire Swag was talking about events he was organising and involved in to celebrate the 150 year anniversary next season.

Trying to join the dots up and the timing of this and the media furore over the womens debacle I wonder if he has been offered up as the sacrificial lamb. He is an easy hit given his age. A nice fat NDA to enhance his retirement pot too The abrupt statement indicates this has happened really quickly.

Sorry - wrong thread.

That thought crossed my mind too. I don't expect any of them to but it would be refreshing if some of the senior men spoke out. After all it could be them next.

I think Yasir Sufi will be in the frame. A self-serving, subservient yes man will be in the job description and he fits the bill.

That statement is a terse as it gets. Delighted he has gone but the big elephant is still in the room.

I honestly believe this is going to get worse. Redundancies and deliberately relegating the womens team is a mere taster of what is to come. I read this morning that the vast majority of the players affected by this culling won't have the support of the PFA. The BBC article says you have to have played in the WSL to attain membership. Some of these will have nowhere to go for advice and it wouldn't surprise me if the shysters at Ewood took full advantage of this. Shame on the PFA.

Elliott Bennett nails it here. It's something that the Punekars and their cohorts will NEVER understand. FOV.

And too many wannabes try to out football those types.

I was pleased to see Postecoglou sacrifice his principles and methods to win the game by proper defending and not over playing in the wrong areas. It adds weight to my theory that 'Pepball' is on its way out and that there is more than one way to win a game.