Sorry ozzie, I couldn't believe what I was reading when I saw that. You'll be urging us to hug a hoody and befriend a Burnley fan next!!!

Not unusually the 3 page review of Saturday's match in the LT had nothing to do with Rovers but was an interview with Sparky waxing lyrical about the RFW's career at United and his methods. "Ah well" I thought. "At least Andy Neild has managed to write a piece without directly championing Mark Hughes for the United job." Then I turned back a page to the fans jury and the question was "What do you think of all the speculation tipping Mark Hughes successor at Old Trafford?" I nearly choked on my lunchtime butty. The only bloomin' speculation to that end has been in our own local paper!!!! I've rarely seen his name mentioned elsewhere. As for the game itself I rarely if ever go into a match thinking we'll lose but this is the exception that proves the rule. Minus Savage, with them in their best form for five or six years, and if we play like we have been doing ever since Krakow away a 0-3 or 0-4 reverse beckons.

The RED SCUM have indeed been deservedly beaten 1-0. Hilarious for tonight but the worst possible result for us re:Saturday.

Good post. Well managed, there's no real reason why Rovers Premiership future should end in the forseeable future. On the contrary, given the gulf in TV revenues really we should be comfortably better than the 3 promoted clubs each year. On the flip side of the coin, poorly managed, big crowds are little guarantee of success as Leeds have proved and Newcastle are proving.

I wouldn't go so far as to say he's put many to shame but I would say Peter's performed a lot better in terms of his all round play than MGP when he's been on the pitch. It's still a difficult call though because even when he's playing poorly there's always the possibility that MGP will magic up a wonder goal out of nothing.

I have to disagree with that, Hughes is fielding virtually the only starting eleven he can with the players available to him. We've fielded virtually the same eleven players in recent games both in Europe and domestically so how is that treating Europe as a priority? Where it's gone pear shaped is that we gambled on only having two central midfielders in the summer (and Tugay who should really be a luxury 30 or 40 minutes here or there option) and we've been unlucky enough to see Savage and Reid injured at the same time. Was it an operational decision by Sparky or lack of funding? I suspect the latter but I suppose we'll never know.

No surprise at all about today's result, a continuation of the poor form v West Ham and for 75 minutes v Basle except even worse. Arguably as bad as we've played under Hughes. Once again the bottom line is we can't cope in midfield without both Reid and Savage. We're suffering badly from the lack of investment in the squad in the summer. Savage has become our Bellamy, we need to wrap him up in cotton wool because without him we're stuffed. That said there were still a lot of very disappointing performances in other areas of the pitch. The two centre backs got shrugged off the ball time and time again and just aren't imposing enough as a pairing. We need Todd back in that side. The midfield was non existent and the front two were once again extremely disappointing - waiting for the ball to come to them rather than vice versa. Bentley was the least poor performer today which wasn't saying much. No leaders on the pitch today and worrying times ahead. Hopefully we'll still have our heads above water by the time Savage and ultimately Nelsen and Reid return. One consolation though, it certainly isn't going to be dull this season, competing for the UEFA Cup on one front and battling against the threat of relegation on the other!

Rubbish, if in doubt blame Gray. The second was down to Zurab and he had a mare throughout. He and Ooijer aren't physically strong enough as a pairing.

Despite the deep embarrasment seemingly felt by the sanctimonious brigade on here who seem ashamed to venture out of their front door because of our crowds, Rovers attendances seem entirely consistent, with those of our nearest geographical rivals i.e. Preston, Burnley and the lowish 20,000 turnout at Bolton v Wigan today. On a related note, don't know if it's been mentioned specifically but the Dog on Revidge and the Hordens in Feniscowles plus 2 Pubs in Darwen were reported in the LT yesterday as having had satellite equipment confiscated.

Sorry the quote from JW was possibly misleading in isolation. What he was saying was that they couldn't experiment with the cut prices and then dump them after one game, they had to persevere with them as far as possible consistent with still giving ST holders value. He wasn't saying they couldn't do them again etc. Alan were exactly was that articlee you saw - can you reproduce it on here? It seems to be in direct conflict with what Egerton Vernon said c2001 when he said that the Trust fund was for the benefit of all the Walker Businesses and was a dynamic fund supplemented by profits from all the businesses. This was to counteract the suggestion that there was to be an ever diminishing pot for Blackburn Rovers. Of course there may have been a distinct sea change in policy since then. (Although shouldn't they still abide by the original wishes of the settlor i.e. Jack?) What we really need is an up to date and clear statement of intent from their Trustees regarding their relationship with the club. Are they committed long term to the club or are they looking to sell? (I think we already know the answer to that) Whilst they are still involved with the club, shouldn't some net transfer funding be made available to our exceptional young manager? etc etc. A key subject for BRISA to pursue?

