Do you not think they were sold a shiny new vision of something that couldnt actually be done in practice though? If it was what the owners wanted why do you think it was scrapped when it was? Would have been nothing stopping it getting to the latter stages of the process at least.

That's the worry. Won't feel secure on that front until Waggott has gone.

Big assumption there on the strength of one interview that Broughton will automatically be a huge success and is the man to transform our fortunes and will only be thwarted by machiavellian owners. He might be a success but could just as easily turn out to be a liability as an asset. Still doesn't do any harm to get your feet under the table ASAP with whoever is in Authority at Ewood at any given time does it?

Fair point.

Great post overall, but you seem to have an unbelievably rosy view of Steve Waggott. I don't know what his secret is, but he seems to have this remarkable knack of convincincing people who have met him in person that he is an all round good egg who has the interests of the Club at heart. I'm simply not having it. The crap food is symptomatic of his apparent penny pinching attitude but is a relatively minor issue. It's under his stewardship that affordable seating was scrapped. It's under his stewardship that prices were raised by up to 25% during a pandemic for a season where no-one could attend. It was him that was involved in Coventry City's attempt to flog their training ground when he was there. You can't put any blame on our owners for that. Therefore it defies logic to think that it wasn't him that was the driving force behind a similar attempt here and indeed he openly admitted that he was the one driving the idea. The scheme here was based on the fraudulent premise that a Category One Academy could be housed in a facility and on a site half the size of the existing ones. I wonder how much he cost the Club with the aborted scheme once a few inconvenient home truths were brought to light? Prices continue to rise, every pricing initiative that comes out of the Club is a near disaster and remedial steps to mitigate the damage are only taken once people like those silly posh QEGS lads running round in their rolled up trousers with their secret handshakes, or yourselves on the Trust, take them to task. Why can't anyone at the Club get something right first time round for once? He had essentially one job to do this season just gone - get Lenihan, Nyambe and Rothwell signed up to new contracts. 100% failure rate in that respect seemingly. The managerial search has been an absolute embarrassment and seems to have been designed to put off any better candidates. With the benefit of hindsight it would obviously have been far better to replace Waggott before Mowbray and have someone vaguely competent conducting the search. In summary, everything he has touched since he's been at the Club has been a disaster. But it's OK it seems because it appears he's extremely attentive and wants to help. (But never does.)

The bookies odds (I know I know) seem to find it reasonably hard to separate JDT and Deila (who seemingly is off to Standard Liege so for what it's worth, they must not regard JDT as anything approaching a certainty yet. What puzzles me about JDT is why he left Malmo after two successful title winning years and has subsequently been out of work for 6 months. Does anyone know the circumstances of him leaving? Was the break orchestrated by the Club or him? If the latter, did he have a better job lined up which never materialised or did he just fancy a break from football?

BIt the bullet and renewed ahead of the initial deadline about 13.30 today. Was originally going to wait and make sure we didn't make a Pardew style appointment but a fool and their money are easily parted eh? Was expecting there to be a sizeable queue but we were the only people in the shop which I thought was a very bad sign given it was deadline day and the shop was only open until 3p.m. I asked a lad in the ticket office who's been there a long time how sales had been going and he attempted to put a brave face on it by saying he wasn't told numbers but he "thought" levels were roughly the same as at the comparable stage last year.

Never mind "reading between the lines" you seem to be having difficulty comprehending what I posted in black and white. Would JDT have been my first choice? Of course not. I'd have been (very) happy with Dyche or Farke. But at least if it is JDT I would still regard that as a vast improvement on a "Mowbray Mark 2" appointment like Pardew or Adkins. And I would be prepared to give JDT a chance to show us what he can do unlike you who seem to be dismissing him out of hand before he even gets here. Has the recruitment process been a shambles? Of course it has. But that imo is what you get when you leave Waggott in charge of anything.

That post may come back to haunt you if we did appoint JDT and he turns out to be decent. Don't know anything about him myself but on the face of it his CV is far better than Mowbray's so it seems very premature yo be dismissing him out of hand before he even gets here. Not sure if you're being serious with this post or are in your usual wind up mode, but once again it seems extremely odd that you never complained about a manager who struggled here for years and who finished the second half of the season in relegation form but would dismiss out of hand the claims of someone who won the Championship of the Country he was managing in for the last two seasons.

The main advantage to the appointment of Broughton in my book is that someone like Pardew would have such an inflated opinion of themselves they probably wouldn't be prepared to work under and defer to a DOF. Unfortunately the converse probably applies in respect of a genuinely good candidate. Between that and the apparent requirement to work with Lowe, Benson and Johnson rather than staff of their own choice and I really can't see a decent appointment being forthcoming.

Broughton MIGHT be very successful. However imo the reason we haven't been very successful over the last 4 years isn't because we haven't had a DOF - it's because we've had a shite manager and even worse CEO. If we had an absolutely superb manager and Waggott I think we could still just about be successful. If we land another shite head coach or manager then I doubt very much the outcome will be any different to the last 4 years, regardless of Broughton's abilities.

On the subject of Deila, why pay compensation to get him out of his contract because he is willing to work with Lowe, Johnson and Benson? Would it not be easier to get a better guy who is temporarily out of work, and use some of the money saved by not paying compensation towards paying off whoever he didn't want, then starting afresh?

Fair enough, good post.

The first bit is looking increasingly likely. The second...... not so sure, he may be here for the long haul and not in a good way......he's seemingly already cottoned on to the Mowbray mantra of jam tomorrow and long term "journeys' which of course never come to fruition but you get a bloody good screw out of it in the meantime.

I really really hope not. Just about the only name mentioned so far that would save me £430. I would probably put Adkins in that bracket too.

What is there to be positive about about the appointment of a former Academy Director no-one had ever previously heard of? He might turn out to be a success, might not, but has no previous experience as a DOF and I really don't understand this assumption he's going to transform our fortunes.

Players revolted and fixed it for him you mean. After that the relationship between everyone had gone. How did we fare after that game again?

Couldn't agree more. Subsequent to Venus's departure I was told not even he could stand Lowe. What sort of recipe is that for a harmonious camp and dressing room? Surely you need everyone pulling in the same direction if you're to stand a chance and I think we saw that in the second half of the season albeit the main culprit was Mowbray and his preference for playing Bradley Johnson as a false 9 rather than sign a back up striker.

And who is already talking about selling players and "long term plans".

The time for Johnson imo would have been 2-3 seasons ago in any of the various campaigns when Mowbray was failing. Johnson could have had a good 10-12 games towards the end of the season and we could have seen if he was up to the task or not.

We need Tom Jones. "Why why why......is it Deila?"

Yet again the situation apparently hinging on any new man's willingness to take on Lowe, Johnson and Benson. Utterly bizarre.

She'd also probably be a better option.

Greg Coar's been at the Club a very long time. Nice bloke and wish him all the best at Wigan but you'd have to say we've been lacking in this respect for some time. Be interesting to see if this change has a positive impact.

What, because I asked PM why the appointment of Broughton meant we'd be fishing in a completely different pond as regards recruitment? I think it's a legitimate question to ask. If he'd said he thought the appointment of Broughton would revolutionise the pathway from Academy to first team I'd have thought that would have been a fairer proposition but I'd still want to see evidence of that happening first.