Think you might be right. It's just the fact that there's talk of him renewing now after Mowbray says he is leaving that raises some eyebrows. It could be as simple as him not finding the move he was hoping for and deciding he's better off staying here. An example of how fan perception can be wrong sometimes. I was listening to a Craig Bellamy podcast interview on YouTube recently. He was saying how Sparky hardly spoke to him when he was here. That surprised me. I always assumed that the only reason we got him was because of Sparky and that they were mates to a degree, but Bellamy didn't give off that impression. It sounded like Sav being here was more of a factor in him signing than Hughes. Anyway, back to Nyambe. Sign him up as soon as and don't waste a penny on Zeefuik. I'm so glad there was no obligation to buy the latter.

There are many more like the above fan on twitter and at Ewood. On here many of us dislike Mowbray's management and give the owners stick over how they run the club, but we seem to be in a minority, which is bizarre as all we are doing is calling for standards to be raised at the club. We refuse to accept and excuse mediocrity at Rovers. That doesn't make anybody who feels like that, "spoilt". However, inside Ewood is a different matter, as generally the fans at the ground these days think Venky's are doing a good job as they have stuck around this long, we'd be screwed without their money and that they were conned by agents in the early days. There's definitely a bit of "we should be grateful" going around some parts of the fan base. The irony is, they (the owners) are the reason why Rovers are a shell today and all ambition has been drained away from the club. They are the reason why the club has been dragged down to this level. They are the reason we keep on seeing these spirals and slides down the table (as they could have sacked him long ago). Yet we should be grateful for that and want more of the same by giving Mowbray an extended deal. It's pretty sad, really, but the fans aren't to blame for all of this.

The director of football lines feel like throwaway comments to me. Nothing to worry about. It's like somebody asking would you like a swimming pool in your back garden. "I guess it would be nice in the summer and the kids could spend as long as they want in it, but we prefer to go abroad as a family as we usually do and enjoy the pools that way". He's a goner.

Reading that latest piece from the LT, it seems pretty clear cut to me. He's leaving and he's not changing his mind. The situation is still same as it was pre Bournemouth. The owners might call him but it doesn't sound like he's going to stay on now.

I honestly think Mowbray gave up on the idea of promotion a couple of years ago when he realised that the owners wouldn't be giving him money to spend to bring in promotion winning players. According to him, he needs a big budget in order to play the possession football he wants. That is the way to promotion for him. Not with a team of Academy graduates and "young lads". He doesn't believe in these lads to deliver promotion and I think that explains his behaviour this season and why it's all about development now. His message last week was "if you just want to win you need to spend some money and bring in players who can help do that". He came out and said "these lads are punching above their weight" when we were up there in January. That's not what any of us wanted to hear, but it shows his lack of belief in them and his lack of a winning mentality. A better manager would have got more out of our squad and had us finish inside the top 6. What we saw in January was a disgrace from the owners and Mowbray. The owners, because they showed no ambition, no care and they didn't give him a decent amount to spend. Mowbray, because he was so blase, uninterested and unmoved by our league position. He wasted the little resources he had on fillers and not one of them suggested promotion was on his mind. Then again, he said promotion didn't even cross his mind "one iota". I don't think he was lying when he said that as he doesn't believe this squad can achieve promotion. If it is true that he had to "calm them down" when the owners wanted to spend years ago, then it serves him right as he seems to have paid the price for that ever since. A crap and infuriating way to end the season, where the only people who wanted and had hopes of promotion in January were the fans.

Exactly what I'm thinking. Smells of somebody trying to push Hibs into making a decision to me.

