roversfan99

Priority has to be to fix the defence properly. Would a 21 year old Crewe defender help that? Continue to leak goals and it will at some point be the end for Mowbray and a lot of our players.

Im not sure about that. Bowyer was sacked with us 16th in the League. We finished 15th. You look at his jobs since too, awful recent record. All talk IMO. What is with the looking down the nose towards Dyches style ? Dyches football has been successful consistently over a few years, getting them into the top 10 again in the Premier League. Effective and not horrible to watch as people would have you believe. More goals last season than Sheffield United and the Brighton side you regularly laud under Graham Potter.

I think most of the excitement around him has fizzled out to be honest. Last season, in 21 starts and 15 sub appearances, his end product was a deflected goal v Reading, a second goal v West Brom and 2 assists. 2 goals and 2 assists in the season before too. The wide areas need to be fixed, we have not had players in those positions for quite a while who have been effective. Even Armstrong was far better centrally. I suspect they will continue to be neglected. I dont see how Chapman can fall into that same category baring in mind his season compromised of 78 minutes across 5 sub appearances.

Did he do a particularly groundbreaking job at either Wycombe or Colchester? That is true and surprising, but looking at their points per game, Lambert collected 1.33 points per game and Bowyer collected 1.44 points per game. Lambert just had that ability to appear like a man with a plan based on what he said, and obviously it had become stagnant under Bowyer. Lambert chose to sell Rhodes and brought in a number of substantial loans, Graham was a very good one, the likes of Gomez, Watt, Grimes etc far more underwhelming. And the likes of Bennett, Jackson and Ward were just him signing players he already knew.

Also @chaddyrovers what would you do if you was manager? Would you prioritise getting that defence solid and keeping the ball out of the net, or would you only consider "ball playing defenders?" Our central midfield partnership of Evans and Travis is a very effective one but its not the best in terms of keeping possession. They are decent on the ball but their strength lies in putting themselves about, pressing the opposition. With those 2 and then plenty of athleticism and youth in front, we should focus on pressing teams and getting in their faces far more often. That is what the game plan should be built around. Do we have the players to be totally dominating games? Not for me. Also, tactics like false 9's, wide strikers etc dont work but Mowbray chooses them. If we can get an Adarabioyo who can do both, excellent, but we need a left back, centre back and experienced goalkeeper who can help us get well down from the 60+ goals conceded, thats the priority. If we sign this Dickie that you mention, has he got the calibre to be able to single handily pass the ball out like Adarabioyo did, baring in mind that Lenihan is very limited on the ball himself? And one of our main midfielders in Johnson is abysmal at picking the ball up on the half turn. Once we do that, if we can keep Dack and Armstrong and get them working together, then we might have half a chance. I dont think these 2 are realistic necessarily, but I would love us to push the boat out for Van Der Hoorn or Ayala. Both would command high wages, but both are proven at this level, both are free agents and proper defenders and would make a very good partnership with Lenihan. But are they fancy enough for our manager and his delusions of grandeur?

Off on a tangent but I dont think the BBC punditry is all bad, Lineker, Shearer and Wright are good together and I enjoyed the lockdown podcasts they did. Its once you start getting to your Murphys, Keowns and Phil Neville that both charisma and intelligence go out of the window.

Hes the absolute master of PR though. Here, he knew that Venkys were the enemy. The results and football werent great, so what does he do? Announce that he is leaving due to Venkys and criticises them publically and he goes out as a hero. At Ipswich, when results were really poor, he pulled out the "pay for the supporters travel" trick when (a couple of 100) fans came to Ewood. And all the way through he has slagged off the chairman and the owners publically which initially at least got the fans onside and ignoring the dismal job he is doing

Lets hope he can do the basics first because if we dont tighten up then we wont get near the play offs and our better players will leave.

If that role is anything other than conceding as few goals as is possible then we have problems.

Whatever your source is, maybe best to ignore it next time! And maybe dont prematurely big yourself and the source up 2 days before the player goes elsewhere on the back of Nixon posting the rumour in the paper ?

Have you seen his work at Ipswich, or indeed at Stoke, Wolves or Villa? I think its fair to say that a team with Williams and Bennett at wing back and Lenihan in central midfield isnt going to be challenging. I dont think Coyle chose to sell his best 2 centre backs willingly. Mowbray has made mistakes and has plenty of flaws but hes certainly better than that chancer!

Not necessarily disagreeing with much regarding Mowbray but Lambert would not have spent 15m on strengthening the team, not successfully anyway!

Very surprised that they didnt change upon relegation. Not sure his record is anything to write home about even before Hull.

Reading on my laptop it allowed me to directly translate, here is the bit mentioning us (With some hilarious translation) In addition, there should now also be a request from England. Blackburn Rovers is traded as a possible buyer in the transfer market rumor mill. The club from the 2nd division (Championship) ended the season in 12th place and is apparently looking for reinforcements in the attack. Philipp Hofmann would be such a man, because last season he helped keep KSC in the 2nd division with his 17 goals . So he knows where the gate is and that has now apparently been heard on the island.

