roversfan99

Hes probably our most valuable player, and im not sure hes that valuable. Currently recovering from a second serious injury, and not young or of sufficient quality to have Premier League interest.

Its good to have experience but we have absolutely no sellable assets or players who down the line we can polish up and sell on should we choose. Problem is, they cost money, and absolutely none is being made available despite all of the sales we have made. We need to have players like that because our squad is full of plasters and they get ripped off in the short term.

I never said they shouldnt give Eustace what he wants. They should, it should be a case of heres your budget, Eustace and associated footballing staff, use it how you choose. Sell and buy if you want. But backing him equates to giving him a decent budget to sign players. Being linked to players is not backing. But assuming we do sign a couple of loanees that he has chosen from a list. That still isnt backing him, thats allowing him to select from a very limited list because he hasnt been properly backed.

Its not about how it affects me or any one individual. And notice doesnt change public transport etc. How many times.

Eustace being backed would be the actual signing of players with a decent fee involved. Backing is not being linked to a couple of old players on loan by a journalist hack. Again, the burden of proof isnt on me. But it reads like a load of all shit to me. Just like the owners never refuse to sign a cheque, teams are sniffing around £10m Buckley and Rothwell's dad telling people on a train that Mowbray had hatched a plan to get all of the players whose contracts were expiring to all wait and sign for his next club. Feel free to believe it. Either way, point is that it is purely down to the owners as to how much money is made available. Thats the top and bottom of it. So compared to the Rothwell situation, we will actually get a fee for Dolan and he might want to stay more. Meaning that comparatively speaking, it made even less sense to keep Rothwell. It turned out to be the wrong one because Rothwell couldnt be arsed with the rest of the season, left on a free and those players we could have had with the money we would have got never arrived. Self explanatory. And we ended up in the Championship. What if Balaji Rao started telling Eustace to play certain players or that he wanted him to sign a specific player? Or that we are selling someone. Im guessing that would be ok if they felt it was right for the club. Nonsense. Give the football people the budget, let them make the footballing decisions. Simple as that. Dont need a long and laborious explanation.

The Preston game has again been moved to a stupid time to allow a presumably small number of neutrals to watch it. Earlier in the season we had one where only 1 running train allowed fans to get there before kick off. You always see these stupids comments about people not atending games. As if every fan should be equally willing to prioritise Rovers over every other potential source of enjoyment in their life regardless of cost.

Selling a centre back who has been outstanding this season in an area of no depth would be something else rather than bold.

This morning has been full of nonsensical theories and supposed ITK stuff that makes your stuff on our lack of budget just being down to Waggott not asking for it seem pretty tame. They are the ones who send whatever budget we have over, end of story.

Its not about the individuals in question. Thats the main point. You let the footballing people (manager and if you have one a director of football) make the decisions and the owners job is to provide the budget. They are better placed to make those decisions. If you dont trust them, get rid. If you do and their decisions are wrong, you get rid. The decision turned out to be the wrong one. It was compounded because if you go with the approach of keeping Rothwell, you provide reasonable funds without having to sell him. They didnt do that either. So we couldnt really strengthen, as we couldnt in the subsequent 2 winter windows, and each time our results dipped.

He backed the owners so he had the quite opposite reaction regarding Rothwell. At least now Mowbray has gone and like with Tomasson he went from agreeing with them to suddenly blaming them for many things. I suspect he would back Eustace if the Dolan scenario happened. Until Eustace left when he would look back and decide to point the finger. Hes linked us a few times to him I think in recent years and it didnt happen.

I cant believe that all of that has just been taken as fact.

Waggott and Pasha have both been here for ages, including when Mowbray was here. Makes no sense. And doesnt benefit them, why would they do that? Venkys have in the past couple of years in particular started slashing the budget beyond reasonable levels. Theyve become embroiled in self inflicted legal disputes and their interest seems to wane further every year.

What does "it says everything about him" even mean in this context? Due to your dislike of him going well beyond unhealthy levels, you often suggest things about his integrity beyond his competence as a football manager. Im guessing this is similar but im struggling to work out the logic. Selling Rothwell for a fee as opposed to letting him go for free and signing a couple of players on long contracts with the money would have not only potentially benefitted the team for the rest of the season (a wantaway player who then went on to play poorly and a couple of new signings to help to strengthen a shallow squad) but also whoever was to take over after him, leaving him with a couple of extra players to build around. We needed some reasonable money to strengthen. Not only did they not provide it, but they wouldnt even allow him to trade to generate the funds we neeeed. We then had similarly a lack of budget in the following 2 winter windows. In all 3 seasons our form dipped as our small squad caught up on us. Youve even started suggesting that the blame lies with Waggott for not asking in an attempt to again not blame the owners.