Nigel Adkins is the one for this lot. I don't want him, but I think he's right up their alley and likely to get the job. If I was asked to guess who I think will get it, I would go with Adkins. On the scrapheap just like Mowbray was. He's not even in the discussion, just like Mowbray wasn't in 2017. A similar manager to Lambert, Coyle, Mowbray. He would jump at the chance, IMO. He was previously linked with the Rovers job too. Why would they like him? 1) Because he won back to back promotions at Southampton once upon a time. From L1 to the Prem in two seasons. Something that they apparently wanted Mowbray to do in 2018. 2) His Southampton teams played good football. 3) His stats at Southampton are pretty good. In their promotion season from L1 they kept a club record number of clean sheets. 4) The following season in the Championship they set a club record of 10 consecutive league wins. They lost only 2 of their first 17 games (the opposite of a Mowbray spiral). They went on a 12 game unbeaten run from January to March to stay in the top 2 and finish 2nd (opposite of Mowbray). They stayed in the top 2 all season in their first season back up from L1. That's pretty impressive. If we look at what happened with Adkins after Southampton it's clear he's another Mowbray though. Reading - Appointed in March 2013 with Reading in the Premier League. He couldn't save them from relegation, even though most of the damage was done by previous manager, Brian McDermott. First season in the Championship he finishes 7th. One spot above Rovers and a point away from the play offs. He was sacked in December 2014 after a 6-1 defeat against Brum with Reading 10 points behind the play off places. Sheff Utd - He lasts one season as their manager in L1 guiding them to their lowest league finish in 32 years. They finish 11th, 8 points off the play offs and Adkins is sacked as a result. Hull - He arrived at Hull in December 2017 with Hull sat 20th and 3 points above the drop zone. They finished 18th, 8 points clear of danger. The following season he achieves a comfortable mid table finish in 13th. At the end of that season he rejects the offer of a new contract and leaves the club as he and the owners fail to agree on future plans. Charlton - He takes over from Lee Bowyer in March 2021 with 10 games left to play in the 20/21 season. He wins 5 out of those 10 games, as Charlton finish level on points with Oxford in 6th place but miss out on the play offs by goal difference. Similar to Mowbray in that "he was so close". He was sacked this season, in October 2021, after a dismal run of 2 wins in 13 left Charlton in the relegation zone in L1. He definitely has a bit of Mowbray about him. I don't want him here, he would be no different to Mowbray for me. What are the chances though that the Pune lot simply hear about his Southampton days and say "yeah, he's the man"? It would be just like them to ignore recent history and appoint him based on what he did 10 years ago.

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/phillip-cocu-interested-hibs-job-26814496 Cocu interested in the Hibs job. Which of the following is it? 1) He's desperate to manage again. 2) His agent is just putting his name out there to see what comes up. 3) Something dodgy is at play here. Kean at Hibs. Cocu at Rovers? A playground for the bastard agents. Avoid Cocu. Not interested in his big name reputation. Something doesn't seem right.

A fair point. That is a toughie. Ah, ok. Thanks for that. I knew McKinlay had been linked at some point, but not the timeline or how it occurred.

There aren't other examples, you're right. What I should have said was, the seed was planted by Shebby and they went with Berg at the time. For them, it provides a way to try and appease the fans and make a cheaper appointment at the same time. Berg cost them in the end, but a former player now would be cheaper than a Farke or Bilic. Bring in a former favourite, the fans won't be against that. It's not as straightforward as that though. We've been linked with the likes of Sherwood, McKinlay and Davidson in the years since Berg left, whenever we've been looking for a new manager. Wilcox coming here could have legs for a number of reasons, especially his work with City's Academy. Personally, I don't want any former player coming here and potentially having their name sullied by working under this lot. I have many good memories of Wilcox as a player. Wait until we have proper owners here, Jason, would be my message.

Really hope that turns out to be the case. Shutting them out is the first step to recovery for Rovers. If we were to land Farke it would be a big shock, a good one though and a step in the right direction. Let's see how it plays out.

They seem to have something about getting a former player in. A hark back to when Shebby was at the club. I can believe the Wilcox link.

Hasselbaink would be a cheap option, which wouldn't be surprising. If there's anything in the Farke interest we've got to be all over that quickly, before somebody else nabs him. It's just a hunch, but I think Nigel Adkins could be the man coming in.

