On the basis of the brief highlights on MOTD, I must say we looked all at sea defensively. How we could do with our best pairing of Todd and Nelsen. Did it look that way watching it live?

That's the worrying thing if it is correct. Didn't see today's game but in two of our other three games we created no chances and one chance against Portsmouth and Chelski respectively. So it seems that in three of our four games thus far we've mustered just 2 chances! The other worrying thing was why one of the forwards didn't have the bottle to step forward for our penalty. You'd have thought they'd have been snatching the ball off one another to add an easy goal to their tally in the current climate.

When he and Darren Peacock played together in the middle, you could get a double decker bus down the centre of our defence -sideways- and it wasn't all Lorenzo Amoruso mark one's fault. As for whether the town of Blackburn is or isn't a dump, that's not really the point. When you're lucky enough to be receiving 12k per week (back then) from the club and have the option of living in Manchester, Cheshire or the Ribble Valley AND things are going pear shaped on the pitch you really should have more sense than to make disparaging remarks in a foreign publication.

There's no accounting for poor taste but harsh to criticise the guy for that. Edit: Beat me to it MK.! And put it far more succinctly as well.

In terms of strengthening the first eleven and squad for a joint assault on Europpe and attempting to maintain last season's League position it's been extremely disappointing whilst those around us have strengthened. However, given the fact he seemingly has been given no money to spend, the manager has done extremely well. The real problem might be central midfield where one injury and one suspension could cause havoc. On the other hand if reports of a 4m pre Bellamy warchest were correct (hmmm.....seems very unlikely now) then we would have 6m available to spend in January following Kuqi's sale should we need it.

Sounds par for the course for Rooney as well. Rooney involved in more controversy - surely not. Nice balanced article in the Sun as well - after all it's not as if our international superstar could be at fault in any way.

If we lose, it would tend to suggest that we'll have an extremely hard season to put it mildly. Although Sheff utd. played extremely well opening day v Liverpool. 0-0.

Because he's miles past his "best" if that's what you can call it. What an awful signing. Never rated him, was part of one of our worst ever central defensive partnerships when he was here and helped get us relegated. Was carried for many seasons by the majestic Hypia at Liverpool and then as his form deteriorated even further was farmed out to Wigan and it seems now even they didn't want him. I'd rather keep Matteo and that's saying something. Hope to god Todd and Zurab stay fit otherwise it's Championship here we come with Henchoz and our untested Dutchman at the back, 64 years young. What a farce after finishing 6th last year.

Ditto - they might have 52 tickets left in a while.

Tend to agree with Col. I can't believe the controversy this thread is causing, I'm in the "couldn't care less camp" To me when the atmosphere is good, the drummers make no odds whatsoever one way or the other. When it's poor I actually think they liven it up slightly.

I was waiting to see what the club were going to come up with. But 479 is ridiculous.

Perhaps he's seen enough of Jeffers already.

Yeah, the established international had an absolute blinder didn't he?

I must say I'd rather people would stop using my name in this way. I don't know that John Williams had anything at all to do with me being removed from a Roverall View. Maybe he did, maybe he didn't but I'd rather people didn't simply presume on my behalf that that was the case. I'd like to think that everyone connected with the Club surely has a million and one more pressing issues they could be devoting their time to than that.

There was a Liverpool fan who texted TalkSport today appalled at the prospect of signing Neill. Said it would be like Portsmouth signing Ben Thatcher! For 2m, make Neill sit in the reserves until the January window. 3m, snap their hands off, given the contractual situation.

Yes................us remaining in the Premiership for the forseeable future whilst our nearest "rivals" (in geographic terms if not competitive terms get comparatively poorer and poorer! Errrr.............. we are your Lancashire United already in all but name aren't we Gordon? Haven't noticed Preston, Blackpool, Burnley, Accy Stanley Rochdale, Morecambe or Carlisle, in the top flight in recent memory. No true died in the wool fans of those clubs are ever going to support us but you've a fighting chance of picking up support from the next generation of youngsters if you have a Shearer, Duff or Bellamy. Can't for the life of me see anyone above a certain age wanting to support "Lancashire United" either. As for the youngsters, surely they might as well support us?

