Maybe Tony Khan reads this board ? Seriously though, this has really peaked my interest!

I thought Royal Rumble was the best thing I’ve seen in ages. That aside I can’t remember the last WWE event I enjoyed. I barely watch it either, although I do like NXT UK, mainly due to the fact I’ve followed a lot of those wrestlers on the UK scene for years. I really want to be converted by AEW! I think my personal preferences are too far removed from the direction they will go though. I’m enjoying revisiting (and discovering) a lot of old stuff at the minute. That’s typical of me generally though. I love music, and own thousands of albums... maybe only a couple of dozen of which were released this millennium!

I don’t find his gimmick amusing or entertaining in the slightest. I don’t understand why anyone would... actually that’s not completely true. It’s just like any number of other indie level spots and gimmicks that have been done for years that gain a bit of traction on the internet. Like a dickflip, invisible man, hand grenade, whatever. These things have always appealed to small niche audiences at an indie level. AEW is just enabling all of them to see it with a bigger platform. For me it’s illogical and stupid. I know the cat is out of the bag in terms of kayfabe, but these things are so far removed from the whole idea of what wrestling is. I think you’ve got the nail on the head there. Their core fan base is there, and they are rabidly loyal. Having said that, I noticed MJF getting a lot of heat for going “too far” on Twitter last week. Some skewed moral compasses amongst some of them, but that’s another story! I know Meltzer lives to bang on about the demographics, and AEW are absolutely killing it with theirs. I’m guessing the 20-30 year old males are a huge proportion of their audience. Certainly seems that way on live shows. I don’t think they have any real interest in doing so, but I can’t see them doing anything to take the WWE’s kids viewership away. I worry that the core audience is so into AEW, to the extent they won’t entertain even the most minor criticism, that any appetite for change/growth will be stifled. They are riding a hell of a wave at the minute, but I don’t know how long it can last. Mind you, WWE shows no sign of doing anything to win back their lost viewers who are utterly fed up of their product. Me included. I think we are reaching the point where many people have picked a side and nailed their colours to the mast. Either AEW or WWE. I’m not enamoured enough with either at the moment, but I think AEW’s “issues” (or what I perceive the issues to be) are far more easily fixed.c

Caught up with Revolution. Thoughts... Most I’ve enjoyed a Bucks match yet. Don’t think it was worthy of the hype, and plenty of things in this match were over the top, but some psychology in a bucks and Omega match for a change. Decent. Cody and MJF was brilliant. Women's title match was not good. Darby Allin grows on me every time I see him. I think Jericho should’ve retained. Don’t see Moxley as being near his level. Inner circle losing 2/3 is not smart. I hate Orange Cassidy. Hated that match more than I can describe. I thought I made PAC look ridiculous. The only way to make that match anything other than a disaster for everyone involved, except the people in the crowd in on the joke, is for Cassidy to do his schtick (if he must) and PAC to absolutely brutalise and demolish him. Leave him bloody and injured. I will have to just fast forward any of his nonsense in future. In short, so much potential for AEW to be brilliant. It needs some direction from someone more removed, more experienced, and less emotionally invested. The lunatics running the asylum are holding it back.

Absolutely! They have got it so wrong in WWE. Every feud is dull as dishwater. They are introduced in a rushed fashion, become massively repetitive, and never have a blowoff at the end. Back in the territory days they would use TV to build the feuds and let them play out on live shows, meaning they weren’t overexposed. In the early days of PPV they would have one show every three months or so, and they built genuine anticipation. They really need a rethink. There are definitely too many shows (TV and PPV) but their roster is more than big enough to cope with it. No appetite to change from the current formula though, which is why I’ve all but given up.

Haven’t caught Revolution yet, but I’m planning on watching it all. Seen the results and bits of clips. Not a fan of Orange Cassidy at all and I can’t see this match doing PAC any favours whatsoever. Big credibility clash. I’ve seen people awarding the tag match 6 stars and heralding it as “the best tag match ever”. I very much doubt it will be to my tastes at all. And having read @DE.’s summary, I know the near falls are going to annoy me. I’m massively looking forward to Cody and MJF. They are both absolutely on fire. Both WWE and AEW should be using these two as a benchmark in terms of storylines and character development. Presume Statlander will be poking noses, so I’ll likely skip that one, but the other matches are intriguing and I’m looking forward to them. I’m not really on the Moxley bandwagon. Will be interesting to see where the title picture goes from here though. Is Jericho taking some time off to tour? If so I think they will miss him. Badly.

I thought he should’ve been, but we didn’t bring in enough defensive reinforcements. You can’t say he was finished last season when he started the first game as captain. There is something more than meets the eye to it all.

