jim mk2

It's a Middlesbrough thing.... Southgate and Mowbray from the same stable You can see why Southgate never hacked it really as a club manager.

Couldn't even qualify for the World Cup Try again

England lucky to survive that onslaught. Southgate gets so many things right, but then gets alot wrong too. First win in Italy in 60 years though, so a reason to celebrate

Gareth's tactical nous doesn't get any better. Some strange subs here

Italy are a poor side and have been for a while. They failed to qualify for the World Cup months after winning Euro 2020. England players should be kicking themselves for losing that final - and in our own national stadium too. Why didn't we play like this when it mattered? Congratulation to Arry. Steven Gerrard on Channel 4 encouraging him to leave Tottenham. That'll go down well with Spuds fans!

How the other half live: an interesting piece on how elite footballers get to matches around England. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/65017565 Now I understand that the time when the top football clubs travelled everywhere by train or road (because we had a transport system that worked) has gone. But is it really necessary for Nottingham Forest to get a 27-minute flight to Blackpool, or Ben Chilwell to fly from London to Leicester (an hour by train)? Of all the forms of transport short-haul flights are known as the worst emitters of greenhouse gas emissions. Do these clubs and players care (or know about) the damage they are causing?

End of the 2010-11 season, at the old Upton Park, we were in danger of going down for a while but ended about 15th IIRC after winning a 3-2 thriller at Wolves on the last day Robbie Keane missed a sitter for West Ham near the end so we escaped with a 1-1 draw. Their fans are 'orrible, Cockney geezers. Decent Rovers team - N'Zonzi, Samba, Emerton, Nelsen, Olsson etc

Isn't it best they are in the lower tier? West Ham stuck us in their lower tier years ago and their fans in the top tier gave us a good old Cockney welcome by lobbing spittle at us from a great height right through the match Good decision by Rovers officials - got it right for once

Luton ...... please don't. It's bad enough southern third division and fourth division clubs such as Brentford, Bournemouth, Brighton and Watford etc in and around the top flight in recent years without another non-entity going up. To see them in the Premier League while we're still languishing would hurt Luton's ground this season is among the worst I've seen - and that goes back to the 1960s when many grounds were smelly and decrepit and falling down

Palace, Southampton and Bournemouth would be a nice trio for the drop - 3 southern clubs to be replaced (hopefully) by 3 northern clubs including 2 from Lancashire 😁 Having seen them play Rovers in the Cup though I wouldn't be surprised if Leicester went down. They looked a poor side (albeit without Maddison that night).

Yes it was, Leicester in the Cup recently was close but Celtic never got a kick until the last few minutes when they scored (and that was a header). Martin O'Neill was a wily old manager though and he had sorted out in the second leg

Superb article 3 paragraphs from it I don't know how (or why) referees do it when you get scumbags like Conor Coady and their families. It should be compulsory for players, as part of their football "education", to be taught to respect officials on and off the pitch. Marriner and his assistants were in good spirits an hour after the match, as they were led outside to the car, past the team dugouts, which were now populated by Everton players and their families. A few players nodded at them, but most went quiet, as if a teacher had entered the classroom. Then Conor Coady, one of Everton’s centre-backs, turned to his two young children. “These are the referees,” he said, pointing at Marriner. “And we don’t like them … Boooooo!” As the toddlers responded by pointing and booing, too, the other players and their families laughed and joined in. On the way back to the hotel, Westy assured me that this sort of behaviour was normal. “Referees are the pantomime villains,” he said. “People think we get paid to turn up, ruin everyone’s day, and fuck off, but they don’t see all the work that we do.”

Going back decades Rovers were known for having a higher proportion of women at matches than most other clubs. I’m not sure of the reason but maybe we’ve always been a family club. We often went to games as a big group, mums, aunts, sisters, daughters, the lot. They know their football.

Back in the 1990s glory days we were pulling them in from the Fylde, north Lancashire up to Furness, and even parts of Yarkshire. If we can get only some of the back we'll be doing well.

We can't keep waiting until we're "ready" for the PL. If the chance is there, you have to go for it and see what happens. Yes, it will be tough and we'll struggle but top-class sport is hard. A West Brom-supporting friend prefers to be at the top of the Championship instead of labouring in the PL basement because he likes seeing his team win more often Is that what it's really all about?

The worst ever: England v West Germany, World Cup 1970. 2-0 up and lost 3-2. Absolutely harrowing. Still hurts now. For Rovers, there's been so many overs the years and today was as bad as any

The post was about the FA Cup.

FA Cup, read the post

Look at some of our (excellent) crosses today. Even an average finisher would have been on the end of at least 2 of them. Gallagher just doesn't have that ability. He's been playing quite well of late by his standards but the bottom line if we are going to get anywhere is that he needs to be replaced

A Wembley FA Cup appearance (even if it was a semi-final) for the famous blue and white halves is something I'd love to see in my few remaining years and to get so close is hard to take. While not quite reaching the heights of the Leicester tie Rovers put in a excellent performance and the players can hold their heads high. Lady luck did not smile on us today. This time next year, we'll be at Wembley, Rodney. Let's hope so. The sands of time are running out

Not worried about going out of the cup. Piss poor post

Subs killed us but we should have 3 any way

The subs have insetted us we look disorganised

Gallagher is always never quite there

Aynsley Pears and Sammie Szmodics Don’t call them Shirley