The more I think about it, the more I believe that Mowbray's demeanour, behaviour and attitude this season, as well as the post January collapse are all enveloped in the following belief. That famous Alan Hansen saying: "You can't win anything with kids". Mowbray has been the embodiment of that this season and for a time before. I suspect that if any of us were to put that to him privately he would agree with that philosophy. Many of us don't agree that this Rovers side are just kids who are inexperienced. Yeah, there are young players here but not as young as is made out. However, Mowbray seems to genuinely see them that way and he doesn't believe these type of players are capable of winning promotion. "We need men out there" has been said by him more than once. But they cost money, money that Venky's won't provide. I think that's why he wasn't even thinking about promotion when we were up there, as much as that infuriates the lot of us. January is largely on the owners for not stumping up the money that was required, although Mowbray should have got us at least one striker in on loan. In the absence of funds to spend on promotion winning players, he packed it in on the promotion front years ago, not only this January, and went with "developing" these lads instead. The owners not providing a reasonable transfer kitty, particularly when the situation calls for it, is a big problem and will continue to be a problem for the next manager, unless they have a change of heart. The decision to not renew his deal (as it seems) is the correct one, but the way it has been handled is disgusting and not befitting of this football club. It shows up the owners, or should I say Balaji, for what he is. An uninterested, flash coward. There's something quite sad about the way this has all ended, from falling away like we have to how Mowbray has been left in the dark, and this is coming from someone who has been massively against Mowbray in recent months. I stand by most of what I have said about him, apart from likening him to Kean. I will take that back, as despite some snide comments, he isn't anywhere near as bad as that rat really. The most frustrating thing about all of this is that this lot are supposed to be billionaires. Money isn't an issue to them, yet they have no idea how to use it when it comes to Rovers. Nobody's asking for City or PSG style spending. Just spend on a good manager for once and be in with a chance of receiving £120m in return. It will never sink in until the poisonous agents are removed from the equation though. That Boro bastard agent is trying to tell them "you don't need to spend big and risk bankruptcy", allegedly, and we're trying to tell them spend a reasonable amount on a manager and players in order to receive a £120m prize. It doesn't add up, does it?

It's most likely going to be somebody none of us have mentioned or even thought about. One of those where you think "eh, is he still about in football?". That's the Venky way. John Gregory's blue and white army 😢.

I wouldn't want him back, personally. I understand the view that he didn't get much of a chance when he was here, but we really need to be aiming higher now. I don't think he'd want to come back anyway as these owners handled his departure disgracefully too, just as they are doing with Mowbray. If I remember rightly, Appleton said that a note was left on his desk telling him to collect his P45. Sums up the absolute cowards that the owners are.

It isn't, no. They have plenty of appearances and experience between them. It's Mowbray that has come up with this "young side" talk in recent months. It has begun to stick with some fans as he is constantly repeating it. The worrying thing is, I think he actually believes it. He's said a number of times in the past how he "needs men out there". There was just something about yesterday's press conference that made me think he threw in the towel a while ago in regards to promotion because he couldn't get the funds to sign those "men".