The whole Mulgrew situation is very strange. He was pretty poor defensively in the latter half of last season, so much so Mowbray felt the need to make his infamous ‘defenders are coming’ speech. Yet Mulgrew still started the first fame of this season as captain before his out of the blue, last minute loan to Wigan. He’s seemingly finished and not in contention for a place in the squad, under any circumstances, and he’s still got a further year to run. Something has happened.

So for what seems like about the 1,000th time in the last 10 years, we are debating how best to cobble together a back four. Despite a pretty horrendous run of injuries to attacking players, we are still spoilt for choice in those areas. This failure to properly invest in the defence has cost us plenty of times before, let’s hope it doesn’t again.

I’m glad he’s nowhere near the starting 11, but with defenders as thin on the ground as they are surely he’s worthy of a spot on the bench instead of one of the three strikers. As the game went on it became more and more apparent that the only likely source of a goal would have been a bit of individual magic... something like a Mulgrew free kick.

He could’ve put up 37 and I still would t have fancied us to score. One of them days.

After the consultation meeting, as part of a discussion with a group of fans, somebody stated something along the lines of “It would be amazing to go up even for one season, purely for the money”, to which Waggott replied “Absolutely, we could do something with that stand, get the hotel.” He’s absolutely obsessed with the idea. Anything else is secondary to him.

The latest episode of the Jim Cornette Experience is well worth a listen. He watches Raw for the first time in years and critiques that alongside Dynamite. Don’t want to issue any spoilers, but highly recommend it!

Bloody hell! Feel for you there pal... I’d kill for one of those seats!

Absolutely right. I’m no horticulturist, but I believe it had something to do with the the pitch getting too much/not enough water/light. The original plans for the bowl style stadium gave a lesser capacity than we have now. 25kish. And no executive boxes breaking up the tiers. The mock up of the planned Riverside redevelopment, which was shelved after the 1999 relegation, is still in the boardroom... or at least it was when I used to run ground tours.

I’m amazed there is so much appetite amongst our supporters to do anything at all with it. We certainly don’t need extra capacity, we don’t need any more corporate facilities either. We can’t shift sponsorship either. Money would surely be better spent elsewhere. Waggott is obsessed with the idea of a hotel, “like we had at Coventry”. Make if that what you will. I think he’d like to see some sort of conference centre, I’m not convinced, and I certainly don’t think the Riverside is the place for it... due in no small part to the river! Selfishly, it’s my stand of choice, and has been since it was rebuilt. I’ve tried every other stand but I prefer the view, perspective and the aesthetic of the Riverside to any of them. I know I don’t really have a say if I am boycotting, but I doubt I’m alone in this. There were some rules around emergency vehicle access... you may notice the hash markings at either end of the walkway at the front. The Riverside was the designated entrance for fire engines and the gap at the front of the stand big enough to accommodate them. Don’t know if there is now an alternative or if there has been some change, but this was definitely the case. Also, the wall at the front of the Riverside is the oldest part of the ground still standing. I like that. I wouldn’t be opposed to making it a safe standing area in the future, depending on how things pan out.

Not just digging out you here Chaddy, but the amount of stick referees get is ridiculous. He was by no means perfect today, but it’s not only a tough job, it’s a completely thankless task. Wherever you look these days people love moaning about how refs are incompetent and ruining the game... these are the same people who celebrate ‘shithousing’. Players attempting to cheat and con the ref is widely accepted. Teams work on it. When they are successful at it it’s all the referees fault. These ridiculous expectations, along with the massive scrutiny and inevitable outrage they face have led to shit ideas like VAR being introduced.

That would be fine by me! It was so hard leaving out a lot of the people I did!

I’ve added an interview segment to mine... 1. Intercontinental Championship Match Ricky Steamboat v Kurt Angle v Curt Hennig 2. Sherri Martel v Charlotte Flair 3. Cruiserweight Championship Match Eddie Guerrero v Koko Ware v Jushin Liger v Jody Fleisch 4. Haku v Brock Lesnar (w Paul Heyman) 5. Tag Team Championship Match Midnight Express - Bobby Eaton and Stan Lane (w Jim Cornette) v Hart Foundation - Bret Hart and Jim Neidhart 6. John Cena (w Nikki Bella) v Rick Rude (w Bobby Heenan) 7. Sting V Undertaker 8. TLC Match Rock n Roll Express (Ricky Morton and Robert Gibson) v Steiner Brothers v Thrill Seekers (Lance Storm and Chris Jericho) v Harlem Heat (Booker T and Stevie Ray) 9. Brother Love Show with Guests Jim Cornette and Vince Russo 10. World Title Match Randy Savage v The Rock 11. War games: nWo v DX v Four Horsemen Team nWo: Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, Hulk Hogan, Syxx Team DX: Shawn Michaels, HHH, Billy Gunn, Road Dogg Four Horsemen: Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Tully Blanchard, Barry Windham

It’s coming!

