RevidgeBlue

Not for the first time recently, didnt like our substitutions at all today. I thought we were building up a bit of a head of steam around the 56th or 57th minute and were having a decent spell. Cantwell was putting more effort in than in the first half and ACD was looking very dangerous. However Eustace pulled them both off in what looked a predetermined move not based on how the match was actually going and with it went all momentum. Did Woodrow ever actually come on? The second two substitutions weakened us still further and the rest of the game after that was a procession. I dont mind Dolan but he looked well out of his depth against Premier League opponents. Overall it was a real eye opener how much bigger, stronger and quicker than us they looked. Physically it was men against boys or older men. Very disappointing but pales into insignificance next to the managerial situation.

Correct. He was looking for it and manufactured the contact. Was two thirds of the way down before the "contact" occurred. Very poor offside decision though, it never felt offside even to the naked eye.

(Tin hat on) I think Kargbo looks flashy and has a bit of pace but will prove to be a player who gets himself into lots of promising situations but who has no end product. Still miles better than Hedges though. Quite like the look of Dennis. He'll just about be getting up to full fitness by the time he goes back to Forest. Has Eustace's Uber to Derby arrived yet?

All came from Cantwell losing the ball. He's an absolute liability. Wahlsted Mk 2 didnt help either. Edit: Now it's 2. Game over.

Clear dive. Another one on an unnecessary yellow. Generally playing well though.

Bad decision. Unfortunately we're not Man Ure at home.

Stupid from Buckley. Completely unnecessary. Put himself under all sorts of pressure.

Toth's a disaster waiting to happen. Where do we manage to get them from?

If there's a silver lining to this particular cloud, there's no way Waghail would fork out for Rooney's wages.

Disagree completely on Lambert. Started off well for the first 5 games then lost the players and it was dire stuff from thereon in. It was only a couple of wins in the last two games of the season which were dead rubbers after he announced he was leaving that made his record look slightly more respectable than it really was. Also knew exactly what he was doing, was only in it for himself as evidenced by him putting in the break clause. He wasnt wrong with some of the things he said in the Press about the ambition of the owners of course but notwithstanding that he was quite happy to come in and take their money and get himself back on the job ladder for a limited period.

I still cant get my head round a team that theoretically has a very decent chance of being involved in the play offs just sitting back and allowing a team in 22nd to come in and poach their manager without so much as a murmur of dissent. I mean it has to be absolutely unprecedented in recent times doesnt it, can anyone think of any similar examples? Just when you think we couldnt plumb the depths under this regime any further something else crops up. Unsuccessfully attempting to flog Brockhall O Brien and Brierley - sabotaging the paperwork and sending it in late Mcguire deal pulled mid Atlantic- -far less favourable loan deal agreed - "forgetting" to press send A window where we've signed six players none of whom are fully match fit And now this As for Eustace himelf if he does want to leave, I wouldnt blame him for one minute but he shouldnt be involved today. Put Johnson in charge.

Yep. He cant be allowed to pull a stunt like that again.

To strip it down to brass tacks the first question Jackson, the Trust, the Fans Forum and anyone else should be asking is: "Why are the Club seemingly entertainining offers from other Clubs for our very successful head coach as opposed to dismissing them out of hand? Surely we are not prioritising a few hundred thousand pounds over the success of the team on the pitch?"

Disagree. The League's gone for the reasons you mention in the last para imo. Conversely for a few one off games in normal circumstances Id have been optimistic we could raise our game. Sadly I think we'll be completely demoralised by the rumours concerning the manager and be well beaten now.

In the general scheme of things after what happened to O Brien and Mcguire I dont think this will make a great deal of difference. Could our reputation get any worse after those two debacles?

Yep. Cant disagree with that but I suppose that runs the risk of paying off Sigurdsson then failing to land a replacement. End of the day, we left everything way way too late as always.

Maybe there is some truth in the thought that we were unsure as to whether we'd land a striker and therefore kept our options open with Sigurdsson in case all else failed. If thats what we did then we were perfectly within our rights to do so. We're not a charity. Well - we have been in the case of Sigurdsson and he has the bad grace to moan about it.

Ok, thanks for clarifying that. I've still zero sympathy for him, he can join a Club where the window is still open if he wants and realistically it wouldnt have made that much difference in practice if we'd told him we were de-registering him in advance. The regular season ends on May 3rd. He's not available for another month and if it takes him a further month to get up to full match fitness he's only missing a month's football for which of course he's being fully compensated. Needs to get over himself. Great post by Eddie above as well.

See this is where a normal Club would tell the enquiring Club to do one rather than be obssessed with how much compensation they could squeeze out of it.

As far as Im aware free agents can sign any time as long as the buying Club have space in their squad. All Rovers and Sigurdsson have to do is come to an agreement to terminate his contract. (Which will involve us paying all or part of it off)

If you're classing Toth, JRC, Buckley, Hedges and Cantwell as being amongst the spine of the squad you know you've got problems.

9th or 10 th might be optimistic. If teams around us win their games in hand we go 8th and only 5 points separate us from 14th.

Loath as I am to defend the Club hierarchy this is absolute BS from Sigurdsson. He isnt available for selection due to injury, wont be for some time, and hasnt been for even longer either. Even if he'd been fit and available and had been playing well, if the Club thought they could bring someone better in and they wanted to de-register him, that would be entirely their prerogative as well. You'd think from his comments that as a result of being de-registered he suddenly ceases to get paid or something. The worst that can happen to him is he continues to get paid a fortune for doing fuck all until the end of his contract. In reality its up to him now to stop swinging the lead, get fit and for him and his agent to pull their fingers out and negotiate a deal with someone else which will no doubt entail us having to pay him off in part to make up for the inevitable shortfall in wages.

If we lost our second manager in a year, this time to a bottom 3 side whilst we were sat in the plays offs, surely that would finally raise eyebrows and be the final straw for the fanbase?

Eeerily reminiscent of 1960. Dougan asks for a transfer to opponents Wolves on the eve of the then final. Eustance linked with a move away to a side in the bottom 3 today. Happy Days.