Ideally what we need is something not with a huge capacity, but with about the same capacity of the Riverside or very slightly more and which is aesthetically appealing and fairly unique - instantly recognisable across the world so that when Sky home in, people across the world will instantly recognise it as Ewood Park. And not for the wrong reasons because they're looking at a potting shed. In the past we as a club have shied away from redevelopment of the Riverside or even spending money on repositioning cameras facing the more attractive three sides of the ground preferring to spend any available money on the team. That's quite sensible but I really think in the current climate we need to explore every angle and option of making attending a match at Ewood seem a more attractive proposition. As a side issue, redeveloping the Riverside would temporarily restrict capacity, possibly encouraging people to think a little harder about their purchase of tickets and season tickets.

"Disappointing" wasn't actually the phrase used by John Williams directly. Andy Neild wrote that officials were "slightly disappointed" (which is about right) by the turn out of 13789. JW said that "We can't keep dipping in and out with these initiatives" which is of course entirely correct.

Anyhow, if we get the point we need from the next two games, is there guaranteed money in it for reaching the last 32, and if so how much? I seem to recall John Williams being quoted in the LT as saying there wasn't much money in the UEFA competition until the knockout stages.

Yep, I was surprised at that after the incentives worked so well for the Salzburg game. Strangely enough the disincentive (if you can call it that) last night was probably the fact we'd got such a good result in Krakow. Some people perhaps regarded last night and the remainder of the group stages as a formality. "I'll save 15 quid tonight, watch it on telly, and go when we get down to the nitty gritty in the knockout stages" etc. A disappointing if not disastrous turn out, all the Club can do is to persevere longer term with the recent excellent pricing policy, (countless people I speak to still seem to think it's 30 quid plus to get in to Ewood because of the opening Everton game) and produce reasonable results and performances on the pitch.

That's not true Lee the majority of Sky money is allocated roughly in accordance with wher you finish in the table. And thankfully gate receipts at c6m form a very small percentage of our c40m turnover.

But getting x million more in TV money obviously doesn't count??????

True, I remember jim commenting it was no use playing well and losing after our brilliant performance in the 2-3 reverse at Spuds last season.

It's a "My dick's bigger than yours" thing. Completely irrelevant when you're supporting a team from a borough with a population of 140,000, half of which don't seem to want to turn up at present.

Unbelievable 3-0 scoreline from an extremely poor performance - at least until Tugay scored - and up until his annual screamer he'd hardly passed to a Rovers player. Neill looked like he couldn't be in the least bit arsed, hasn't there been some new transfer speculation about him this week? Gray had a poor game. Savage was just about the only player who turned up properly in the first half prior to injury. Mokeona was simply dreadful as his replacement. Bentley and MGP were quite lively throughout. The front two were awful, I thought they'd cloned Dwight Yorke twice and we'd resigned both. Yet again we looked a lot more potent when Gallagher came on for the last few minutes. Fantastic result in the context of the competition but not very encouraging for the immediate League games, particularly Savage's injury.

Just to bring this thread back up I was fascinated by events last weekend following the Everton v Sheffield United game. Neil Warnock was less than complimentary to say the least about Dermot Gallagher's performance and whilst he has a bit of a reputation for whinging unjustly, one of the allegations he made was that Gallagher was presented with a signed shirt by Everton before the game. They were making a bit of a thing about it on Talksport the following morning and the head of communications at Everton came on to give it the official spin "It was Dermott's last season and probably his last appearance at Goodison, and it was decided as a club in private that if he didn't send two of their players off etc they'd make a presentation to him after the game blah blah" Then David Moyes came on after without hearing what the other guy said and let slip that Gallagher had an Irish connection with Lee Carsley and had specifically requested a shirt signed by Carsley. Moyes didn't think there was anything at all untoward about this and said it was entirely commonplace for refs to ask for shirts signed by particular players. This raised more questions than it answered and I texted in saying that if it was commonplace for refs to ask for shirts signed by certain players this must indicate clear bias in favour of the team in question. The text was read out by Mike Parry and Andy Townsend who quickly dismissed it saying that refs didn't ask for them for themselves they were often used for charitable purposes etc. That is no doubt often true but it obviously wasn't the case in that particular instance and, sorry, there's no way Gallagher would award anything of any significance against Everton if he was hoping for a signed shirt from Carsley! How many more refs officiate games not wanting to jeapordise their chances of a signed Henry/Rooney/Gerrard shirt?

