We weren't. Mowbray when referring to the Maja deal after the window had closed said that it would have been a loan deal.

He signed that goalscorer to be fair as well as the one last year who scored 28 goals and made the club a considerable amount to which he wasnt able to reinvest in a replacement. We also lost 2 games recently in which 2 key injuries left us uncompetitive due to the inadequacy of what we had left. Mowbray shouldn't be still in a job even acknowledging a decent start considering the cut backs and pitiful lack of reinvestment allowance in the summer due to the stagnation seen last season. We need a fresh start and we need someone to overperform in reality which is possible, see Barnsley last year and Coventry so far this year. But it is not a top 6 squad at all even considering the poor standard of league. Our first 11 is pretty much known, Kaminski, Nyambe, Lenihan, Ayala, Pickering, Travis, Buckley, Rothwell, Dolan, Gallagher, Brereton. That isnt a top 6 starting 11, and it has started only 4 games this season, beyond that there is nothing. 4 loanee kids making up the numbers on cheap deals, and basically nothing else.

I want Mowbray gone too but you've "predicted" that for months with your usual level of accuracy! Sadly, 9th in the Championship is roughly the pinnacle of the last 11 years of mismanagement under our horrendous owners which is simply not good enough yet probably unlikely to change in the next 11 years.

Dolan doesn't have much end product, so I think he is at times a little overhyped, but I think whilst raw he has promising attributes and he definitely has improved and makes our best 11. Perhaps he summed himself up in the first half with a lovely bit of skill and then a very tame shot. Poveda I don't rate based on his limited appearances and he wouldn't start but I think it is only fair to say that today I thought he was bright, the ball to Brereton was very good and he was probably better than Dolan today IMO.

Good to see Man United lose today. Hopefully they will allow Solskjaer to continue the poor job that he is doing.

😂

Edun is not a loan signing so his supposed lack of interest cannot be put down to that, although I personally am not keen on the assumption that a loan signing will automatically put less effort in. Elliott is an example that you have given as proof that it is purely down to the individual, indeed all 4 loanees I suspect will struggle to ever breakthrough at their parent clubs, so they are in the shop window. I just think that all 4 are very raw and not particularly good for us at this moment in time, sadly due to our disinterested owners, such signings are deemed as necessary to pad out the squad, more useful than say 4 of our kids (ones that arent already involved in the first team) but ideally we could sign better. I thought Edun had a very mixed game though similarly to you, took too many risks at time (which to be fair many of our players were afraid to do) but often lost it in dangerous areas. He tired though and Mowbray mentioned him and Van Hecke post match as players who tired. Khadra also had tonsillitis according to Rich Sharpe as well as PIckering.

I liked his desire to run at players, in fact I felt like he was lacking in the confidence to ideally do it once or twice more, and more often than not we retained the ball once he had done so, with one particularly good pass. I am certainly not overly optimistic about his signing though to be honest, sadly I feel like our squad is really lacking with 4 loan players looking very raw and only signed because they are all that we could afford in spite of raising a big fee from the sale of Armstrong. But much better today compared to his 3 shockers v Boro, Barnsley and Huddersfield.

As if the owners give a shit, they won't care if we finish 4th, 14th or 24th.

His quotes are fine, bigging up a player. Maybe he should play more but I am not convinced that he would make a major difference, I suppose it is a bit unknown. If we had any money in the summer to replace Armstrong, then Butterworth ideally would be out on loan as intended.

Agreed on Lenihan looking uncomfortable as a left centre back, a direct result of playing 3 at the back. I do think that it was part of the problem out of inviting pressure in the second half. A big issue for us is the inability of Dolan and Gallagher to hold the ball up. We couldn't push out partly because of playing an extra defender but everytime the ball went forward, it came straight back. Gallagher I agree was poor and his general game does tend to be really poor, he doesn't win headers, he can't play with his back to goal, he keeps running offside, he just isn't very good. We also lack the composure in midfield to control the game, take the sting out of it and keep the ball. Johnson should have come on with his experience rather than Davenport who isn't very good. The defensive record is really poor, 2 clean sheets is not enough to build on, the idea of becoming a more defensively solid team as you have mentioned wont be happening soon I don't think. Disagree on Poveda too. Maybe people have made their mind up on him but I thought he was ok when he came on, tried to add a spark.

If he said how bad Butterworth was in the press then there may be an issue! I thought Poveda did ok today, one great pass, ran at his man a few times looking to be positive, a few other neat passes, won a foul, nothing groundbreaking but I saw something that simply wasn't there in his first 3 poor appearances. I suspect that people have written off Poveda now, but I thought there was something there today.

Dolan has developed 100%, but today bar a couple of weak shots I thought he was pretty poor, perhaps still not over his illness. I thought that Poveda did well when his came on, played one great ball to Brereton and made a few decent contributions I thought. I fear that his card may already be marked.

Butterworth becomes better with each game that he doesn't come on to be fair. Do you not think that Poveda did some good things, I thought he was ok when he came on and better than Dolan.

