Rashford has been crap for a while, well before Ronaldo's arrival to which there is no reason why he couldnt work in tandem with him. His body language and work rate is appalling, when looking at United troubles for some reason the focus of the media goes straight to Ronaldo and Pogba (im not saying they are without blame) but its definitely not just them, look on Sunday when Pogba had gone off and they stopped trying with Rashford and Lingard still on the pitch. A bit like Alli, he has obvious talent but has always been overrated and maybe he can be rejuvinated but he looks a busted flush already who believed his own hype.

When Rothwell goes, that will be on the owners who refused to consider allowing the manager to sell in January whilst he had value and bring in 2 players that he wanted. Out of interest, does Mowbray get any credit for that excellent defensive record? Also, does he get credit for getting us "on the cusp of something sensational" and indeed still being in the top 6 now? I stood there in the freezing cold being bored to death like others did whilst you sat at home having to fork out for a takeaway after yet another misplaced bet so I could easily allow my frustration to lead to one sided comments but its important to have balance. Half of our game is excellent, half is in crisis at the moment. We are in a good position as things stand.

Boring shite, a terrible way to spend a Tuesday night watching that crap. Our incompetence in front of goal will surely cost us a play off place. Firstly, the defence. Mowbray is not getting enough credit for how solid we are at the back, Millwall not helped by negative tactics (we werent scoring and they had won 5 on the bounce so they could feasibly have nicked a winner had they tried) never had a sniff. The wing backs were fine too, Rankin Costello aside from his miss was better than usual. Kaminski really cannot kick however. Going forward, we wouldnt have scored if the game was 12 hours long. The best summary of Gallagher is that when we need a goal, he was replaced by a kid who scored 1 in 10 for Halifax this season. I get the desperation but he isnt the answer. Giles was ineffective on the wrong side, as were both Dolan and Hedges. Buckley was good in the first half but its no use if he is going to miss sitters. Mowbray is getting the blame for the January window as if we had a massive kitty available to which there is no evidence. Although perhaps a forward on loan would certainly have helped. The options we had today, a 200k winger from Aberdeen, a kid released by Preston last summer and another kid who couldnt score in the Conference shows where we are at in terms of options. No ambition even in January from the owners to reinvest any of the Armstrong proceeds. Brereton and Dack both out, Gallagher is a waste of money of which there is no doubt but 2 out of 3 signings over 1m have been proven goalscorers so I suppose its not a bad record there but why he signed Gallagher is beyond me. He did certainly get his selection and his subs wrong today though. Giles on the right needs to stop, totally neutralises him. The subs were too late and didnt do anything, the Vale one was desperate. Badly need Dack back, I suspect he will be needed for a cameo on Saturday as I cant see us scoring prior to that. Brereton is being missed more and more by each passing game too.

I thought id suggest changing up a forward line that hasnt been scoring goals. I dont think hes the type of player who focuses on crossing the ball no matter what he plays. Whether he plays right left or central he is always 100 miles an hour trying tricks etc. Sometimes causing defenders a real problem, but sometimes tricking himself and not yet causing enough genuine problems in the final third. Enough to work with though and hopefully that decision making will improve over time, not really at a stage yet where he is ready to start every game for a promotion chasing team but an asset to have around.

Agreed with much of what has already been said. He definitely does have value and playing him as a false 9 does allow his main strength ie his pressing and energy to thrive, but there has to be far more at the end of it. He has a long way to go however, the excessive step overs miles away from goal may look flash but they need to be toned down I would suggest. His awareness needs to improve, the example already given at the weekend where we had a man over and he didnt look up showed that. And not only does he too infrequently score or set up a goal, but he doesnt look like he is about to do those things too often either, he isnt a threat very often deep in the final third/penalty box. I suppose he was a kid with no senior football who came on a free from Preston, so its not a case of he should be this or that, he is only 18 months into his career. I do think though that the circumstances of his breakthrough and how it was so unexpected at the expense of a local rival and also how he appears off the pitch, very grounded and a seemingly nice guy who helps others, that people often overlook his defeciencies on the pitch.

Pre match!

I think that is the only time that Dolan has crossed like that and Gallagher is hardly the ideal target to score from such chances to be fair.

We really havent. We have had at times marginally more of the ball but we certainly havent been dominating possession. Teams seem to be playing deeper against us. Brereton as a right footer has cut in from the left onto his right and scored 20 goals. Our wing backs are always on the right side like Spence is.

Lampard's Everton look even worse than Benitez's somehow. The "right fit for the job" indeed.

For them, such is the importance of the games, the risk is worth taking. If they don't do well in these 2 games, they wont be at he World Cup.