Had accumulated a lorry load of shite players but were ultimately propped up by Grosicki and moreso Bowen who is a Premier League player. Once they went, they predictably tumbled.

What about Dack?

I agree in hindsight but obviously the aim for every team is not specifically to finish 7th-20th. The aim was play offs for us. Therefore the logic to Adarabioyo and Cunningham was the correct one. I would say that the problems were primarily loaning a young goalkeeper which is always a huge risk. He turned out to be crap and we had no alternative to stick with him due to the position, and with no potential long term benefits. They were also trying to fix all 3 positions with loans within the same area of the pitch. That was compounded with us actually having money, spending it elsewhere having sacrificed the keeper to do so, and missing out on Bauer. I would be happy to get 1 or 2 loans this season IF they are better than the other players in that position that we could attract and afford. The thing is, I would not want a loaned young goalkeeper, or ideally a CB to be honest.

To be fair, we do indeed have 2 goalscorers and none of them are called Sam Gallagher. Bradley Dack and Adam Armstrong are those 2 players. Gallagher is often reminisced about with fondness over a 1 goal every 4 games season which is well out in front as the peak of his career thus far. Whilst not awful, it doesnt warrant the term "goalscorer." Hopefully Armstrong and Dack can strike up a partnership central as well as we can hope, and Gallagher (and Brereton) can post respectable figures as very much competition/back-up for those 2, rather than being shunted out wide at times as you touched upon.

If you are thankful solely that your club is still in existence/has not been put into administration then it suggests that you have very low expectations surely and you do not view your club as a competitive one. We can hope for more than that.

Very good addition but I dont think they will get promoted unless they seriously strengthen. Smallwood did his role well for us in League 1 but ultimately it was the quality of Dack, Graham, Mulgrew and Armstrong that really made us stand out, the likes of Smallwood played key roles complimenting that, soldiers and artists. Hull dont have that quality. Their attack consists of Josh Magennis and Tom Eaves, even if Smallwood does his bit winning it back, they wont be scoring many with them 2 donkeys!

Agreed. He put his neck on the line with mentioning Iversen, for him to go elsewhere isnt particularly bad in terms of the link, but less than 48 hours afterwards to a totally different league, on the back of the last 2 keepers he linked to us (Hart and McLaughlin) being specifically rubbished by Mowbray in interviews, he is clearly not in the loop. Now he has reverted back to cryptic tweets clearly, listing the positions we all know we need!

Food analogies aside, I think the problem going back to those loan deals were not the deals individually, it was the fact that we filled ALL 3 spaces with loans, having sold a permanent goalkeeper of the same age, missed out on a permanent answer at CB ( after apparently saying essentially that he wouldnt be a first team player) and spending 5 million on a striker. If we filled say one of those spaces again with a loan, it wouldnt be that bad as long as it wasnt the goalkeeping position, for the reasons I have stated (little alternative once you get him in as number 1 if it doesnt work out, and also the position whereby you are most prone to costly mistakes, not ideal developing someone elses player there) and if it was only one of the defensive births. For example, sign a permanent experienced keeper, a left back and then loan back Adarabioyo (wont happen but for example) and that would be totally fine. The only thing I didnt agree with in what you put is if you say you may aswell avoid loans if you are going to finish mid table, you are then accepting finishing in mid table before youve begun! But I agreed with your scepticism on loans, especially in goal. Definitely agree on Muric. If Mowbray chose to plug the goalkeeping gap with a player with 5 senior League appearances on a temporary basis, following a loan spell at Forest in which his inadequacies were costing them only 5 games in and they had to sign another keeper, he would need his head testing. If Nixon has suggested it then hopefully its as accurate as his Iversen link, the McLaughlin link earlier in the summer that Mowbray totally rubbished, and the Joe Hart link which again Mowbray said there was absolutely no truth in it.

I just think that if he specifically mentioned us and another Championship side as interested in Iversen and within 48 hours, he moves abroad on loan, it seems like the story was not correct. Also, all of the back scratching, "spot on again" type posts we saw on here on Sunday (including from yourself) because the oracle Nixon had put his name to the Iversen rumour turned out to be premature and misguided. Now he has reverted back to being cryptic, just naming the positions we all know that we are looking for. My status on loaning a kid in net hasnt changed and I am just glad that there is one less possibility for that. Hopefully the Muric link is equally untrue.

https://sport-90.de/hamburger-sv-und-blackburn-rovers-an-philipp-hofmann-dran Unsure how reputable this is, it needs translating too but a link to Hofmann. https://www.mylondon.news/sport/football/transfer-news/brentford-boss-what-went-wrong-13219230 Also a bit on why things didnt go right at Brentford, including that he wasnt physically in good shape. Would be a weird one, maybe agent talk. Last season he scored quite a few goals, before then, not so many, he is a target man so not really fitting in with Mowbrays supposed "vision" and he would cost a decent fee. Would also potentially mean Armstrong out wide, unless he is going.

Glad that Iversen has gone elsewhere, one less potential loan. Hopefully Muric will go elsewhere too. Yet again, Nixon proves to be talking shite and all the back scratching and self appreciation done once the Iversen link surfaced at the weekend was premature.