This squad is far from a top 3 or top 6 squad. It is paper thin, you look at our first 11 which is competitive and even then, you have a player signed for the under 23s a year ago after Preston let him go playing a critical role. We have 4 very raw loanees signed for a pittance making the numbers up. I accept the criticisms about today and Luton, it is not a good habit and Mowbray takes blame as I have mentioned above. But equally, we got a late winner at Forest, we stole a point from Millwall, points have been earnt and lost in similar situations. How on earth can you say that Davenport has been "Mowbrayed?" He has barely played in a Rovers shirt following Mowbray signing him because when he has, he has been poor, and he has also often been injured. He hardly had played prior to joining either. Where have you got this impression from that he is like Travis prior to having the ability and life sucked out of him by Mowbray?! What is with the obsession with everyone finding outrage in how Mowbray acts on the touchline? There is enough to discuss and potentially criticise on the pitch including Mowbray's tactics, subs, even signings without obsessing over him being "a disgrace" getting frustrated on the sidelines.

Very frustrating afternoon and another occasion on which we throw away a 2 goal lead which isn't good enough. Think that Mowbray got his tactics wrong today, 3 at the back didn't work and Van Hecke didn't impress me. Lenihan also had to play left centre back in a 3 when he is usually right in a 2 and you could tell that he was uncomfortable. We invited pressure for too long in the second half, the first goal was coming for a while and when it did, a second was inevitable. Edun was very hit and miss too, nearly put them through in the first minute and lost the ball quite a few times trying to take risks, although he did also do some positive bits of play. Nyambe was fine as was Ayala, but for all the talk of being more defensively solid this year, 2 clean sheets is piss poor and simply not good enough in giving us solid foundations, Kaminski was also shaky and his distribution is poor. Rothwell deserved man of the match, lets see if he can follow it up with some consistency. Buckley was stupid for picking up a needless yellow and could have been sent off, and Travis I am unconvinced suits that role as the deepest of the 3. Dolan was fairly ineffective, and Gallagher had a strange day, the ball just does not stick with him, poor touch (which led to a Coventry goal) and constantly offside, he is not clever at all. That being said, great goal and assist so he did his job. The subs were questionable, Davenport again was poor and it should have been Johnson to bring us some experience, and I think a needless and huge risk was taken regarding rushing Brereton back into action. Poveda seems to be again getting stick, I thought in his first 3 games, 2 of which he started, he was piss poor. That being said, I actually thought today he was good, he did more than Dolan I would suggest and showed signs of spark. Numerous times when he got the ball or even prior to that, people around me were already critical, and having read on here since and also on twitter, I suspect that unfortunately his card is marked and that people have made up their minds. Now to clarify, that is not a criticism of a "lack of support" towards him, people suggesting the same about Brereton when he joined drives me mad, it is people sharing an opinion to their friends or online that Poveda is oblivious too, so no problem, but I thought he did well today.

If Burns is going to such a level, even acknowledging the inability due to the rules of a loan within the football league, it perhaps puts into perspective how far off he is deemed to first team Championship football.

I thought Carter was actually better at right back (he looked out of position but coped very well) earlier in the season than he was at centre back in the last 2 games. The chaos around him wont have helped but he himself was poor.

He was poor in the last 2 games, and anyway if we base on that logic, Van Hecke, Wharton, Johnson, Rankin Costello and Dack will never play this season as there will always be someone who has played more.

https://www.rovers.co.uk/news/2021/october/14/boss-crosses-fingers-/ Ayala has missed a few days of training too. You know with him that a missed game is always around the corner, lets hope he is ok for Saturday. If not, give Van Hecke a start. Magloire was obviously out of his depth and as such there was understandably issues with cohesion in the defence in the last 2 games, but Carter himself was poor whilst acknowledging these difficulties.

On the bench for training?

If he is back in the UK on Saturday morning then he surely should be ok for Tuesday.

Worrying team news ahead of the weekend, Gallagher hasn't trained and is a big doubt, and Pickering and Dolan both have had tonsillitis. Lenihan and Nyambe are back, so the main issue will be scoring goals.

That highlighted sentence suggests that you are trying to provoke somewhat, the issue wasn't unreasonably high standards, he looked out of place when he did feature, my personal expectations that season were just for him to contribute with a few goals and assists and look a threat, which he didn't. Nobody expected hat tricks. I have no recollection of him winning that award that you mention, indeed he started the season at a mid table Forest side unable to make the 18 man squad. Ultimately, if a player costing such a sum wasn't close to being in the first 11, then as was the case, the question was should we have spent that money when we had much more pressing matters. Graham was player of the season and Dack was scoring goals with regularity so he certainly shouldn't have started ahead of them. We played a 4-2-3-1 which didn't suit him as much to play wide as the 4-3-3 does, Armstrong had just come off a very successful half season and we tended to play a "defensive winger" on the other side.

Has Rangers' European form shown Gerrard up? In the last 2 full seasons, they qualified from a group ahead of Feyenoord and Young Boys after winning some tricky qualifiers, before knocking out Braga before succumbing to Bayer Leverkusen in the last 16. In the season after, again they got to the last 16, knocking out Galatasaray last season, before topping a group unbeaten and ahead of Benfica.