I get why they want him from Chile's side, but as a Rovers fan, following the initial novelty factor, Chile are really becoming a bit of a hindrance to us, with the extra games, the extra travelling, and now potentially risking him when he isnt fully fit and there is nothing that we can do. https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/sport/19974714.blackburn-rovers-chile-locked-talks-ben-brereton-diaz-fitness/ I can't say I'd be disappointed if they lost the first of their 2 games coming up and had no chance of the World Cup going into the second!

2 more games I think.

Surely that would depend on how we finish the season? If we made the play offs and/or got promoted, surely that would be the ultimate progression? 4th suggests a level of competence, of course the only full gauge will be after the full season.

A good striker will also anticipate potential chances which Gallagher doesnt really do. I dont think playing him central will lead to a significant improvement in his performances and I definitely dont think loads of crosses against big centre backs will be too fruitful as he is deceptively poor in the air. That being said, it would make sense to try him centrally just to try something slightly different.

A reason why I was unsure as to whether to suggest Gallagher up front is that he isnt a physical presence and playing against 3 big centre backs, crossing balls in to him will not be a successful plan. Quick players and balls slipped through might be the way forward.

That implies that any signing would have been a loan, Premier League clubs offering their players to us. Hardly a sign of available finance.

Giles has been a disapointment so far, he always impressed me at Cardiff and we did need strength in depth at left wing back but with Pickering now back, he needs to play further forward. He is a creative player who can cross but unfortunately our only good forward got injured soon after his arrival.

Key being the word "if."

I don't think there was a specific timeline or date of any bid for Dembele. The fact that he left on deadline day doesn't mean that Bournemouth bid or declared interest on that same day, never mind us. If you want to take your interpretation as proof that funds were there and not spent and put it solely down to incompetence by Mowbray, Waggott or whoever, fair enough. I tend to judge available budgets by what we do spend, not by rumours of deals that fell away. It doesn't even seem that Mowbray has full autonomy on transfers anyway, not being given the choice to sell and replace as he wishes, so it wouldn't surprise me if we didn't have a specific budget and Mowbray could only spend funds based on specific parameters, including age/position, but again that would be purely speculation on my side. The idea that supporters with no direct influence on anything can lack focus on this season is a bizarre one. But if this is genuinely your stance, why have you spent all weekend talking about contract offers for beyond this season?

As I said, we have no idea if that bid was made on the condition that Rothwell was about to be sold, which is plausible considering that Mowbray mentioned 2 coming in with the proceeds. All ifs buts and maybes, we spent 700k. I know, youve taken my comment out of context. Either way, not much to supplement a promotion push, especially when 500k of it goes on a player unfortunately injured straight away.

I would certainly have liked to have seen him more. That being said, suppose you are limited trying to improve a Championship attack with 200k.

Weird how its solely down to management incompetence that Armstrong was never replaced rather than budget constraints, yet even if it was merely a case of the management not getting deals over the line, that money never seems to get spent in subsequent windows.

Again I was more identifying the potential reasons and stances behind people specifically not attending based on the manager, because surely that is based on results historically in which case, surely going on to be potentially successful would then allow those people to change their minds. If we went up, it would be a superb achievement, and Mowbray would almost certainly be given a new contract which would be totally justified. I don't think that will happen mind. I would personally probably consider a contract warranted if we finished the top 6 regardless of whether we went up. Anything less than top 6 and a change would make sense. I do think that as @Mattyblue has pointed out, many have cornered themselves and will not even allow themselves to praise the manager even if the season ends in success. Whether we ought to have beaten Sheffield United or not, we didn't, thats all that matters. The wins v Boro and QPR were important though and have us 4th at the moment, so hopefully the poor run is overcome/

I feel like you are being pedantic there, what I meant was: So if we went up and Mowbray remained, you wouldn't get a season ticket? But out of interest, do you have a season ticket this season? Did you last? And would getting one next season be dependant on Mowbray being in situ still, and if he was, would that stance remain unaltered even if we achieved promotion under him?

Kaminski Lenihan Van Hecke Wharton Buckley Travis Rothwell Pickering Hedges Gallagher Giles Subs: Pears, Rankin Costello, Johnson, Davenport, Dack, Khadra, Dolan Keep the back 5, I would opt for Buckley at wing back over Rankin Costello I think. Bit of a change from the false 9 with Dolan and Khadra dropping out, I am not convinced by Gallagher central but I would try it with Giles on his natural side and also Hedges able to cut inside from the right. Hopefully Dack off the bench for 20 minutes.