I respect you greatly Paul, but you seem to have completely lost the plot on this issue now and have imo always lacked any sense of balance or perceptive regarding Covid. (You would probably say the same about me from the opposite angle I'm sure). Vaccines did get us back in grounds (see the entry criteria for tomorrow). Are you actually going to call chaddy out because it wasn't quite as quickly as anticipated? There's also an intensely boring discussion on the matchday thread about how you allegedly pass on less virus if you've been vaccinated so if that is correct, in that respect it is helping "save" us or to keep us safe as well isn't it? Merry Christmas to you and your family. Hope you are all well.

Do Premier League teams still not have to nominate and choose from a squad of 25 though like in the Championship or are the rules different there?

Lockdown or severe restrictions would also cause huge disruption to the economy and people's lives and livelihoods. I know not everyone will agree but the best thinhg that could happen for me is if this new strain does have less serious symptoms and sweeps rapidly through the population eradicating the nastier strains. A bit of herd immunity at last. Apologies if we're taking the thread off topic. As regards the Championship season if the current variant is particularly infectious I suppose we will have to expect some inevitable disruption but I'd say incidents should be dealt with on a case by case basis rather than by means of an enforced break again.

Me neither.

Quite right.

Never have the words "might" and "could" received so much overuse. Can't believe some fans seem to be encouraging others not to attend matches. Thought these young lads needed all our support?

However, it's up to chaddy to do what he wants, as long as remains within the regulations at any particular time. It's absolutely nothing to do with anyone else and people should stop picking on him for exercising that choice. If people aren't comfortable with the situation they're quite at liberty to exercise their own choice and stay at home quite frankly.

It's pretty obvious that when organisations like the WHO say "they cannot conclude" whether or not the new variant is more or less serious than the existing variants it's actually less serious as if there was the slightest possibility the opposite were the case they'd be predicting the end of times.

What, made him even worse? 🤔

Have to echo that. He was absolute shite! Hopefully "3 Club rule!".

Ulrich may be putting it a trifle bluntly, but given the overall state of Scottish football this should be viewed as a positive because?

Correct but I understand he has been tasked with specific duties from Jan 1st.

Hope so, otherwise it'll be carnage trying to get in. Have to say that the vaccine passports are extremely unfair and discriminatory against the elderly who may not be computer savvy and/or those who don't possess a smartphone (not Rovers fault). I also don't feel the need for a vaccine passport for Saturday has been particularly well publicised. When I was looking for prices of Birmingham tickets the other morning I thought I would check the Rovers website to see what the requirements or potential requirements would be and there wasn't the first mention of it. Whether it's on there now I don't know.

Well said chaddy. What's the point in being vaccinated if it doesn't allow you to carry on leading your life as normal?

From 1st of Jan.

It's absolutely nothing to do with being "positive" or "negative" and it's a bit naughty to paint it that way. It's fans understandably voting with their feet after eleven generally dire seasons under the current ownership, some shocking pricing policy by Waggott over the last couple of years and (prior to this season) a pretty dire level of performance under Mowbray since returning to the Championship. That said, I agree with you that these young players deserve our support. It HAS to be a two way street though and before the missing fans flock back in massive numbers there will have to be a radical overhaul of pricing policy - I am very hopeful this will happen in the New Year. It will also require us to hold firm and the owners to say that none of our key players are leaving in January and actually add a couple of net bodies to give one or two extra options and cover in event of injuries. I have no idea at this stage if that will happen in January. However for me personally it's the litmus test of whether the owner's commitment to improvement moving forward is as strong as certain parties have been led to believe behind the scenes. Mowbray's defeatist comments the other day were far from encouraging in that respect. One can only hope he is somewhat out of the loop and completely wide of the mark.

Went into the Club Shop today for the first time in quite a while to get an extra ticket for a mate up from London forthe Brum game and had a quick look around. Seemingly no medium home kits left. About 10 medium away kits left. Now it's one thing running out of kit in March but to me running out of kit prior to one of your main selling windows at Christmas is just gross incompetence to me no matter how you try and dress it up. Neither Covid nor supply chain issues from overseas are brand new phenomenon and I wonder if Liverpool or Manchester United have these "supply" problems and you can't get one of their shirts? Some of the leisurewear was quite nice but the prices were frightening. Most of the stuff was min £50 going up to £65 and I put my hand on a bench jacket which was admittedly exceptionally nice but it weighed in at a whopping £150!!! How do we expect to sell anything at those prices? We really haven't got a clue.

No doubting Aguero was a great player but you could also flip that argument on it's head and say that if Shearer had spent his career playing with the players Aguero played with for an all conquering City side, he'd have scored a lot more than he did as well.

To be fair, you wouldn't expect that much to happen until January anyway and there has been a lot of discussion about the fate of DL RN JR and BB which I think is relevant to a transfer thread.

I've said previously that changes at the Club are in the offing and I expect improvements in this respect (pricing) in the New Year. The Club will be chopping the legs off any positive efforts made by the commercial department if players are sold in January though.........

Imo the damage was actually done the summer before last when Waggott removed the affordable seating and raised prices by up to 25% for a season when no-one could attend. Then, the fact that they had to give incentives for those you bought last season meant these headline prices were locked in for good. I'm actually surprised in all the circumstances and the dross we witnessed on the pitch last season we made it to 7,300 ST'S. Shows the resilience of the fan base. Then he compounds it even further with the ludicrous match day pricing...........

And in terms of pure finance, how many other "town" Clubs have multi billionaire owners who supplement the Club's income by c £20m p.a. ?

I'm sure you have previously been steadfast in your belief (apologies if I'm wrong) that a) We have a contract extension in our favour on BBD. b) Said extension will be activated by the Club and c) He will not be sold in January. Has something happened to change your stance on the above?

I would blame the owners but by the same token I wouldn't expect our manager to be seemingly coming out in support of the player moving either. This is the trouble with a lot of managers not just Mowbray, they have such an over inflated opinion of their ability in the transfer market they think they can sell their star player then replace him with 2 or 3 players for half the price and improve the team overall. It rarely if ever works out. As for the second part of your question hell yes. Islander has nailed it above, we received the £16m for the Training ground exercise in the last FFP cycle and the Armstrong money in this one. There should be no need to sell at all before the summer and to sell him in January if we're still in 3rd or 4th would be indefensible.

"If he can get a top top move, ........I'd never stop him doing that." Fuck off Mowbray. Obviously it isn't his decision ultimately but he shouldn't be coming out in support of the player moving. Like I said, his job is to put out the best team he can for BRFC. If that doesn't coincide with what BB wants in January tough. He's employed as our manager not Brereton's agent trying to secure him a dream move. As you rightly say (if we have an extension) we should just sell him in summer if we don't go up and six months is hardly going to ruin the players' career.