You also said that Brereton doesn't want to play up front and potentially advocated Dolan there instead so I just pointed out how that was not a valid point when they have both said the same thing basically.

Unsure if you watched the same games but when he played he was not physically outfought, he was surprisingly tenacious. The only question mark would be stamina across 90 minutes as he more often than not was subbed off.

Im not sure how Rankin Costello would be as a central midfielder anyway to be fair.

I very much doubt that Morton will come permanently, Liverpool would probably value him above our meagre budget anyway.

Abused 😂

Minimal in a deeper midfield 2 in the first team then.

I still think we would be taking something away from our play to move Rankin Costello. He gives us something from there that nobody else does.

Based on my opinion, he didn't warrant questions about his future because even in the bad spells our league position was good. A minority thought otherwise as you said though, but I was talking specifically to what I thought, even though I admittedly did have niggling doubts at times.

But with JDT, results have never dropped to a level whereby you question things to the point of changing him. Even in poor runs of form which of course happen to everyone, we always maintained a decent position in the table. Chelsea have now dropped into the bottom half and it is difficult to really see what he is trying to do aside from constant changing the team in the hope that something works out.

Plans are all well and good but you should only stick to them if they show signs of progressing, and seemingly this one didn't, hence the change.

I was just highlighting how your point about Brereton "not wanting" to play anywhere but from the left was flawed, as shown by the fact that him and Dolan have pretty much said identical things. The reason presumably why people want to change it is because they don't want Gallagher to play and Brereton is our only consistent source of goals and physical threat.

Even in that 6 weeks, nothing has improved. Constantly changing your team to keep everyone happy seems very desperate and has not led to any consistency.

"I like playing across the front three, I’m not that fussed where." https://www.lancs.live/sport/football/football-news/dolan-blackburn-rovers-accrington-championship-24448454 Whereas Dolan says: "I like playing on the left because I can come inside" So basically, both ideally want to play from the left, but are happy to play anywhere. So let's not rubbish the idea because "they don't want to."

How do you know that Brereton wants to play from the left? We have had the same debate about Garrett before.

I haven't seen much in the way of something progressing so I can understand why a change was made. He has not shown progress to warrant extra time, I think the Aubameyang situation is pretty indicative. At Arsenal, Arteta totally jettisoned him from the squad with no exceptions, rightly or wrongly, it still showed a clear showing of leadership. Potter removed Aubameyang from his Champions League squad yet had him on the bench more than once in the league afterwards. Mixed messages does not show that authority and in general I have wondered if he can and was commanding the respect of players with big egos. Cucurella is a defensive liability, not best suited to playing as a centre back especially when Potter had a £30m left footed centre back on the bench. He seems to be just throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks with regular changes and little consistency. I think Pochettino is overhyped.

The loan market is a very potentially fruitful one for Championship clubs with limited resources, but Morton as a young midfielder was not what we needed in that position. You look even at the top 2, Sheffield United loaned in McAtee and Doyle who are obviously better than Morton but also compliment the experienced midfielders that they already have. Burnley have loaned a number of players but they also have the likes of Cork, Brownhill, Gudmundson, Rodriguez, Barnes, Taylor and Roberts providing plenty of experience, and even then, Harwood Bellis and Maatsen already have had loan spells in this division. Broughton and co have failed us in midfield as they have up top. Besides Travis, we had Buckley who has some experience in general but none in central midfield and 2 at the time totally untested youngsters. It isn't just that ideally they would have found a better youngster than Morton, it is that he shouldn't have identified a youngster to compliment what we had.

He is crap unfortunately, both in midfield where positionally he is all over the place and in midfield where he is a liability. Just not up to it, and Tomasson seems to have figured that out hence why he struggles to get near the squad.

I would drop Morton too (not for Garrett) but that in bold shouldn't play any part in team selections. The focus now is solely on these 8 games, not future development. Equally, we wouldn't drop Brereton or Thomas for the same reason.

I get that, and as is a risk with a director of football structure, he may not have necessarily wanted the players he got. But still, there is so much quality there, even on Saturday he had 2 centre backs on the bench with 2 full backs at centre back, and Loftus Cheek at wing back. I also question whether the players respected him as they did at smaller clubs previously. They haven't looked like they were ever making progress under him, even small steps.

And none are that great, so they wouldn't be missed too much. They could also probably sell the likes of Pulisic, Ziyech etc.

Is it not difficult to gauge where we should be without tracking the progress of the teams around us?

As long as they improve you at all, even if it is as part of the squad. You look at Sheffield United, Doyle and McAtee are not massive improvements on Berge, Norwood and Fleck but they give them such good depth to have those 5 options and compliment existing experience. Morton was not what we needed though.

Is it? He has some really talented players at his disposal. The squad is bloated but I feel like his shortcomings may come around managing high profile players. His team selections are really random too. Yesterday he had 2 centre backs on the bench yet Cucurella and James were 2 of a back 3 with Loftus Cheek at wing back.

I wouldn't feel too sorry for Potter. He is set for life off the back of 6 months work!

Graham Potter has been sacked. Probably something he was expecting, it has never seemed a good fit from day one and results have been terrible.