This could be the game that gets our stop start season back on the rails again, if we can secure the win that will virtually secure qualification. The key factor is Savage's availability, if he is fit and operating at full capacity we've every reason to hope we can produce a performance of sufficient vigour and tempo to win. If he's out I'd settle for a point and living to fight another day. If Emerton isn't fit I don't see that as a major problem we just need to employ Neill in his usual position and Gray at LB. On the left side Peter is a more than capable deputy for MGP, albeit maybe without the capacity for the wonder strike out of nowhere. And hopefully the game won't be played at quite the frenetic pace of a Premiership which should allow Tugay to operate more effectively than of late. What does worry me slightly is where the goals are going to come from. imo McCarthy has looked a bit jaded over the last three games and to me by the time Jeffers gets round to pulling the trigger, the chance has gone. If Nonda is unavailable I would play Bentley up front with Benni and Gallagher on the right. Or vice versa. The other question is can finally we stop conceding sloppy goals? Heaven help Todd if he'd been responsible for some of the rank bad defending we've seen recently. 2-1 Rovers, qualification assured, season back on track. Hopefully.

We're definitely suffering from the lack of investment in the team over the last couple of years since Hughes came to Ewood Park, not only has he not had a penny to spend in net terms, I think he's about 1.5m up in the black after selling Kuqi!!! He's worked miracles on what he has or rather hasn't had available to him but there's only so much you can do if you hit a particularly bad run of injuries. The crux of the problem is that we can just about cope with the loss of either Savage or Reid in midfield but certainly not both of them at the same time. The lack of depth in midfield was highlighted by many including myself in the summer, and i think it's already a season too far for Tugay. Instead of looking to offer him yet another deal we need to be looking at who will eventually replace him and, painful though it might be to the Board, this will cost money. Mokoena's position at the club must now be tenuous- he's shown that he isn't up to playing anywhere in the side other than mopping up as part of a five man midfield. Up front the injury to Roberts couldn't have happened at a worse time, with Nonda also sidelined. Whilst Jeffers is capable of very neat build up play I've seen nothing from him to suggest that he still has the quickness of thought or physical sharpness to find the back of the net. Another make do and mend option which hasn't come off. Elsewhere I actually thought Gray played quite well and we looked much more threatning once Gallagher came on down the right for the last few minutes. Quite what he has to do to earn a chance I'm not sure. But it was all far too little too late in the end. As many have said, with our first choice eleven on parade including Nelsen, Savage, Reid, MGP and Nonda/Roberts we're more than a match for anyone. Unfortunately a number of fringe players haven't stepped up to the plate over the last week. Whether the Trustees can or should provide Hughes with more funding is probably a debate for another day. And I'm sure we'll be fine when one or two injury absentees return. Suffice to say though I wouldn't be confident of us getting a result against anyone if both Reid and Savage were out.

I'm taking my two daughters along, who don't usually go, if everyone does that we'll have 36,000 home fans trying to get tickets.

I can't remember the last time we beat Bolton at home, and we're usually a bit slow out of the blocks after our European sorties so I will be very pleasantly surprised if we win this one. 1-1.

Spot on that Hughesey, with the proviso Blue Blood mentioned that we had a weak ten minutes at the end before we scored. I thought it was a very good performance on the whole, the only weak points on the day being Neill who couldn't cope with their right winger and MGP who had yet another poor game. On the chance he missed, he had the time to bring it down, take another touch, and make a cup of tea before sliding it in yet tried a near impossible first time wonder volley. But overall an excellent display and Hughes and his coaching staff continue to confound despite a lack of financial backing. Just hope our lack of cover in midfield until Reid returns doesn't ruin what is starting to look like a very promising season. An injury of any note to Savage now and we're stuffed. AS far as the UEFA Cup is concerned, if Salzburg and Krakow in particular are indicative of the standard of the competition, then there's every reason to hope we can remain in the competition well into the knockout stages. A win in the next game and we'll be through with a minimum of fuss and effort. I wonder though if yesterday's win now takes the emphasis off a win in our first home game slightly and the absolute priority now is not to lose? An interesting one. I've always subscribed to the theory that if you're playing games and winning you don't feel tired so let's hope that holds true for the Bolton game on Sunday. A proud time to be a Rover thanks to Mark Hughes and his coaching staff!