The key thing I take away from this is when he says: "But I also understand for the support base, just get somebody who wins. Let's wait and see. The correlation of that isn't quite right, so if you just want to win and you get somebody who just wants to win you have to spend money and bring in some players who can help them do that". Reading between the lines, he's trying to tell us that the owners won't spend the money. We (the fans) want somebody who wins, but the owners don't care and won't spend the money bringing such a person in and the quality of players required. If you just want to win you can't rely on a group of young lads like I have to, is what I take from that. That does not excuse his own lack of a winning mentality, him passing up golden opportunities and his stubborn tactics that have cost us vital points this season and in years gone by. None of that is excusable by pointing to budgets. I've spent the last few hours trying to calm down and look at the situation without losing my head. To try and understand why Mowbray has said or done certain things. This isn't me making excuses for him, far from it, but I'm trying to look at things the way he might see them, using today's post match press conference. The following is my interpretation of Mowbray's approach and mindset, not what I feel personally about the situation: 1) Mowbray believes that he needs a big budget in order to do well e.g. to achieve a play off spot or to win promotion. 2) Because that big budget hasn't been forthcoming from India, Mowbray believes he can't go for promotion as he doesn't have the quality of squad for it. He hasn't received the budget he needs, so in his view, the best he can do is develop these young lads, try to win football matches and "see what happens". That might explain the change in tack to "development", his apparent lack of care and the shoulder shrugging when we don't win (not that that is ever acceptable). Call it a petulant sulk at the owners for not giving him money to spend, maybe. A 'what can I do with no money' kind of attitude. 3) Mowbray has never believed that this group of lads is good enough to achieve a top 6 finish or win promotion. How often has he talked about the "young lads needing a bit of help"? I take that to mean the owners needing to spend money to bring some quality in. This belief might explain why Mowbray laughed when Andy Bayes asked him whether the top 6 was a realistic aim back in August. Of course, it was disrespectful and insulting to hear that, but it shows that he didn't believe this squad was capable of achieving that aim. Is that why he didn't seem all that bothered when we slipped down the table? Maybe. It's still an unacceptable stance, obviously. We can argue against all of the above and say he had £15m for three strikers and so on. That is true, but it's also true that he has spent peanuts on permanent transfers since. He wasn't given a significant transfer kitty in January. He had something to spend, yeah, and it could have been used better, but it wasn't a significant amount either. The budget argument can be countered though by pointing out the likes of Luton, Millwall and Barnsley in recent seasons who have produced better results and shown more hunger than Rovers on low end budgets. Their managers have shown a heck of a lot more nous, determination and a will to win than Mowbray has, so it's not all down to money. I've consistently said that giving Mowbray a big budget would make no difference as, IMO, he doesn't have what it takes to push us on to the next level. I just think him not getting the money he wanted caused him to bin off any talk and hopes of promotion a while ago. We've been strung along ever since as there has been no ambition to go up from the club, but we've still maintained that hope. The ultimate blame for all of this lies with the owners who have given no direction, set no aims or goals, held nobody accountable and who just let things bumble along until a footballing bomb site stares them in the face. They and Mowbray are both to blame for these 5 years that have been wasted. The problem is, the next guy is likely to have problems too if this lot carry on running the club in the same vain. Spend some money on a proper manager if you want success! And bloody communicate with that manager! I'm not hopeful of much changing though. Mowbray has gone (so it seems) and rightfully so, but a major problem still remains. Venky's out!

I agree with that wholeheartedly. We need a winner. However, I see what Mowbray was getting at with those comments yesterday. He was saying if we just want to win, then the owners need to spend money on getting that type of manager in and allow him to bring in quality players to help in that regard. With the squad as it is, "young lads" that is, he feels we need a developmental coach instead. Reading between the lines, he was trying to tell us these owners won't spend on a win at all costs manager and buy quality players. Therefore a "developmental coach" is more suited to the current situation. Not that I agree with that.

The defence has been atrocious today. Nothing more than Bournemouth deserve. They've been piling forward at will with all the time and space they could wish for. A fitting end for Mowbray.

