Regarding the Nyambe rumours - although using the term rumours might be generous - our owners are incompetent, but they've consistently shown that they will hold out for a good price for players. Raya is probably the only one we've got majorly wrong, but even that was more down to the fact that Mowbray had decided to move on. I can't see them letting a useful player go for a million or less. At that price they will hold onto him.

People have come on the Forum and given their opinion and interpretation... And now, here is my opinion presented as fact. 🙄

We are not unique in the fact that we are struggling to get players to renew contracts. I'm not a huge Mowbray fan and think other managers could do (much) better, but not everything is his fault. Just last month, Southampton manager Ralph Hasenhuttl was pretty open about how they've been struggling to get players to renew contracts, why he thinks it is happening, and why it is bad for the game. We should have been more proactive with some of these contract negotiations, but I have no doubt that almost every agent will be telling players to sit tight and test the market. If that is the case then we are faced with only three real solutions: significantly overpay a player to get him to extend his contract (which is a path we've gone down in recent years and it has never worked out), hope that our players get towards the end of their deals and decide that Rovers are the best place for them, or get promoted and put ourselves in a position where players get what they want (more money and Premier League football) from this club. The reality is that we, like a lot of other clubs, will lose players on frees. The positive side of things is that we are likely to be able to benefit from players at 'smaller' clubs running down their contracts.

Thanks. Understandable, and I know the importance of website speed and first contentful paint for SEO performance, but that's why I think next gen image support and optimised images would help improve user experience and website performance (I'll step back from my CMS marketing arguments). Again, not a really important one, but the homepage looks great on my phone and very bad on my laptop (using Chrome).

Not a big issue, but would it be possible to have the banner image on the front page support optimised images so that they look right on any browser/device? It's constantly out of focus and blurred. I know how hard you all work on the site, but this seems like an easy fix.

Not strictly Rovers related, but we recently had Brett Johnson on our podcast to talk about the business of football, his groups takeover of Ipswich Town, and the other football clubs that he has investments in. Really interesting conversation, he came across very well, and I have to admit that it made me a bit jealous of a club having an ownership group that is so open and approachable - stark contrast to what we experience. We will definitely be having him back on in the future (as well as some other owners), so it would be great to get some feedback and any questions that you might like to be asked in future interviews (we also always appreciate some more subscribers to the show).

There's no way that any of our players will be 'less committed' next year. I'm firmly in the Mowbray-out camp and I'm fairly pessimistic about our future, but none of the players in question will have a host of good options for the next move and the current financial climate in football will ensure that every player will want to put on a good show if they're looking for a move. The contract situation is a mess, but I don't think it will lead to players underperforming.

and just in case watching is more your thing...

It did come up quite a lot...

This might provide a little (or no) distraction, but last week we had John Buckley on our podcast to talk about this season, his career so far, and some other, more random, topics. We obviously didn't address any of the controversial topics that are floating around at the moment, but there are some interesting little bits of information in there. I'll post the video of it later on once it is up, but here's the link for Spotify (extra subscribers, ratings, and reviews are always appreciated). We will likely have him back on, as well as other Rovers players and other footballers, so let me know any questions or topics you'd like to have asked in the future.

So, we should play an inferior player because then we won't go up, but we will get to keep them? And we should also play a less skilled player because, even if we don't go up, who cares about the pleasure of watching a talented player turn out for your side? Oh, and we shouldn't bring talented players in on loan because there is no way that they could possibly have an impact on the squad, influence other players, and pass on skills. And, finally, we shouldn't bring in players on loan because signing good players and showing that moving to Blackburn can be a good career move is in no way a good thing for the club to do and it can have no benefits on future transfers or contract negotiations. Makes sense.

January isn't THAT important of a deadline. Hotlby may well get some interest from Germany and Nyambe could get some interest from abroad, but I think that would be about it. When you then factor in that they are unlikely to get huge offers I would think that we won't face that much pressure until the end of the season. That being said, we may not already be at a point where they have all decided that they will test the market. We've already seen this play out with Downing and I'm sure a few of them would find their way back to Rovers even if they did try their luck. What also has to be factored in here is that the club might be gambling on the possibility that we may go up before we start making serious offers to some of these players. The prospect of promotion might change our interest in a couple of expiring contracts for players that we think are good at this level, but not good enough to make the step up. There are reasons for both sides to be sitting this one out and I'm not overly concerned...yet.

Was subjective your word of the week?

