Just got in from a night out in Middlesbrough. Fortunately it was a lot better than the game. Terrible game between two poor sides. We actually took the lead through an excellent goal from Travis against the run of play at that point and it was the first effort I could recall feom us being on target. After that Boro were so bad I thought we were nailed on for the win until Wally Walton gifted them a goal by pushing a tame shot straight back out into the six yard box. Following that we were lucky not to lose as Gestede in particular put a header wide from point blank range when it was easier to score. The result and performance merely highlighted for me we're going nowhere and never will do with Mowbray in charge.

Really don't think they would. Similarly you could put up with finishing 15th or lower temporarily if you could see evidence that there was a promising team of youngsters emerging. But not a load of sad sacks who are never going to get you promoted and never going to get any better.

It's not hard info, I'm only surmising, but you're right, if your projections are anywhere near correct then this summer is vital.

Please don't. Being made aware of Chaddy's increasingly frantic attempts on Twitter to find out if there was any Rovers related news when he should have been enjoying a night out with his good lady was bad enough, the funniest thing I've seen in a long time. Like Alan Partridge self imploding live on air when Roger Moore should have been coming in. But didn't. Don't take it the wrong way Chadster, everyone should have your passion and enthusiasm.

I'm fairly sure the rule is simply that you can't lose any more than £39 m over the 3 year period. As far as I'm aware there's no restriction on annual losses before that which is presumably why you see some Clubs vastly overspending in the hope that they'll be promoted before the sanctions come into effect.

That would sound feasible wouldn't it, but if there is a bit of wiggle room overall it makes the failure to bring a couple of bodies in last month even more inexcusable.

This transfer approach of Mowbray/Waggott/Venus is a work of art and will surely become the industry standard for a lot of Clubs. 1) At the start of a transfer window put in various bids for players at a fraction of the asking price. 2) Sit back and pick fluff out of your navel until just before the end of the window. Make regular press releases to elicit sympathy about how difficult the market is and how other Clubs are pricing you out. Discourage loan activity by making it plain that any potential incomings will only be coming in as squad members and not into the first team. 3) With a couple of days left before the end of the window if you've done your job properly and pitched your bids low enough and been plain enough with your press releases then you should have successfully blocked any permanent activity and ensured other Clubs won't want to loan you players. Well done! Release a few hard luck stories about alleged near misses and put your feet up until the next window then repeat. 4) If despite your best efforts above you are still getting excessive heat from either the owners or fans about lack of activity then there are 2 options: a) In the extremely unlikely event any of your original targets are still available and haven't been snapped up by Clubs making a sensible offer, go back in and pay the original asking price for a player you could have had weeks or months earlier or more likely if they have been snapped up: b) Vastly overpay for anyone who is left regardless of whether they suit your purpose or you've done adequate research on them. If you're not too keen on them label them as "one for the future" and promptly forget about them as soon as they arrive at the Club. Genius.

I'm guessing J*B's figures exclude our annual operating losses which usually run at 10-15 m p.a. As such we needed a manager who invests any available funds wisely, offloads players who aren't contributing and keeps the size and balance of the squad under control. In Mowbray we have the polar opposite.

I think you're being argumentative for the sake of it there. I'd have sacked him long ago and if it was my money wouldn't give him a bean. However as it appears that the owners seem happy with the job he's doing, his job appears relatively secure and the owners don't seem overly concerned either that he has wasted millions of pounds of their money, it stands to reason that a poor manager with superior players will fare better than a poor manager with worse players!

I want a well paid job in the so called Rovers "Recruitment" Department. Must be the cushiest job in Britain. Assuming nothing happens in the next hour, over the last two January windows we've brought in a total of one player who hasn't even started a game for us, making just two substitute appearances and who was here on loan before we brought him in permanently so we knew all about him. We haven't even gone to the bother of shifting anyone out this time round either. Money for old rope. Ten years on and people are still taking advantage of Venky's it seems.

You beat me to it there Mercer. An essential part of player trading is moving players on who are no longer part of your plans. We'd have a damn sight better chance of staying within FFP if the manager hadn't wasted most of our budget two seasons running on expensive flops, not brought in other players who he then barely used once they arrived, not handed out new long term deals to players who were never that good or getting past it or both and not treated the football Club like a social Club where the players had the option whether they wanted to stay or leave regardless of whether they are in the manager's plans.

Sky still going big on the King story. Either they aren't aware of Bournemouth's response or are trying to con viewers into thinking there's actually something happening on deadline day.

There has to be a chance now that Dack will walk on a free six months after returning from injury. Wonder whose bright idea it was to only give him a deal until the end of next season?

Not much use if we've any genuine designs on the play offs.

Bournemouth have apparently tweeted that Man Ure have ended their pursuit of King. Hardly surprising given they were asking £50m. Even if we did get a fortuitous £10m windfall out of this at some point in the future, would you want Mowbray spending it?

Given the quality or lack thereof of Walton and Leutwiler Id say that's a strange move. Bit like loaning out Wharton and Magloire when we were already short on centre halves.

He's probably going to have to starve on the basis the actual price of the deal is £17.99.

Go on on then I'll provide the punchline........ It's never deterred you in the past! ?

Atsu is presumably a last minute panic idea having as usual drawn a blank elsewhere all month on our main targets.

You'd have thought they were a bit long in the tooth to be arguing about who sat at the back! If only they got as wound up on the pitch with each other when someone made a mistake which led to a goal!

I can see both sides of the argument on this. You're right with what you say above but at the same time he wasn't particularly good either. That said, I wouldn't have said he was particularly any worse than other dollopers we've had like Lowe and Evans. Maybe Evans isn't "Lowe Mark 2" maybe the latter 2 are "Andrews Marks 2 and 3" !

There's a surprise. Initial reaction from Toon fans on Twitter seems to be that they're disappointed they haven't been able to offload him.

To be fair you did claim last night that the deal that we appear to have been blown out of the water on was a virtual certainty to happen and that it was just a case of dotting the i's and crossing the t's etc. Other than that both of you should probsbly stop willy waving at each other or get a room. You're entitled to post info if you wish and he's equally entitled to believe it or not. For my own part I find it hard to give much credence to a rumour where no names or specifics are given but there you go, I'm sure most people appreciated the info.

Funny, your reading of that. Can't comment on this player as I know nothing about him, I take that to mean it's a " no go" because as usual we're not in the ball park on financial terms. Great this tyre kicking lark. We can spend all month sniffing round quality players trying to make it look like we're doing something and by 11 p.m.tonight won't have spent a bean! Lovely!

'''We're just looking to add some depth.......we're Not looking to replace anyone in our team". And that ladies and gentlemen is why imo Mowbray needs to be replaced yesterday and why we would never challenge if he was here for a hundred years. He has no interest whatsoever in trying to improve. Condemned out of his own mouth. How can any owner or Chief Executive read that and think he is the right man for the job? And as a side note for God's sake don't admit in public you're a poor negotiator, I think we've all sussed that out after three, soon to be four, fairly disastrous transfer windows anyway but by saying that you're just throwing out an open invitation for people to try and mess you about in future. Ironcally I don't think the problem is what Mowbray thinks it is. I don't think there's anything wrong with having a valuation and sticking to it, there's no skill in just going back time after time until you end up paying the original asking price, the skill is in assessing what you think the other side will accept and pitching your offer slightly lowerbut close enough to tempt them into doing a deal. Our problem seems to be we have no realistic idea of what players are worth in the current market, put completely unrealistic offers in at the start of each window then wonder why no-one is getting back to us. And then panic and either miss out or overpay for someone else altogether at the last minute.