Lows - I'm going to start off with these as I'd like to finish the post with the good times. I was gutted when Shearer left, when relegation happened in '99 and when Duffer left in '03. But there was always hope back then, that we'd recover. Everything from November 2010 to today has been a low point. The first two years when the rat was here were the worst I've ever known. It has largely been nothing but a comedy of errors, humiliation and embarrassment under these owners. Highs - there have been many, all before 2010 for me. The ultimate is the title win in 1995. I was quite young at the time but can still remember the celebrations in Blackburn town centre that evening. People running around overjoyed, chanting, flags being waved, car horns blaring, me stood up waving my Rovers scarf through the open sun roof of my dad's car. Brilliant scenes and surreal to look back on considering how awful the past 12 years have been. A few months later Colin Hendry turned up at my school. That was a 'wow' moment and a half. My teacher knew I was a Rovers fan as we'd often talk about the weekend's games, he was a Liverpool fan. He pointed me out to big Col as being a keen Rovers fan and I couldn't believe I had the chance to talk to him. Eventually, I asked him a question and he had a laugh with me when I told him Shearer was my favourite player. That was a personal high. Deepdale 2001 is in there. The League Cup win in 2002 is obviously another, especially due to the way Rovers were being dismissed beforehand. All Tottenham had to do was turn up, apparently. We'll see about that. A sweet, sweet day with Rovers doing the business and sending the dismissive skulking off. There are a couple of results against the big guns that I count as highs too. Arsenal away in October 2002 when Dwight Yorke chipped in the winner is one. I listened to it on the radio and have never been as on edge when listening to a game as I was that day. We were 2-1 up but got battered for the last 30 minutes. Every time Arsenal went forward I thought they would score, it was head in hands stuff to listen to. It was an onslaught but Brad was superb keeping everything out and the defence put in a heroic effort that afternoon. The feeling at full time, I'll never forget it. That was a serious Arsenal side too containing the likes of Pires, Bergkamp, Henry, Cole etc so it was a big thing. The second game is the MGP show at Old Trafford, September 2005. Probably the happiest I have ever been after a game aside from the trophy winning games. For two weeks leading up to it I had cocky United fans telling me how Rovers had no chance and Ronaldo would do this and Rooney would do that, blah blah blah. Standard arrogant comments everybody has likely heard from United fans. For us to go there and put them to the sword was special. To hear Sparky say before the game "we want to give them something to worry about" just added to it all. We went there to win and I love that attitude. A complete contrast to today and the approach of the current manager. I often bring out the t-shirt below to wind up those United fans. I'm absolutely delighted to see the situation as it is at United and all their fans crying. Apparently some of them are "falling out of love with United". I can't think why. Long may it continue 😂.

United were abysmal for large parts of that game. Bailed out again by Ronaldo. Imagine where they would be this season had they not signed him. Chelsea will be kicking themselves, even though they can't go any further up the table. They had so much time and space on the ball and plenty of opportunities to win easily tonight. Alonso's goal reminded me of MGP. Good finish.

Putting my thoughts on Mowbray to one side for a moment, I have to say, the way the owners have behaved in this situation is not on. To arrive at this stage of the season and this point in his contract, and still not have anybody in a senior position indicate anything regarding his future shows a real lack of professionalism, class and more worryingly, a lack of interest from the owners. That is the reason why the scumbags sniff around, smell an opportunity and then step in with their "we'll find a manager for you", "leave it to us Balaji, we'll handle it for you". It all stems from a lack of interest from the owners. He could swat those tossers aside if he wanted to or cared enough to. Andy Bayes was right to push him on it being "strange" because that's exactly what it is. I think Mowbray tried to give a diplomatic response to that as he will know it's piss poor in reality, but can't openly say that. I'm happy for him to leave, he should have been replaced long ago, IMO. True, he has wound me up with some of his behaviour/comments over the years, but I do not like or agree with how the owners have acted in this situation.

Been waiting so long for this. It sounds like it is going to be worth it.

Always good to silence the North End fans. That's two games running Rovers where Rovers have turned up to Deepdale and made them look silly. You don't expect Paderborn to be a match for Bayern Munich, do you? 😂. Jokes aside, a superb display from Rovers. Intensity, closing down, quick passing, it was all there. Massively frustrating that we haven't seen this for two months. Infuriating actually. Just two more wins during this dire run would have had us in there and in a good position. The overwhelming feeling and question after that is: why now? There's slight hope, even though we need other results to go for us. At least the final two games aren't dead rubbers. The Bournemouth game should be a cracker as they need the points too.