100%. If they get it wrong they fall on their sword.

Middlesbrough come in for Dolan in this window, offering £3-4m. Eustace wants to sell and buy a couple of players, knowing he has a minimal budget otherwise, bur the owners refuse. Dolan stays, we arent selling him to a rival, he will leave for free in the summer instead. Eustace then admits to the media that he is annoyed that he wasnt allowed to do it. Would you agree with the owners and think that Eustace is wrong?

If we play Garrett and O'Riordan, 2 players who clearly arent up to Championship standard as the former has already shown and as both failing to get game time in League 1 highlights. We block them from getting a loan in the second half of the season.

The Portsmouth game being a few days after makes this selection a bit harder. I always favour going for it in the cup and can never get my head around people who say they dont care about cup games. Our play off push is unlikely to be maintained but a win could also help to boost confidence after a very poor run of form. That being said, a small squad and a game so soon after mean that 2 or 3 definitely need resting. Tronstad is the obvious one, the centre backs need a rest and we need to protect Beck. The problem is, we lack depth in a number of areas. Buckley is crap, McFadzean is our only centre back cover and he will struggle in a back 4 so we will have to play at least 1 of the main centre backs and in other areas we dont have any good cover. We also know that signings wont be here in time. Toth JRC Hyam McFadzean Brittain Buckley Baker Hedges Weimann Dolan Leonard Beck, Pears, Batth, Tronstad, ACD and Cantwell can all come back to start v Pompey.

Even at his peak, Schlupp was more of a utility man than the type of winger that we are crying out for. One that will offer us a goal threat and provide some individuality. We would (if it happens, which is up in the air) be getting a jack of all trades who will do his hard work but wont add many goals, will only be here temporarily and will be on a physical decline.

The MAIN reason why we failed to sustain our promotion push, and why we have also seen dips in results in the following 2 seasons during the second half of the season. Is due to budget cuts from the owners and an inability to really strengthen in January with any sort of reasonable budget. Our squads lack of depth and quality caught up with us, and probably will again this year. The squad is a bit stretched at the moment and the cracks are already starting to apear. There are tactical reasons etc across those seasons that can be questioned, but that is the main reason.

I never said either of those things. Who Eustace wants is obviously most important. Although according to you on the topic of Rothwell, the owners should just sign whoever they want... But if Eustace does want Schlupp or at least thinks he is the best option. That would probably be indicative of a very poor list of players due to budget restrictions. And also, I would disagree with him signing. Just because Eustace picks him doesnt mean I need to agree. And also, my point was it is hard to be enthusiastic when so much money has vanished without reinvestment to be potentially signing players in the bargain basement of limited ability. Because these arent the sort of signings that will either get us into the top 6 or benefit us beyond this season. They may be the best we can afford, and better than nothing.

You are fixated on the Giles situation as if he was a special talent who we wasted. Hes proven since that he isnt particularly good. He was used strangely but I dont think he suited the team anyway, his sole strength is crossing and we had a counter attacking side that didnt have the same attackers that Cardiff did where he had that bit of success. You fixate on people who have left and put all the blame on them, same with Tomasson who you again didnt say a bad word about until he went. I think you are trying to convince yourself that the people who messed up previous seasons have gone, the owners are still here so you deflect blame away and think this is the year everything changes. £20m of sale proceeds has gone, oh well, which QPR striker can we sign on the cheap to fire us to promotion. I dont understand how anything other than this can be correct. Footballing people decide footballing matters. Owners provide money and communicate to CEO.

Yes, full autonomy to the manager and if applicable the director of football. Ie the people specifically employed to deal with football matters. It doesnt require hindsight to see that replacing a want away player with 6 months left and replacing with 2 or 3 long term aasets to improve the side short and long term is a wise move. Although hindsight does prove we made the wrong call.

It could have made us stronger though, short term and long term. Wouldnt have been hard considering how Rothwell chucked in the towel. But either way, the issue is the owners shouldnt block it AND then refuse to provide reasonable funds. We fell away and as has been the case in the 2 seasons since the blame falls on the owners.

Its one of them. I cant personally get excited about which Palace veteran utility man we might sign or which QPR squad player we could sign. Because fundamentally, I know that working under such meagre resources will see us fall away, I know it isnt enough. History backs up that suggestion, the squad is already buckling. And longer term, it leaves us with big issues in the summer. Do I think Schlupp solves one of the problems we have at the moment? No.

You are defending them on this matter then.