It's not semantics, words have meanings. You're basically saying that we've had 4 'great' managers in the past 25 years? Great should be reserved for managers that do great things over a sustained period of time, not simply for managers that have good to very good seasons every now and then. Mowbray has been decent in his time here so far. If he manages to get us into the playoffs then I would consider that to be a very good turnaround from the club that he took charge of. As of yet he has failed to do this. By your definition of great there would be 20-30 'great' managers in the football league at all times. That takes all meaning away from the word.

I've had my moments doubting Mowbray, but have mostly been in the 'back him' camp, but to call him a great manager is ridiculous. That isn't a knock on what he's done here or his career, but great has to be reserved for managers that are genuinely...great...

With throw-ins also making the news after the North London derby at the weekend. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/lazy-incompetent-and-a-failure-to-accept-responsibility-how-one-throw-in-sums-up-the-malaise-at-arsenal-ndv9vznrj

It's been a long time since I've really had any confidence in any of our set pieces (and I'll include throw-ins in that mix).

Over the past few months, we've spent more and more time discussing Mowbray's preferred formation, tactics, and set-up. So I thought it might be interesting to post an interview that we just did with Thomas Gronnemark, a freelance throw-ins coach that currently works with Liverpool and a number of other European clubs. It was really interesting to talk to him about how undervalued throw-ins are, what makes a good throw-in, and his career in general. He spoke about working with the likes of Brentford in the Championship, but it might be something that a club like us should think about in the near future. https://open.spotify.com/episode/2qiXtfqsvV3dOj3iTu4F2b?si=_R9ztrxCQJyF3Alc-ZIPFg

The answer is clearly yes. Anyone saying otherwise is delusional. The real question is - given the player development, the budget available, and the squad that he has had at his disposal for the last two or three seasons - should we be closer to going up.

I can't really speak for the Brazilian or German press as anything I read would be translated and taken from an outsider's perspective, but I can tell you that the French press are decidedly kinder. Now, they've also won 2 World Cups and a Euros in the past 20 odds years, as well as losing a final in each competition, so any criticism would have to be against that backdrop, but they are generally far more forgiving - and they've had a lot to forgive (the 2002 debacle, the 2010 debacle, losing a final to Portugal at home when overwhelming favourites). I would say that manager's in those countries are typically given much longer as well. Southgate faces the reality of knowing that his position is very-much judged tournament to tournament. Anything short of a quarterfinal appearance (no matter the side that knocked them out) would certainly see him go and even a quarterfinal appearance might not be good enough Now, one could hope for managers that care little about their own careers and instead want to go down shooting playing the football that they like, but that can't realistically be expected from someone who will probably view this as one of their dream jobs. Many managers would probably opt for a more defensive approach that they thought would limit risk and reduce matches to moments of luck, brilliance, or incompetence and hope that they faired the better. No one can doubt that Southgate has turned England into a side that will consistently beat sides when they are clearly the more talented - tonight proves that and the only real blips in that regard have been, crucially for him, probably in his biggest moments (the World Cup and Nations League semis). I have my fingers crossed that he will embrace a more attacking approach in the summer and be won over by the young, aggressive, pacey side that this England team could be. I won't be holding my breath.

This is a fair point. I don't want to overstate the impact of the press (and the supporters) on the performances of the England team, but it is fair to say that the constant scrutiny and level of negativity cannot help. Southgate is too negative in his style of play, but, overall, the England team has performed fairly well under his management. He will ultimately be judged by the Euros, but I can't imagine how England supporters would be reacting if England were losing matches in the style that France or Germany are at the moment.

It was a gamble. We decided that it was worth taking the chance on a player with obvious talents. Clearly the risks were his attitude and his injury problems and neither has improved. We can't slate Mowbray for that. I would encourage him to take similar risks in the future and one or two of them will pay off.

I never care much about reviews from old clubs. There are plenty of players that we've sold who would have had bad reviews but then went on to better things. Equally, there have been plenty of players who would have left with rave reviews, but who then went on to be flops. He should be judged on what he does once he starts here, not on what some Belgians on Twitter think.

I'll also apologise in advance for my lack of knowledge when it came to Roy Wegerle.

So, going to shamelessly plug one of my own projects, but recently started a new podcast with a couple of colleagues and I thought I would just see if it might interest a few of you. For now, it's a light discussion on a range of sports (football, NFL, NBA, horse racing...just about everything), but we'll be expanding into some decent interviews in the future. You can give episode 1 a skip as we had some sound issues and it should get better over time, but the first 3 episodes are already out. Happy if you give it a listen and subscribe. Available Apple Podcasts here: https://podcasts.apple.com/fr/podcast/the-big-chill-podcast/id1525439798?l=en Or on all devices here: https://thebigchillpodcast.podbean.com/ We'll be on Spotify after another 2 episodes. Thank you if you do listen and share.