Just as a bit of fun... Come up with your fantasy Super Card. Here are the rules: 10 matches, this must include: 1 x World Title match, 1 x Tag Title match 2 other title matches of your choice 1 Women’s match 1 triple threat match 2 Stipulation/Gimmick matches One match can tick more than one box, for example, Eddie Guerrero v Daniel Bryan for the US title in an iron man match would be a stipulation and a title. You can pick anyone, from any era. Living, deceased, active, retired, whatever. The only other stipulation is you have to pick matches that have never been done before. Or at least not in the characters you choose.

The ACV allows the trust a period of 6 months to formulate a bid. I’m assuming that they have to be notified before any sale goes ahead, and then the clock is ticking. How much chance there would be if raising adequate funds, or how much could actually be done if Venky’s were determined enough I don’t know. What it does prevent is a quick, quiet deal. It also prevents a ground sale being used as a get out of jail card. The quickest they can raise any cash would be 6 months. So if the FFP threshold is June, they’d need to have stated their intent to the trust before now.

Maybe two of them. I’d say Armstrong would be another. Suppose it depends on the level of any shortfall. Prices can be crazy these days, although we didn’t do well at all on Raya. With the apparent shock market values have caused this window, you’d hope they’d be aiming for decent fees for our better players.

I get the impression that Mowbray, Waggott and Cheston between them have to really have their fingers on the pulse when it comes to FFP. Mowbray said there was pressure from the owners to sign someone. No mention of this was a specific price, position or player (kind of wish I’d asked). Again, just speculation, but maybe this is a contributing factor to why we overpaid for Brereton and the weird circumstances around the deal. The entire set up is odd. Waggott needing sign off to run a ticket promotion. I thought that’d be well within his day to day remit. Then on the other hand they are trying their best to throw cash around like drunken sailors. Their level of involvement seems inconsistent. I agree we need to increase ticket revenue, but we’d need to sell 60,000 season tickets at £300 to break even. Nothing more than a prediction, but I expect a significant player sale at the end of the season to ensure we keep within the FFP threshold. I’m pretty relaxed about this. Needs must. I’d much prefer this than selling Ewood.

You’ve got a point @Bbrovers2288 as did @JoeH several pages back. These meetings are a requirement set out by the EFL, and sanctions can be imposed if they don’t take place. This is the entirety of the regulation around them: 118.1 Clubs shall hold at least two meetings/fans forums per Season to which its supporters (or representatives) are to be invited in order to discuss significant issues relating to the Club. The framework for these meetings shall be documented in the Club’s customer charter, but are subject to the following minimum criteria: 118.1.1 Clubs must be represented by the Club’s majority owner, board director(s) or other senior executive(s); 118.1.2 where meetings are not open to all supporters wishing to attend, the supporter representatives must be elected, selected or invited in line with basic democratic principles; and 118.1.3 individuals cannot be excluded by the Club without good reason (the Club acting reasonably). Again, I don’t feel they are fit for purpose. Our owners and their main man do not attend. The minute the words “we can’t speak for the owners” are uttered, and they are frequently, this becomes apparent. There are always attendees there from Rovers Trust, Ewood WMC group, BRFCS, the Rovers Facebook Group, Ewood Blues, 100 Club. The usual people who represent the action group weren’t there last night, but they may still have been represented. New York Rovers did have an invite too. There are other groups too, not sure exactly who, but there are a lot of faces I recognise that aren’t from any of the above. The club ask that some of the attendees from each group stay the same from meeting to meeting. Each group has its own ideas and priorities (I’m deliberately avoiding the word agenda). I go as part of a group that has for the last few meetings been responsible for most of the questions, both submitted prior and at the time. I’m sure this annoys a good proportion of the room. Most of what we want to discuss is regarding the owners and we have been vocal in criticising the fact that Mowbray is in attendance and Venky’s aren’t. There are a lot of people who have never said a word in these meetings, that’s their prerogative completely. There are also plenty who seem to primarily want a chat with Mowbray at the end. Personally I feel these need a rethink, and so does the fans forum - for me that is where issues like kits and catering need to be discussed. Consultation meetings ought to be about ownership, governance, finances and long term plans. I don’t know where transfers should fall. Maybe they shouldn’t be discussed, aside from overall strategy, I don’t know. Sorry for another long post!