Bit harsh on McCarthy that imo. Quite a few times during the two home games he's received the ball in promising positions and looked to give it but has had no options. Symptomatic of how we're playing. There's little or no movement off the ball and we're not playing for each other like a "team". Almost as if we're in the "Just give it to Bellamy and he'll score" mode we seemed to be in at times last season.

Neill played really well against New Zealand, albeit against poor opposition.

Some people just have a certain presence or aura about them. Dalglish was in that category, possibly Keane is too. Although I doubt the throwing teacups style of management works these days.

Scotty talking bollux shock! Well , actually not that much of a shock at all really.

You can look at yesterday's game on two levels. On the one hand you could take Scotty's rose tinted view and yes, it's true we didn't play badly against a Chelsea side that barely seemed to come out of the dressing room. And yes, their penalty was harsh, the ball was travelling one way and the incident with Terry occurred in a different part of the pitch. And yes, we should undoubtedly have had a penalty which would have given us the princely sum of two points from three games rather than one. But that's overllooking the bigger picture slightly. After three games (two of which were at home) we're in pretty poor shape. We're generally creating NOTHING, seem unable to convert when on the rare occasions we do actually create a chance, and seem unable to shut the opposition out at the other end. Not a healthy mix. There just doesn't seem to be any dynamism or vibrancy to our play somehow. As Bryan said, is this really the side that finished 6th last year? Whenever we got the ball just outside the Chelsea area no-one seemed to want to drive into the box and put the defender under a bit of pressure. With the benefit of hind sight throwing Ooijer straight in for this game backfired horribly. It reminded me very much of Patrik Andesson all those years ago who had a mare in the League Cup semi against Sheffield Wednesday. He never really recovered. Hope Ooijer can. Just about the only real plus from yesterday apart from Bert was the fact that when Gally came on for MGP we seemed to have a much better shape somehow and looked a more credible proposition going forward. Overall though we have to improve drastically i.e start creating and converting a few chances and be far meaner defensively otherwise we'll be in real trouble.

Something definitely seems not right at Chelsea to me. They've now lost three out of their last four Premiership games and the team spirit in the camp doesn't seem to be as unified as during the last two seasons - players looking to leave etc. In addition I suspect they've gone from making Mourinho type signings, i.e. slightly lower profile names that will blend in well and form the strongest team and squad to Abramovich authorised signings of mega superstar status in the hope that this will bring instant gratification in the Champions League. That said their reverse at Boro couldn't have come at a worse time for us. They'll be desperate to avoid two on the bounce and undoubtedly still have a lot of quality. I think we'll get thumped 0-3. After that, with Tugay available again, Reid back to full fitness, Ooijer competing for places, and Roberts hopefully gaining a bit more confidence in front of goal, I think we'll start to climb the table.

The criticism regarding Gray and Todd has also reached hysterical proportions. I thought for the most part we defended very well last night, Friedel never had a thing to do until the last quarter of an hour, although admittedly during that period Todd made two bad errors for the goal and penalty that should have been. The problem was that in the first half we played some neat stuff but failed to take our chances ( a trait often displayed by teams that end up getting relegated). And in the second half, even more worryingly, once we went a goal up, we stopped playing our normal game and retreated into our shell. Rather than individual defenders being at fault the problem was more that the entire defence and midfield retreated far too deep and failed to press the ball. It's all very well saying that we were eight minutes away from hanging on to the points. But if the game had gone on for another ten or fifteen minutes we'd probably have lost. Worrying because we should be going out and stamping our authority on matches at Ewood.

Probably because everyone else can probably spot a country mile off that Reid was being asked to do a job in midfield whilst clearly not fully fit. Still good to see you're showing your usual "objectivity" as well regarding Reid. It just highlights of lack of strength in central midfield. One suspension and Reid has to soldier on nursing an injury.

A chap called John Myles (who I think featured in the fans jury) will apparently be taking up the hotseat as from Tuesday.