Because the Utd fan will only be there one game a season but the floating Rover might return several times that season and many times in the future. A pound is a bit of an extreme example to use for ManUre, prices wouldn't have to be that low.

The flip side to that argument is: How much do you make out of that City fan per season? 32 quid? If you attract a floating Rovers fan in for 12 quid , you may lose 20 quid on the City fan initially but if the Rovers floater comes three or four times the following season as a result you're well in pocket.

Problem with that is officially of course the club have to be seen to be completely opposed to all illegal broadcasts. I have to hold my hands up here and confess to being a bit hypocritical as I actually like watching a lot of the away games on the dodgy channels.

Good point. It's up to the Rovers to get that point across properly with their marketing. Especially with the newly self styled "Accrington Stanley Evening Telegraph" promoting Stanley's cause.

The point is the "what more can the club do?" argument doesn't wash anymore. We aren't doing very much at all different to what we've ever done. ie. offer the odd price promotion. Circumstances change all the time (as with the current foreign TV fad and in Rovers case demographics) and you have to react accordingly.

Another thing I would advocate is making a section of the ground cheap 10 quid pay on the turnstile on a first come first served basis. Left hand side of the darwen end ideally or possibly move the family stand and use the top of the Blackburn End for that purpose?

Similar scenario. Now chasing Champions League/UEFA spot.

Au contraire we saw that when we were chasing promotion in 2001 dropping the price to 5 quid saw a gate of 27,000 plus for a midweek game v Sheff Utd and very nearly 30,000 v Portsmouth at Easter.

All of it. That's why I didn't select part of your post to quote.

The kids season tickets and half season tickets are exceptional value sure, and should be continued and marketed to death. But once you've missed them the club need to be sensible about pricing for individual games. To charge 15 quid as with yesterday for kids for any game with the stadium nearly a third empty is ridiculous. You may only earn a pound if it's a quid a kid but it's one pound more than you earn from an empty seat! You don't have to go down to a quid every game but I don't think there's any excuse for kids tickets being more than a fiver at the moment. Rovers are going to have to be a lot more creative than we've been in the past due to the new "watch it in the Pub on dodgy Arab TV" phenomenon. I caught the end of an interview with the Watford chairman Graham Simpson yesterday and he sounded like a breath of fresh air. They seemed a lot more proactive than us at getting fans in as opposed to smply talking about it. They're gunning for automatic promotion but he didn't see it as the fan's duty to dutifully troop through the turnstiles. Quite the opposite. He said they were the only professional club in Hertfordshire and it was their duty to share the "Watford experience" with the masses. They were bussing people in from alll over the County. They were still selling season tickets for the remaining few games at discounted rates and had sold 500 that week. He himself was going round the area giving talks at places like Stevenage sharing what they were trying to achieve. Their academy was absolutely crucial to their business plan. Most interestingly they were doing a cheap block ticket for the remaining 5 home games at 60 quid for adults and 40 quid for kids. Rovers are very much in a similar boat. With all due respect to our smaller neighbours You simply can't get the "Premiership experience" or excitement like yesterday anywhere else in East Lancs. An imaginatively promoted and priced "Champions League Charge" ticket for the remaining games perhaps?

Absolute garbage.

I understand the point you're making but billhooks to that, let's have ManUre winning sweet FA (again) and us qualifying for the Champions League!

If we get 15 points out of the next 18, as long as the solitary defeat isn't against Spuds, I'd say we'd be nailed on for the Champions League. Over the last 2 seasons 60 and 61 points have been good enough for 4th spot. It may be very slightly more this time but there's nothing in Spurs recent form to suggest that they will get anything like 2 points per game over the last eleven matches. (Which would give them 68) 63 I think would certainly do it. Anything in the 60-62 range may yet be good enough again however. The trouble with us as we've seen countless times over the last 5 seasons is that we come to a difficult looking fixture and win, then facing a subsequent easier looking run of fixtures things go pear shaped. Find the answer to that one and we will be cooking on gas.

Arsenal are very much like ManUre these days, stop Rooney and you stop United, stop Henry and you stop Arsenal.

Fantastic performance today. I posted after the Everton debacle that I was ashamed to be a Rover after that performance. Well exactly the opposite tonight. Very proud. We were superb for 70 minutes, Arsenal never had a serious effort on goal in that time and the only worry at half time was that Todd and Savage had both passed up fairly simple chances to make it 2-0. On 70 minutes Friedel was finally called upon to make an excellent save and if there was a slight criticism today we sat back far too deep for the final 20 minutes and stopped doing the things that had got us in a winning position in the first place. But that's perhaps being churlish and we held out without too many problems. Everyone played well today but I thought Todd, Savage and Bellamy were exceptional. Todd fully deserved his MOM award and Savage was back to his best after a couple of below par performances. Up front Bellamy proved the difference for the second straight home game and when fully fit and in the mood seems virtually unstoppable. I thought he might be good when we signed him but I'm amazed how much better than that he actually is. Absolutely top drawer. Once again his fitness over the last eleven games will be crucial. It goes without saying but you have to put in a big shout for Messrs. Hughes, Bowen and Eddie Niedsthingy at this point . Only 995,000 spent and we've been transformed from relegation certs to live champions League contenders. How good a job are they doing?

Well no, it's to finish one place higher up the table in 4th! It's still imperative we get no worse than a draw next Sunday.

You must be joking. Todd was magnificent today, the ball was attracted to him like a magnet.

A friend of mine prefers "Amotortoise". Equally uninspired but no-one will convince him it isn't ribtickingly funny. Rather than blame Amoruso who seems to be a genuinely nice guy off the pitch perhaps the finger should pe pointing (again) at a certain ex manager. Would love to know who made what out of the dealings that saw Berg leave us for nothing, us sign a vastly inferior player of the same sort of age for 1.5m, and Berg eventually join Rangers.

The next two games will make or break the season. If we are to maintain the improbable dream of Champions League qualification then we can't really afford to lose either and 4 points will be the minimum requirement. A win from either would probably be enough to keep UEFA hopes alive. For some strange reason, and somewhat unusually, I'm not feeling optimistic pre match about either game. Let's hope I'm totally wrong.

Wigan 2 Spurs 2. Got to be a good result for us. Could West Ham be the fly in the ointment?

Derbyshire came on as sub during Parkes testimonial and scored a goal that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Only a really natural goalscorer would have even "seen" the opportunity he successfully converted.

Yep, I've always tended to like Smith, but cant feel much sympathy for him after the way he targeted Savage in the 2 Cup games.

Is that all? So are we!.

No problem with the Villa promotion, however I was thinking of taking my 2 daughters to the Arsenal game until I saw it was 15 quid for juniors. I don't think so at that price! I have always argued the club do this the wrong way round. First and foremost we need to get BLACKBURN fans into the big games. Only then if they like what they see will they be tempted to go and see the Charlton/Fulham fixtures etc. Another opportunity lost.

Originally you compared Reid with Bert